Category Archives: Travel

Travel

My FlightDiary: 100 flights via Mumbai

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Business travel is very boring. But along the way, you need to find ways to keep it exciting. Haynes introduced me to FlightDiary which has helped me keep track of travel and analyze it. Day before, I took my 100th flight via Mumbai from a total of 170. Here is how my flight-diary looks now:

And some stats to go with it:

Total Most flown
170 Flights 66 flights in 2014
42 Airports 100 flights via Mumbai
25 Airlines 44 flights on Singapore Airlines (SQ)
23 Countries 12 times to Singapore
32 Aircraft types 31 flights on Boeing 777

Measure #
Total flown 557,427 km
Average 3279 km, 04:35
Longest BOM↔EWR, 12538 km, 15:30 hrs
Shortest CPH↔SGD, 195 km, 00:45 hrs
Around the world 13.91 times
To the Moon 1.450x
To Mars 0.0100x (need to work on this)

Continue reading My FlightDiary: 100 flights via Mumbai →

Business, Travel

The plight of business travel

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I would usually write personal travelogues titled ‘A day in Thimpu‘. But I’d rather use something like ‘Singapore in a day’ when writing about business travel. The pun, only to demystify business travel along with the craziness & hazards that surrounds it. As soon as one steps in IT, the first thing they want is to get onsite and I felt the same way. But the excitement only lasts the first few trips. This one is about one such trip to Singapore last month, where I took a late night flight after a day’s work, and headed straight to a meeting on landing. I’ve done such meetings multiple times, in every direction, in every continent, and have kind of mastered it.

Stretching out
Stretching out

Since I don’t fly business (and luck never favors an upgrade), I try opting for an emergency row seat. I have a trolley bag that levels Continue reading The plight of business travel →

Travel

2 days in the air with Skyteam

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I usually try flying Star Alliance (*A), especially with Air India (AI) on board. But there are still quite a few sectors where *A lacks good connections – like Portland for example. I’ve been consciously avoiding Air France (AF) after reading about their mistreatment of Indians. We did try booking easterly via Japan, but with just a week’s notice, even that was sold out. I was left with no option but to fly Skyteam all through BOM-CDG-SLC-PDX-AMS-BOM with AF-DL.

The numbers

The to & fro journeys happen to be my longest 2 ever: a whopping 32 hours end-to-end to Portland, and 25 hours on the return. It also has the highest meeting-to-journey (MTJ) ratio of  28.5 hours of travel per hour of business meetings 🙂 The previous record was 15 hours. CDG-SLC also happens to be my longest sector this year – 5072 miles.

BOM-CDG on Air France

Midnight snack on AF
Midnight snack on AF

Without airline lounge access, I used the Clipper lounge which seems inferior to the new CSIA First Class lounge. We had an on-time departure around 2am. On board the A330, the crew seemed very pleasant. They distributed headphones and a night kit with an eye mask & ear muffs. The light midnight snack was the largest served by any airline that operates flights post midnight. LH, LX, VS, DL all serve a puff roll with drinks. Apart from the hot snack, AF served fruits – really help keep you hydrated on long flights – and a granola bar to munch later in the night. They used an older In-flight entertainment (IFE) system Continue reading 2 days in the air with Skyteam →

Travel

A Night in Sønderborg

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I’ve been to small towns before. Quite a lot of European cities, and Melbourne, can be explored on foot (maybe, some tram). But last week, I visited the smallest of them all – a town named Sønderborg in East Denmark.

Sonderborg, like many other towns in Europe, is the home of a manufacturing giant, for which it is best known. Corporate presence helps create employment opportunities and develop local infrastructure of these smaller towns that would otherwise be neglected. A local airline, Alsie Express, operates a few flights to Copenhagen everyday with their ATR aircraft in jet-black livery.

Hriday: finally comfortable
Hriday: finally comfortable

Shortly after takeoff the hostess came out of the front door to serve coffee, chocolate or nachos. We initially thought it was the pilot making good use of the auto-pilot, but later realized it was the ATRs cargo hold. The aircraft is an all business class configuration with the kind of leg-space that my friend Hriday needs, but hardly gets. Each seat stretching two window panes speaks for itself.

