The Journey Home

A 12 hour flight used to be a doodle when I was a student. Now it was becoming a drag. I guess I was starting to show my age actually. But this flight being MAS were amongst the best as far as economy class was concerned. For business, take one of the Middle Eastern carriers, but with the drawback would be having to transit on the way rather than a direct one. And transit could be a pain.

The flight coming and out this time around was a bit too rocky for my liking, especially across the Andaman Sea. But the in flight service was good as usual, and I managed to catch some movies, a luxury really. On the flight back, I slept for about four hours, as it would be late afternoon at landing, and I didn't want to be wide awake tonight.

I also noticed that this being the flagship MAS flight - MH001 - the crew were also rather senior, but definitely offered great service. Experience counts I was sure. The flight landed on time, but as usual, it took nearly 45 minutes for my luggage to clear through. I didn't have a choice but to check in from the amount of shopping I did.

Unfortunately I had to work tomorrow. Now with unpacking done and the children in bed, I was chatting with Anita about the trip. She wished that she could come along. And so did I. Maybe in the next couple of years, as it would not be cheap to bring the two boys along. When I showed the photos from my trip last weekend, both of them were excited. So much so that Irfan actually slept in one of the T shirt I brought home for him.

Just Arrived

Thought I just made a quick entry as I have just landed and was halfway across to KL Sentral with my bags on tow. Then a short taxi ride home. Flight landed on time and it was 6.30 pm local time at the minute. With the 6 hours sleep I had, I thought I might be ready for bed again very soon. Rather starving now, so looking forward to dinner with Anita and the boys. Will blog more later.

Thanks again to the well wisher for a safe flight home!

Boarding soon

At KLIA now, and just crossed over to the Satellite Terminal. Grabbed a sandwich at O'Briens and off I went utilising the free wifi here. It was only available for 2 hours though before your address is blocked. Connection rather sluggish and start-stop, and I ended up using my iPhone for connections.

While I settled down, the other people in my group started to show up. I had to have the coffee as it was pretty clear that I would probably fall asleep soon. That was good since I was hoping to be able to sleep all the way to Heathrow. It should be early morning when I touched down, and I couldn't afford to fall asleep then. I planned to go see the town on the day. Will write when I touched down and have an Internet connection. Bon voyage!

First Entry

Got my luggage checked in. Plus the big jacket of course as I did not really want to take any chances as far as the weather was concerned. Stepping into the KLIA Express with just a 1.5kg sling bag was should I say, liberating. iPhone in arm, tuned to some podcast, I began chirping away on the phone, with this first entry of the journey.

I realised that I may be a tad too early, but I prefer to get the bags sorted out and just chill out later. Maybe settled in at one of the cafes - hmm! Better check how many ringgits I have left in my wallet. No Golden Lounge this time I'm afraid!

I decided that I would be sleeping the whole journey this time around. At least the first day would be a whole day of chilling. Maybe I would take the tube into Central London and reminisce about the days there when I was a student! So watch this space!

Air Asia it was

I have to confess that the recent day hop to Kota Bharu was my first on Air Asia. I have been hearing mixed experience from those who have been on one before. Air Asia was efficient, straight to the point and basically you pay for what you get.

I was not sure how to categorise my recent experience. On the whole, it was not bad. However, flying off from the LCCT have one drawback however. Traveling to the terminal from KL was a pain as I usually take the KLIA Express from Sentral. There were bus service from Sentral but being buses, I can't assume that it would be as efficient as the 27 minutes travel time you get from the train service. You would also enjoy the convenience of being able to check in your luggages from the Sentral Air Terminal. And since I was able to travel on Business often, there were no such service on Air Asia - disclaimer, I do not pay for my travels usually. Cost was never an issue. The reason for taking Air Asia on that occasion was the timing of the flights. But due to the hold-up which I would mention later, I could have used MAS instead and still reach my house at about the and time.

I decided to drive to LCCT rather than call for a cab and parked at e public space just in front of the terminal. I was only charged RM 27 fees for parking from 7am to 6pm. Open car park though, so your car would bee losers to the elements. The roofed space was located a furthers walk back and I was on a rush then. The terminal would also take you an extra 20 minutes travel from the KLIA main terminal - I almost missed my flight that morning since it took longer than I expected to get to the LCCT.

Landed in the rain, and finally allowed out of the cabin after 30 minutesThe second issue was the fact that we could not disembark or board in heavy rain. According to the crew, opening the cabin door was the main problem as the rain will get into the cabin and make the floors wet. Practical excuse I thought. It would cost the airline tons of money to leave the jet idle on the tarmac, so I was sure they were not making it up.

So the bottom line, would I take Air Asia for traveling with my precious brats? Definitely no. They would go berserk at the terminal. But traveling on short hops like I did last time, I would definitely do it again but if the schedule was tight and I couldn't afford a delay, then definitely I would have prefer MAS.