I have quite a bit of experience with [some¹] airlines, with the scars mileage [cards] to prove it, and my recent [Tuesday to Thursday] trip to the Taiwan sparked some thoughts.

1. A 90 minutes flight on CX has infinitely better service than a 12-hour flight on AF.
   CX service can be incredibly good. I found it amusing that it was actually better on the way back than on the flight to Taipei, but that was more facilities-related; the airplane on Taipei-Hong Kong was a revamped 747, with incredible seats — at least in business class. But the staff too provided somewhat of a better service. Hard to point out what it was, but whereas the flight Hong Kong-Taipei, on a Boeing 777-300, was nice if nothing to remember by [albeit with the feeling already that this was way better than on an intercontinental AF flight], the team on the 747 back “home” really went the extra yard to make us feel special.
2. Stewardesses shouldn’t be confused with Harajuku chicks
   On the flight from Tainan to Taipei’s Songshan [domestic] airport, with TransAsia Airways (復興航空), an airline I had already had the mitigated pleasure to fly with, on their one ATR-72-200, I shit you not, I had the surprise to be greeted on board by a cute little thing barely out of teenage, looking like a Harajuku chick. Okay, nice to be popular with the too-much-makeup, dyed-hair, I-swear-I-am 15-forever crowd, but sweetie, I’ll find my seat on my own, how hard can it be in a 72-seat flying cigar? Nice short skirt, and white polo shirt with thin stripes and pink collar. Ah, waiddaminit. There’s something on the sleeve of that polo shirt. Whazzat? 復興航空?!? Dude, you can’t be serious? Apparently, yes, since there was another one, same outfit, but hair àla Peko-chan, and looking impossibly younger than Missie Long Legs Short Skirt here. Greats. That’s the people in charge of our comfort and safety on this flight? Weeeee. I can see how comfort could be interpreted in relation with their outfit, age, and cuteness. But dude, that’s a plane here we’re boarding, an a rickety-rackety one at that, not a KTV or something. Doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence. OTOH they spoke 2.5 languages [Mandarin, Taiwanese/Min-nan/Hokkien, and English?]. At least I think it was Hokkien. Can’t be Hakka, the percentages are wrong I think. And it didn’t sound like Hakka, although with the sound quality in there… Who knows?
3. Announcements in foreign languages
   In Hong Kong, most PA announcements are in Cantonese, Mandarin, and English, although the Airport Express places English before Mandarin. Living in an environment where everything — almost — is written in some kind of cross-dialect Chinese, announcements in multiple languages, and few people having a basic command of English makes for an interesting experience. In Songshan Airport you’ll hear announcements, depending on where the flights go, in a bunch of languages. I have heard announcements in as many as three Chinese dialects in a row — none of them Cantonese — with some interesting ways of saying thank you. Standard Chinese is 謝謝, xie xie. I have heard 感謝 [not really sure how it was pronounced really, just sounded close to the Korean version of 感謝, kam sa], and 多謝 which is one of the two ways to say thank you in Cantonese, except in Cantonese it’s to je, and what I heard sounded more like the Korean version of it, ta sa. I have suspicions the latter is Hakka. And on top of Tanglish, the Taiwanese mangled version of Airport English, there was some Japanese too.
   Kuala Lumpur’s International Airport has Malay, English, Mandarin — in a country where the local Chinese speak Cantonese, go figure — and Arabic. Yessir. Not really surprising when you see the number of Middle-Eastern people. I don’t remember what Jakarta has, I was so much in a hurry to leave that friggin’ place, anyway… Of course, Charles de Gaulle has French, and, er, some anglais I suppose, which nobody understands, or even listens to. Ah, and other Latin languages on a case by case basis, depending on the destination of the flights. OTOH, why AF and KAL have announcements, in their flights to Hong Kong, in Mandarin, beats me… I am pretty sure very few people understand the announcements, and even less the simplified characters in the subtitles. Whatever…
4. Not all airports are born equal
   Pretty obvious thing to say I guess, but when you experience this almost every day, it doesn’t look so trivial. Hong Kong’s Chek Lap Kok is great, really. Walking distances are OK, the automatic train makes distances shorter when arriving at/departing from a remote gate. The ferry service, when your final destination is Shenzhen, is great, provided you already have your visa. They pick up your checked luggage and load it onto the ferry. You don’t have to cross immigration at HK, just in China. And frequent visitors to HK can get a frequent traveler pass that enables them to go through a dedicated immigration channel, that makes it a breeze at immigration. And when flying with CX, it’s even better. The lounge kicks ass. The ground people are efficient and polite. They always try their best to accommodate you, and usually go the extra mile. The cabin crew members are usually towards the lower end of the prettiness scale, but what the hell, we’re not dating, just traveling… Don’t buy any duty free in HK, though, it’s a friggin’ rip off. Buy downtown, you’ll thank me one day!
   Jakarta’s airport a mess, old, devoid of any architectural interest, and lacking facilities, but do take advantage, when departing, to get your check in luggage wrapped in a film, it’s dirt cheap and quite solid. When you arrive at Jakarta, there’s a large amount of taxi booths fighting it out for customers, shouting like crazy, and trying to get your attention from their small booths. I was expected by one of our prospects, so can’t really say anything about the service. I did take a taxi back to the airport, from the hotel, and the driver turned around to me and asked ke mana?, which wasn’t a good start… ke bandara, idiot!. We toured the facilities thoroughly, since he went first to Terminal Satu, ie Terminal 1, domestic… Sigh!
   Kuala Lumpur’s clean, brand new, efficient, people are reasonably helpful and smiling, but some gates are quite far, although the automatic train helps. When arriving in KL, unless you know where you’re going and what you’re doing — in which case the train to KL train station is good and cheap — go to the booth for taxis inside the arrival hall [it has a yellow sign if memory serves] and pay for the fare in advance. It’s cheaper than hopping into a taxi [as I could confirm by taking a normal cab back from my hotel to the airport…]
   Singapore’s airport is nice, but way too spread out, the distances one has to walk are staggering sometimes. There’s a dedicated room for check-in in Biz and First class [and mileage card holders] that makes things easier and faster though. The KAL lounge was one of the worst I have seen, but I haven’t been there in a while. The lounge common to many airlines is an ad-hoc space reclaimed on some kind of upstairs verandah, but they made the best of it — food is decent, seats comfortable, but space is limited.
   Taiwan’s Tao Yuan Airport is old, bland at best, not enough X-Ray lanes, the duty free shops are unremarkable — but then again I usually don’t shop there anyway — but CX’s lounge, again, great [very good Taiwanese style noodle soup with beef!].
   
