The flight back from SE Asia is always shorter than the flight there, simply because you're not fighting the jet stream all the way back. Nevertheless, I was still dreading the flights, even if both legs were shorter than their outbound cousins. If you'll recall my missive about the flight there, you'll recall that my butt was in serious pain by the time we got to Singapore. I was determined that this wouldn't happen again. I'd seen an inflatable pillow designed to relieve the pressure on your tailbone in Skymall magazine on the way over and endeavoured to find one during the whole trip to little success. I had resigned myself to trying to make do with a couple of pillows under my butt to try to raise my tailbone up off of the seat pans of death on the flight back, and even experimented on our bus ride back to Singapore, with some success. My butt still hurt, but not as badly. Fortunately, my BIL Sun is a patient fellow and took us around to a number of malls, partly because Rita loves to shop, but partly just to show off pieces of his town. At one of these places there was a giant travel store, and they had a decent variety of inflatable pillows, but not the one I was looking for. In desperation, I chose one that was advertised as a lumbar support, but had sort of a moon sliver shape taken out of the back of it that I thought might do the trick. It was the only one that looked like it might actually last through both of the flights, especially considering that I'm not the smallest guy in the world. As it turns out, not only did it last through both flights, I came away from SeaTac airport feeling as good after a flight as I can remember. Yes, my butt hurt a little bit, but not enough to whine about, or even whimper. No, I didn't get any sleep, but that was no fault of the pillows', it had more to do with the Japanese elbow in my ribs and the cycling of the song "Afternoon Delight" for eight hours in my head. I have no idea where the song came from, although I do recall hearing it one day while driving around Singapore with Sun & Rita. It was driving me crazy, I tried to drown it out with songs that I like, The Entertainer, lots of Jimmy Buffet stuff, etc., but as soon as I wasn't actively trying to push it from my head, it'd pop right back up. Unbelievably annoying. The flight to Narita was only about half way full, so there was plenty of room to stretch out which was nice. This was not to be the case for the Seattle leg. I read about 500 pages of the book "The Hostage" by WEB Griffin, quite good, and finished it on the Seattle leg, about 800 pages in all. If you like his style (and I do), I think you'll enjoy this book.
As I walked down the jetway at Narita I noticed all the round eyes in front of me stopping at a crack in the wall of the jetway...you could see your breath, something not generally possible in the equatorial heat of Singapore. The cool air flowing into the jetway felt wonderful, such a change from the heat! I'd have stayed there longer if it weren't for the mass of people getting off the flight behind me. I took my time getting to the next gate because we'd arrived early, and it was more than two hours before I needed to be anywhere except a bathroom, which needed to be much earlier than that. A quick pit stop on the way through security (why do they not only run you through security, but take away your drinks, when you're basically locked inside the terminal with no way of getting access to anything you didn't bring with you in the first place, and you had to get through security to get there), and then off towards my next gate. I wanted to dash off a quick email to R to let her know I'd gotten there OK, as well as the success of the pillow, but I had no Yen, and there were no money changers around. It turns out that you can use US currency in the stores there, they just make the exchange for you with no problems, and give you change in Yen. So convenient.
Internet kiosks take 100 ¥ pieces for ten minutes of access time. They should refund you for the time you have to wait for the keyboard to catch up with your typing... I tried sitting out my layover at the gate, but it was right in between two of the automated walkways, and they had a continuous loop of "the end of the walkway is approaching, please be careful" playing with women's voices, one version in Japanese, immediately followed by the English version. That lasted about five minutes before I couldn't stand it, so I wandered off in search of a good people watching place that wasn't aurally annoying. I found a stand of seats that were directly in front of the end of the walkway, which has the sound playing in the other direction, so it was pretty quiet. I really wanted to read my book, but I knew if I did, I'd end up finishing it about the time the flight boarded, and I'd have nothing to read on the flight.
The flight to Seattle, was nearly full, but I'd "upgraded" to "coach with a tiny bit more room" for about $200 US, so I was up against the bulkhead, close enough to see business class but far enough away that I had to walk aft so I wouldn't use the wrong head because of "security concerns". Who says that the US is a classless society? In any case, I finished my book, and donated it to one of the stewardesses who'd chatted with me about WEB Griffin for a while. She hadn't read the book and I didn't see any reason to carry it any more, I rarely if ever re-read paperbacks. Sleep was elusive as usual, but I catnapped a bit, at least on this flight I didn't have to keep wiggling my butt just to try to stay out of pain, I simply couldn't sleep. Then there was the Japanese guy with his elbow in my ribs...
