My flight with Air China

Hello! I’m typing this while waiting for my dental appointment at the polyclinic … LOL! I guess I’m just maximizing my rights as a Singaporean by using my subsidized medical care. Cart and I have been here in Singapore for about 4 days now and we’ve been enjoying our stay so far, seeing different places eating different foods … :-D

We came here with Air China by the way. It was my first time with this airline. Normally, we would usually travel via Emirates because of their competitive pricing and also because of the larger seats. Unfortunately when we were comparing for the best price for economy seats 6 months before our flight for this year, it turned out to be Air China this time round.

Among the people that I knew, Air China did not have such a fantastic brand name. In fact, the first time when a friend learnt that Cart came over to Singapore via Air China, she laughed out loud and thought that he was joking!

Oh well. At least I’d be able to see the Beijing airport, yes? I’d be able to see a little bit of China. Believe it or not, I’ve never been there before.

So anyway, on the evening that we left Rome, I was feeling extremely exhausted from cleaning and tidying the house and then packing the luggage after that. I really didn’t want to return home from a pleasant trip to and back to an eyesore. That’s one of my pet peeves.

It was my father in law fetching and sending us to the Fiumicino airport. It was really cold when we were reaching there. 2 degrees! It was probably the coldest that I felt in Rome for a while. My father in law mentioned that snow was expected the next day (and it did!) I was shivering badly underneath despite wearing my winter jacket.

In any case, after checking in, and going to our gate, there were already quite a number of Chinese people gathering around. There was so many rosy-cheeked toddlers. So cute! How is it that so many Chinese babies have cheeks like that? One even wore a traditional chinese costume adding to their cuteness factor. He was so adorable!

Anyway, not too long after, we finally boarded the plane. It was an Airbus A330 (I think) The seats were a little smaller than the one in Emirates but thankfully, our row had two seats, followed by four in the middle and then two on the right. I had the window seat while Cart had the aisle and we could have our armrest lifted so it was a little more comfortable.

In each seat, there is an entertainment set for each traveler. The range of shows were limited though, and the programs did not start on demand. We had to wait till the show ends before it repeats to the beginning and the quality of the videos looked very VCD’ish. Nevertheless, I was laughing at My girlfriend is an agent, crying at the last scene from Shrek Forever After and uh, falling asleep during Ironman 2.

Despite the smaller seats, I thought that the plane was pretty decent. My one small qualm with Air China though, is that I really didn’t like the food. My fish dinner was so bad that I felt really bad for the fish, sacrificing its life to be turned into this inedible dish. And then my chicken breakfast later in the morning … Oh boy. Indescribeable. I’m not such a fussy eater but I really couldn’t take another bite.

9 hours and 100 yoga positions later, we were at the Beijing Airport for a stopover. Its a nice, modern looking airport. I liked how clean and new everything looked. Cart and I were fawning over the fever-detection infrared machines that was at the gantries as we walked along. This was most probably installed since the SARS pandamic some years back.

I noticed that since practically everyone here prefers to speak in Mandarin, it could be a little tough for travelers to ask for help. It could also be the additional cultural factor that the people were rather curt here. But luckily I picked up a little bit of mandarin while in kindergarden, from channel 8 chinese drama serials, and stuff I always hear my Chinese schoolmates tend to say. But I am extremely rusty though! So I was able understand and speak a little, albeit very badly.

Customs Woman : Bla bla bla bla yen ching bla bla bla

Me : Oh! Ok *takes off my glasses*

Customs Woman : Bla bla bla bla bla *hands me my passport*

Me : Xie xie ni.

By the way there are free wifi at the Beijing Airport. And you could ask for access from any shops. Cart and I didn’t realise that till we reached the business counter which was a challenge to find. We walked round and round and I almost gave up.

But Cart persisted and at length we found it! The girl at the counter, while she could not speak English, she was very kind and patient and helped set us up for internet and we were off! Of course the first thing that Cart logged in was his freaking Virtual Regatta boat race. He played that freaking game on our wedding night two years ago even. My husband. Incorrigible -_-

Anyway thanks to the great firewall of China, we couldn’t access plurk. Nor twitter. Nor facebook while at the Beijing Airport. But want to know something really funny? Cart was able to get through to wikipedia in Italian but when the language was changed to English, it was blocked! I kid you not, look!

In Italian

Same page in English

Oh my gosh. What are we going to do on our flight back to Rome? It will be a 7 hour wait. What on earth are we going to do for 7 hours. No plurk, no twitter, no facebook … -_-

But in any case, we did not get to surf for too long because not too long after that, we had to board the connecting flight to Singapore. But before that, we had to take a shuttle bus to take us there. So old school. Walking all the way up to the airplane like that. Cart told me to wave slowly to the imaginary paparazzi.

And at length, after a crampifying 6 hours later, we reached Singapore! It was my entire family welcoming us at the Changi Airport. Woah, it felt very festive. Such a warm welcome :-D

And speaking of warm, this month seems to be cooler for Singaporeans and Kaosd was commenting on how cold it was … Nevertheless, after just a couple of days, I am sunburnt now. Red patches all over my arms -_-

Sidenote : Oh and thank you for the welcome be it via Plurk or Facebook or Twitter. That’s really sweet! By the way, there is an open house going on on the first of January. There will be some Italian food and Nasi Lemak for those who doesnt like Italian food. Oh, if you could bring some Wii games, it would be lovely too :-p