The approach served us a beautiful view of the area – lush green islands in the sea. The airport was a tiny little building – the size of a petrol pump (or smaller actually). The bags were loaded on a cart and then pushed into a gutter in the building. The 4 table cafeteria was empty, and there was free coffee and WiFi in the 8 seat waiting area.

There was a single, large common washroom. In the time that my friend took a smoke, people had moved out in their cars and the airport door was locked. The few taxis that were there had gone and we kept waiting. A lady realized we were new here Continue reading A Night in Sønderborg →

Travel

10 learnings from Japan

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I’ve learned some fascinating & exemplary stories about discipline & honesty in Japan through Quora. When the time came to visit Tokyo, I felt that I should familiarize myself with some Japanese etiquette. And I must say that a few minutes of reading came in very handy during the trip. Here is what I’ll keep with me forever:

1. Respect everything

Courtesy: Hobotraveler.com
Cash tray besides the register

Handle everything with both hands, especially money. Most counters will have a tray next to the ledger where you are expected to place money & pick your change. I guess the practice of receiving business cards with both hands comes from here.

2. Avoid 4 & 9 in every way

The Japanese word for “four” sounds like the word for “death” whereas ‘nine’ is sometimes pronounced ‘ku’, which can mean suffering. Its a superstitious piss-off; I don’t know how many follow, but I would avoid a 4 piece gift or a sales offer with too many nines.

3. Go with the group

Generally, the Japanese believe in group decision making that is focused on the larger good. This avoid favorism and blocks in-ways in an integral group – possibly why Japan was never colonized. This could slow down the process, but that’s how it is.

4. Genuine customer focus

Here’s my story: I went to the information counter at HND airport around 7:25 asking for a bus to my destination. The lady said the next one is at 10am. I had read about one at 7:45 and asked her to check; when she realized there was one, she apologized at least thrice for the possible misguide. She then realized that there was very little time left and I possibly couldn’t make it to the bus stop after getting my bus & train tickets. She, in her kimono and modified geta, ran to help me with tickets and brought me all the way to the bus stop around 7:38am. That was perhaps one of the happiest moments of her life Continue reading 10 learnings from Japan →

Travel

1st impression of Air India @ Star Alliance

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Delighted to see this!
Delighted to see this!

I was scheduled to fly Air India just 1 day before its Star Alliance (*A) membership went in to effect, thus depriving us of our *G privileges. Nonetheless, most of us are delighted about AIs entry to *A which allows seamless transfer of miles, lounge access, priority boarding, to name a few.

Lunch: sans the typical bakery roll
Lunch: sans the typical bakery roll

AI seems to have taken their entry seriously – knowing that memberships have been revoked in the past. Most of our 4-leg journey was as scheduled. But there’s still a long way to go. The food menu needs to be more internationalized and most importantly, legacy crew needs a mindset change. The crew on the international sector seemed more geared up than their domestic counterparts. Continue reading 1st impression of Air India @ Star Alliance →

Travel

Open Borders across Europe

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As Indians, the word border only means war & tension to us. I cannot explain how exciting it is to cross borders on foot without any control what so ever.

St. Louis Grenze
St. Louis Grenze

Basel, where I was based, happens to be the north-west tip of Switzerland, bordering with France & Germany – making it an international city. In fact the airport is also shared by the 3 countries, and you can choose to pass through either country’s passport control. There are 2 main railways – the Swiss SBB & French SNCF station, and the German DB station.

German border crossing
German border crossing
The Intersection
The Intersection

The 3 countries meet at a point on the river Rhine, and the intersection is celebrated by the Rhinecenter mall on its banks. In fact, we walked in 3 countries in a matter of an hour, although it wasn’t good enough to mark them ‘done’. Switzerland also shares its borders with Austria on the east, and Italy on the south. Swiss cars bear the Swiss flag on their number plates
Continue reading Open Borders across Europe →