While we were in Malaysia, we'd bought some nice paintings that the framer had packed up for us into a single large but fairly light bundle. I expected to have some trouble with it at the customs desk when I got back to the US, but this was not to be. The customs officials were far more interested in the bak kwa which I'd made a point of declaring since I figured I was going to secondary for the paintings in any case. Bak kwa is a sort of pork jerky that's one of my favorite things, and my SIL Ho Li had made a point of bringing a bunch down from KL for us. Unfortunately, none of it made it past the customs folks, and most likely ended up in the incinerator, although one of the ladies working the counter looked like she was Chinese, so maybe she took it home. I hope someone got to eat it, but it's not likely, the guy I was talking to told me that they could lose their jobs if they ate it. Too bad, I was looking forward to having some... Oh, and the paintings that were about $500 over my allowable limit for free entry? Not a word, and they never even asked about the half drunk bottle of booze I'd forgotten to claim. Odd, huh?
As I walked down the jetway at Narita I noticed all the round eyes in front of me stopping at a crack in the wall of the jetway...you could see your breath, something not generally possible in the equatorial heat of Singapore. The cool air flowing into the jetway felt wonderful, such a change from the heat! I'd have stayed there longer if it weren't for the mass of people getting off the flight behind me. I took my time getting to the next gate because we'd arrived early, and it was more than two hours before I needed to be anywhere except a bathroom, which needed to be much earlier than that. A quick pit stop on the way through security (why do they not only run you through security, but take away your drinks, when you're basically locked inside the terminal with no way of getting access to anything you didn't bring with you in the first place, and you had to get through security to get there), and then off towards my next gate. I wanted to dash off a quick email to R to let her know I'd gotten there OK, as well as the success of the pillow, but I had no Yen, and there were no money changers around. It turns out that you can use US currency in the stores there, they just make the exchange for you with no problems, and give you change in Yen. So convenient.
Internet kiosks take 100 ¥ pieces for ten minutes of access time. They should refund you for the time you have to wait for the keyboard to catch up with your typing... I tried sitting out my layover at the gate, but it was right in between two of the automated walkways, and they had a continuous loop of "the end of the walkway is approaching, please be careful" playing with women's voices, one version in Japanese, immediately followed by the English version. That lasted about five minutes before I couldn't stand it, so I wandered off in search of a good people watching place that wasn't aurally annoying. I found a stand of seats that were directly in front of the end of the walkway, which has the sound playing in the other direction, so it was pretty quiet. I really wanted to read my book, but I knew if I did, I'd end up finishing it about the time the flight boarded, and I'd have nothing to read on the flight.
The flight to Seattle, was nearly full, but I'd "upgraded" to "coach with a tiny bit more room" for about $200 US, so I was up against the bulkhead, close enough to see business class but far enough away that I had to walk aft so I wouldn't use the wrong head because of "security concerns". Who says that the US is a classless society? In any case, I finished my book, and donated it to one of the stewardesses who'd chatted with me about WEB Griffin for a while. She hadn't read the book and I didn't see any reason to carry it any more, I rarely if ever re-read paperbacks. Sleep was elusive as usual, but I catnapped a bit, at least on this flight I didn't have to keep wiggling my butt just to try to stay out of pain, I simply couldn't sleep. Then there was the Japanese guy with his elbow in my ribs...
While we were in Malaysia, we'd bought some nice paintings that the framer had packed up for us into a single large but fairly light bundle. I expected to have some trouble with it at the customs desk when I got back to the US, but this was not to be. The customs officials were far more interested in the bak kwa which I'd made a point of declaring since I figured I was going to secondary for the paintings in any case. Bak kwa is a sort of pork jerky that's one of my favorite things, and my SIL Ho Li had made a point of bringing a bunch down from KL for us. Unfortunately, none of it made it past the customs folks, and most likely ended up in the incinerator, although one of the ladies working the counter looked like she was Chinese, so maybe she took it home. I hope someone got to eat it, but it's not likely, the guy I was talking to told me that they could lose their jobs if they ate it. Too bad, I was looking forward to having some... Oh, and the paintings that were about $500 over my allowable limit for free entry? Not a word, and they never even asked about the half drunk bottle of booze I'd forgotten to claim. Odd, huh?
1 comment:
Pity about the bak kua, I think the customs officer might have found his new favorite delicacy x)
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