The earth is rounded 4

The beginning of "The earth is rounded vol.4" was really for Japanese people, talking about how you get to central Tokyo from Narita Airport with various transport. I'll skip on that.

My stay in Japan on this trip was only for 6days. My jet lag is getting worse and worse now a days, and I don't want to believe it is due my age. Well, a holiday like this short, I spend my time with Irish time zone. Therefore I do not suffer jet lag when I get back to Dublin. I was up until around 4a.m. and get up at noon while I was in Japan.

I haven't done much in Japan this time. I spent time with family most of the time. It was a bit too late for Cherry blossom season, but it was nicely not too cold, not too hot. I went to Onsen spa, and went to some place to eat nice food.

About my stand by ticket, what happens if the flight was totally full? No prob. You can change flight and destination. Problem on that day was that I definitely needed to arrive in New York on that day and there is no other way to be there without using a non stop flight. If full, then I had to ask captain to give up his seat (Ooops, that called hi-jack).

UA800 / destination New York JFK

This plain is quite often full in Business and First class, and empty in Economy. I have travelled in Economy class on this flight (for 13hours) before, and it was absolutely disaster. Hmmmm, which seat am I gonna get on? I have to wait the result at the gate.

By the way, today was the day the new terminal opened in Narita Airport. This terminal was to integrate all the Star Alliance airlines to be in one terminal. There was TV cameras everywhere and even Maiko miodels.

Hidekis without check-in baggage, went straight to the Electric check-in machine, and that was done within 1 minute. Received a boarding pass (without seat number), I proceeded to the security hall and passport control.

As I entered the passport control, I almost screemed


Empty...


The passport control hall in Narita airport usually filled with full of people queueing and my job was to find out which queue is moving faster than others. It is important to see how each immiguration officers handling it and you know, the shorter queue sometimes moves slower than others.

But today, there is not queue in front of probably about 6 conters. I don't have to worry about this kind of crap. Biggest benefit of the new terminal.


Viva new terminal!


Now as usual, I wait in front of the gate of UA800 until all the passengers get on board, then my name will be called, if not full flight....


Brand new self check-in machine. One machine can handle a number of different airlines system.

The earth is rounded 3

If you see the earth from North side...



The blue routing is for normal person. Hidekis took the red routing. You can see how foolish it is to take the red routing which is almost twice the distance than the blue one.

Anyway. Why am I sitting in the business class? Most of airline employee has so called "Flight benefit". As long as there is a seat available, employees can fly very cheap with stand-by basis. Airlines do not lose money with it.

Amongst airlines, American companies are generally good on benefit. The company where I used to work put employees in First class. If not available then business class. The european airlines I used to work before gave only economy class as customers are the priority.

Well it does not have to be like that. Most of the no-show occurs in the higher class as those expensive tickets have no restriction for changing flights. So higher classes would likely have empty seat in the end. So why not assigning employees in there? I would not agree to upgrade economy customer to business class usless airline disservice such as over booking occurs. The difference between economy and business on the longhaul flights are usually more than a few thousands euro. They should not upgrade customers easily. That would disrespect paid business customers.

How do I justify employee to sit in higher classes? Well, airline employees do not get good salary in general. So they deserve it. OK?

So today, Hidekis was lucky that there was only one seat left on UA845 and that was the business class. My flights today were:

Depart Frankfurt at 08:25 --- arrive Chicago at 10:27. Journey time 9h27m

2h32m waiting time

Depart Chicago at 12:59 --- arrive Tokyo at 16:15 (next day). Journey time 13h16m


Changing planes in the state is unpleasent. Even you do not stay in the States, you must go through the immigration. Furthermore, after September11 incident, security became tight and everytime you go through immigration, they take your finger print and photos that makes whole process very slow.

I do not have a good luck in Chicago every time. This time I see it would go smoothly, but about 10 people before my turn, they stopped the visitor line and let US citizen go first as the queue for US citizen was longer. So all the visitor had to wait more than a half an hour.

To reduce any of those stress, Hidekis never bring checked baggage. I bring small enough bag for carry on (if you change planes in the US, you need to claim bags and re-check in).

Chicago O'Hare Airport, the world NO1 busiest airport has 4 terminals and 8 concourse.
My UA883 bound for Tokyo leaves from Terminal1. Arriving at Terminal1 by airtrain, I quickly had one cigarette, then to gate. Busy, busy.

I know this flight is busy flght. I know it. But still not happy. The boarding pass I got shows "Economy class".

At least my seat was in the Economy plus area that has extra legroom in it. But economy is still economy. I used one special cushion for my back and another one for neck to sleep.


13hours later, UA883 is now at final approach. Senery below is difinitely Japan. I departed toward the opposit direction than other Japanese people I saw in Frankfurt, but here I am, back in Japan somehow.




UA883 was in the boeing777 old livery. Average opinion says the old colour is better than the new one. I actually like the new one. What do you think?