Sometimes it amazes me that the public at large can successfully travel from one city to another without getting stymied by airline bureaucracies and ineptitude. Modern flight is truly miraculous. Modern airline technology, customer service, and business processes often are not. I run into frustrating situations with airlines all the time, and I do this all the time and – presumably – I even sort of know what I’m doing. Most people don’t. Delta agents don’t know who their partners are. American doesn’t publish its award redemption rules. United tickets on partners re-issue and cancel. United ticketing issues are especially problematic. For instance, How to Make Sure You Really Have a Ticket When You Redeem Your Miles When You Purchase a United Award Ticket That Doesn’t Mean You Actually Have a Ticket United Award Tickets…
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Nahm in Bangkok Serves Better Thai Food Than You’ve Ever Had in Your Life
Must-read Earlier Installments: Singapore, Cathay, and Qantas First Class.. Some of the Best Meals of My Life, and a Tour of Hyatts in Bangkok, Singapore, and Sydney Inside the New Oneworld Lounge at LAX’s Tom Bradley International Terminal Cathay Pacific First Class, Los Angeles – Hong Kong Cathay Pacific “The Wing” First Class Lounge, Hong Kong Cathay Pacific Business Class, Hong Kong – Bangkok Grand Hyatt Bangkok: Suite, Club Lounge, and Facilities Thai Molecular Gastronomy at Sra Bua in Bangkok Getting Custom Tailored Suits Made in Bangkok at Empire Tailors Nahm at the Metropolitan hotel is probably Thailand’s most celebrated restaurant. The Australian-born chef David Thompson is the first person to win a Michelin star for Thai cooking, a distinction earned for his former London outpost. This has been called the best restaurant in Asia…
How to Beat Jet Lag Every Time
Wendy Perrin shares the weird approaches to beating jet lag like blue light therapy, vitamins, and candles that remove curses. But it really isn’t that hard. The simple, best jet lag advice is to:
All My Thoughts Are With the Passengers, Crew, and their Families of Flight QZ8501
AirAsia QZ8501 from Surabaya to Singapore is missing with 162 on board. This is a ~ 2 hour 20 minute, 854 mile flight, operated by Indonesia AirAsia. The plane lost contact with air traffic control in Jakarta at around 7:24am (local time) while over the Java Sea. The flight is presumed down, and speculation is that the problems faced by the Airbus A320 (registration PK-AXC) were weather-related. Watching coverage this morning I’m struck, as in all aviation disasters, how little information we actually have yet how many people are anxious to appear on television and speculate wildly. After thinking about the passengers and crew onboard, their families, and the staff of the airline my next two thoughts were: US news outlets are running headlines like “Another Missing Plane” (emphasis mine). An AirAsia flight without any…
Getting Custom-Tailored Suits Made in Bangkok at Empire Tailors
Must-read Earlier Installments: Singapore, Cathay, and Qantas First Class.. Some of the Best Meals of My Life, and a Tour of Hyatts in Bangkok, Singapore, and Sydney Inside the New Oneworld Lounge at LAX’s Tom Bradley International Terminal Cathay Pacific First Class, Los Angeles – Hong Kong Cathay Pacific “The Wing” First Class Lounge, Hong Kong Cathay Pacific Business Class, Hong Kong – Bangkok Grand Hyatt Bangkok: Suite, Club Lounge, and Facilities Thai Molecular Gastronomy at Sra Bua in Bangkok I love getting custom-made suits done in Southeast Asia. I’ve done it multiple times in Thailand. Labor is cheap, skill level is high, and competition is intense. That translates into a great opportunity for consumers. But it isn’t as good an opportunity that many think it is. Tailor shops will make clothes for you in…
How to Ensure You’re On the Inside to Learn About the Next Mistake Fare
Did you book a $178 roundtrip ticket to Abu Dhabi, or a bit more expensive ticket to Africa, India, or Southeast Asia? Many readers wanted to know, but how do you find these? and how to stay in the loop for other fares like this? Two things to understand in your quest for fat finger discounts (leaving out digits on a fare or rate), currency conversion errors, and other special opportunities. There aren’t as many airline airfare mistakes as there used to be. Airlines have better tools, especially for international fares, to catch mistakes before they’re actually published. Those tools began rolling out in 2009, and now it’s mostly international airlines that haven’t really learned to use them that wind up publishing international mistakes. (This refers to price mistakes, but other kinds of mistakes like…
Review: Thai Molecular Gastronomy at Sra Bua in Bangkok
Must-read Earlier Installments: Singapore, Cathay, and Qantas First Class.. Some of the Best Meals of My Life, and a Tour of Hyatts in Bangkok, Singapore, and Sydney Inside the New Oneworld Lounge at LAX’s Tom Bradley International Terminal Cathay Pacific First Class, Los Angeles – Hong Kong Cathay Pacific “The Wing” First Class Lounge, Hong Kong Cathay Pacific Business Class, Hong Kong – Bangkok Grand Hyatt Bangkok: Suite, Club Lounge, and Facilities Sra Bua by Kiin Kiin at the Siam Kempinski hotel is quite well-regarded. It’s Copenhagen sister is the second restaurant in the world to earn a Michelin star cooking Thai food. (The first was London’s Nahm, and I ate at Nahn in Bangkok on this trip as well.) I’ve done plenty of the world’s best molecular gastronomy. The since-closed El Bulli, arguably then…
British Airways Re-committing to First Class, Converting Remaining 747s to New First!
Conventional wisdom is that international first class is a thing of the past. A dinosaur. The better business classes today are better than what first used to be. Here are the world’s best business class products. There’s a very narrow market that will pay for greater privacy and service, that isn’t paying to fly private. Back in October I explained the reasons that international first class is disappearing. And yet the data actually suggests there’s more first class than ever before, naturally led by he Middle Eastern mega-carriers. One of the big data points used to suggest that first class isn’t a broadly sustainable product is the way that British Airways has de-emphasized it. BA is one of the world carrier’s most dependent on premium cabin travel, and when they’re eliminating first class from a…
For Those Of You Who Are Booking The Etihad $178 Fares…
If you’re going to travel on this amazing fare to Abu Dhabi, India, Africa or Asia you may wonder whom to credit the flight miles to? The key thing to know is that this deal has been booking into E class. Knowing the fare basis of your ticket will tell you what kind of miles you’ll earn with each of the possible programs you’d credit miles to.
Review: Cathay Pacific Business Class, Hong Kong – Bangkok
Must-read Earlier Installments: Singapore, Cathay, and Qantas First Class.. Some of the Best Meals of My Life, and a Tour of Hyatts in Bangkok, Singapore, and Sydney Inside the New Oneworld Lounge at LAX’s Tom Bradley International Terminal Cathay Pacific First Class, Los Angeles – Hong Kong Cathay Pacific “The Wing” First Class Lounge, Hong Kong For more than two years I’ve been looking forward to flying Cathay Pacific’s new regional business class product but I’ve been foiled every time — I keep getting their long haul business product on my short intra-Asia flights. That streak, lucky in most ways, continued. And I was sort of banging my head against the wall over it. What better way than a short hop between Hong Kong and Bangkok would there be to try out lesser seats? Our…
