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Latest Updates
Saturday, May 10, 2008
So I was a bit of a stressball before I went on my leave - my last flight was a Bombay, and whilst the passengers were nice, the senior crew made life quite difficult for me, all resulting in an uneccessary debrief back in CBC.Needing to get my mind onto better things, I headed to the airport on Thursday knowing loads were going to be quite light DXB-FRA. But ground staff had other ideas. Due to payload reasons,(which after 2.5 years in the industry, I still have no idea how 'payload' would prevent someone getting on a flight. If there were 304 full fare pax for 304 seats, they'd get on no probs, and I'd doubt take off/landing weight would have much to do because it'd be fuel for a 6 hr flight, not 14hrs... and what if there was a heap of cargo? They'd still sell as much as they could no?) they weren't going to issue my boarding pass. Boarding started at 7.40am. I got my boarding pass at 7.45am. Oh dear... Anyone who's had to walk from Check-in to Sheikh Rashid terminal knows it takes at least 20min. DXB staff with gold carts didn't have room for me (but subsequently let on about 4 locals) so I bolted off to the remote stand gates. Was lucky to make it, even though I had a mini asthma attack on board. Never had I been so appreciative of my e-gate card. 200 dizzers well spent me thinks. Tine, who was going home, was so nice to me on board, and the guy I sat next to was decent company after a few whiskies had gone into him. He was headed to Krakow, poor guy.  So I reached Frankfurt and after getting through immigration, transfers to Terminal 1, then check-in, then security (which is worse than Heathrow and JFK combined!) then a wait of 3 hours, finally got on the plane to PRG. Scarebus A320-100. 3/3 seat configuration in economy with no TV's anywhere! (Our Muscat's are 15 min shorter and we still give everyone a screen to look at, even if it's just some random TV shows and airshow maps). Business wasn't any better - still had the economy 3/3 seat config but the middle seat had a tray table permanently fixed to it. Pushback was precise, Taxi took ages, climb was VERY steep (felt kinda sorry for the aft-facing Cabin crew). Service was brief - roll in a bag with a fun size Twix, plus drink of choice. Better than our dish-out-trays-and-snatch-off-pax-before-finished-meal type of short haul service. At least we can take these home.  An hour later we were in Ruzyne Airport. I was chuffed, especially when I got my bags intact. Immigration was non-existant - such a shame too. I wanted my passport stamped. So now I'm in my hotel (which has free WiFi and a free buffet breakfast!) and set to post my pics of Prague. I'm sure you've all had enough of my nerdy aviation experience for one day :-) Labels: Airline Stuff, Galley Gossip, Holidays, Work 13 comments |