   Seoul’s IIA is the world’s longest airport, something they like to boast about. Well, THEY don’t walk it lengthwise every day, apparently. Whereas there are travelators to help move people, AFTER immigration, there’s nothing in the halls, which is where they would be most need, since people before check-in have all their luggage… Duty free there is a big business, but I never found anything interesting there. The KAL lounges are reasonably good, although food is a bit bland, and no Perrier, grrr. The biggest drawback though is that the KAL business class lounge is crowded, and sometimes it’s hard to find a seat…
   Beijing and Shanghai’s airport are a collective joke, especially as capitals [political and economic] of a large country. The facilities are inadequate, the staff can be downright aggressive, esp the dudes with some kind, any kind, of uniform, and the departure halls are way ugly; like they want to tell us, now that we got your cash, we don’t need to provide you with anything extra. Particularly, the difference between the arrival hall and the departure hall at Shanghai is striking. Feels like two different airports. The airline lounge, common to many airlines, in Beijing is a joke, but I managed to get online for free, which is more than I can say for some others, like CDG. Ah, if you ever have to change 1,000 HK$ bills in Shanghai’s airport, there’s an automatic money changing machine that will accept them — most money changing outlets with humans[?] in them won’t accept them.
   I haven’t been Bangkok in a long while, so can’t really comment, but the one good memory I have is the limousine service in the arrival hall, which will take you to your hotel for not much in decent comfort. Same goes for Saigon, Tan Son Nhat airport, which was kind of destitute looking back then, despite a nice-looking departure wing, the contrary of Shanghai: you arrive[d] in a shitty terminal, surrounded by unsmiling dudes in uniforms, the customs/luggage inspection counters 3 meters from the exit doors; whereas the departure terminal was clean, new, restricted to travelers [that would cause a revolution in Korea!], and the staff moderately smiling. The duty free was a sight to behold, with half of the products for sale bottles of cobra whiskey, a nice little souvenir for the family, indeed!

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¹ AF, CX, KE, SQ, MH, TG, and local taiwanese airlines like Far Eastern Transport and TransAsia Airways, mostly.

This screenshot was taken a few days ago. If you go now to the article you’ll see that the article has been ‘upgraded’. Still, I thought it was pretty entertaining seeing the word pharaoh spelled correctly, then mispelled, alternatively, like the author of the blurb wasn’t sure, and played both sides…