Chinese tourists flock to gambling hub Macau for Labor Day holiday

MACAU — Hundreds of thousands of mainland Chinese visitors have descended on the world’s biggest gambling hub of Macau for the Labor Day holiday, packing tightly into its narrow cobblestone streets and placing bets in its glitzy casinos.

The surge in visitors comes after China and its special administrative region Macau lifted strict COVID-19 restrictions in January, allowing visitors to stream into Macau for the first time in more than three years.

More than 100,000 visitors arrived in the former Portuguese city each day on Saturday and Sunday, local media reported, citing government statistics, up from 6