Malaysia Trip... First Leg...

Finally... for the few people who are reading this... I'm posting about my Malaysia/Singapore trip. Again I have to apologize for the delay :(

Just a !warning! : I've been having trouble gathering my thoughts lately so the following posts are not going to contain much wit and might not even make that much sense... O_o. Bear with me

We arrived in Vancouver International Airport on the morning of March 5th. (I realize that it's been over a month since I arrived back in Vancouver.. so i'm going to do my best to recall everything that transpired, again, my apologies) I decided to take a snap of this sculpture because (since I left everything to last minute) I though this was a prefect representation of how I felt! BTW taking this picture was almost an adventure in-and-of itself... let me explain.

I actually wanted to take a picture of that particular sculpture from the other side (which would make it look like he was dashing to the right)... good thing I didn't. As I was about to snap the shot... I heard someone yelling at me, "Hey you can't take it from that side!" or something along those lines. I looked up and it was security... thank God they didn't tackle me O_o The reason behind everything was (and I realized this afterwards) right behind it was the security checkpoint where everyone comes through before moving on to their respective gates. That being said, no, they do not want people taking pictures of their security checkpoints (metal detector, x-ray machine, security guards) because then people would be able to study them and blah blah blah... anyway, back to the story at hand. (I'm pretty sure I could have gotten away with a pic facing the other way if I had taken it w/o the flash... the guard didn't even check my cam to make sure that I hadn't taken one).

Ah, yes.... now I remember where we were going when I took that picture. We had actually passed that point but came back to go to the Maple Leaf Lounge :) One of the perks that my dad has. I wish I took more pictures of the Lounge.. it was really nice. The only piccy that I have is the one of the network drop that I was at. Very impressive, it felt like I was back at work :) The facilities were really nice, and if I remember correctly it was free to use the internet.


I was hoping to catch a flight on one of these contraptions :DOur journey to Malaysia had 3 legs:

1^st leg: Vancouver - Tokyo
2^nd leg: Tokyo - Singapore
3^rd leg: Singapore - Malaysia

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1^st leg: Vancouver - Tokyo

This portion of the trip was with Canadian Airlines I believe we were on a DC10. My seat was an aisle seat towards the back of the plane. interesting thing was that since this was a flight to Japan I was surrounded by Japanese people, mostly students... some elderly folks. I was hoping to have a cute Japanese student as an aisle mate :p but no dice, keke. I ended up sitting with some homely looking Japanese girl who spoke almost no english at all. Mind you, I didn't make much of an effort to converse with her... I'm not much of a conversationalist when I'm on planes.

Funny thing is, I've been flying for as long as I can remember (dad used to be a chief stewart on Malaysian Airline Systems) but I still can't stand flying... I guess that's not an accurate statement. It's not so much that I don't like flying, but more the fact that you're stuck in that tin can for x amount of hours and nowhere to go. Everything inside there is so confined as well. I wouldn't say I'm claustrophobic, not by any stretch of the imagination, but unless you're in business/first class you're not going to have much room to yourself, expecially if you've got your carry-on luggage stowed under the seat infront of you. There's no way in hell I'm going to put my laptop in the overhead bin. Plus I have more than just my laptop in the bag. I have my books, etc... anyways back to the topic at hand.

Since this was going to be a long flight we had a couple of meals planned. First, we had a choice of Salmon or Beef. I chose beef... it was damn salty. I remember we had another meal... I can't quite recall what the choices were but I'm pretty sure I chose the Chicken.. I'm also pretty sure that it came on a bed of rice (?) :p or risotto or something :D The chicken was actually not too bad. It was edible as airplane food comes, so I guess that's saying enough of it already ;)
Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to take a picture of it. I was too hungry and forgot :(

Also, anyone who's been on a flight to Asia will know that it's a damn long flight. This leg was over 12 hrs I believe. That being said, I think I recall there being 3 feature films... all of which I slept through. There were a couple of news broadcasts as well as a documentary (I think) :p

On the approach to Japan I was surprised to see that there were Windmill generators along the coast! I'm not sure what area we flew over bud it was a really beautiful sight. The crop fields looked like patchwork, and I could see little vehicles running along the roads. I was half-expecting Godzilla to come out of the water and start battling it out w/ Ultraman :D.

On the approach I also overheard a couple of (younger) Japanese passengers say, "Choh inaka!" Which, if my Japanese serves me correctly, is a slang term meaning "boonies", "countryside" or more appropriately "rural".

The other thing that threw me for a loop was the fact that when we flew over another section (a little farther inland) there were golf-courses as far as the eye could see... seriously... it was whack.


My mom was just as awestruck as I was... I'm sure we counted at least 8... then again, that was over a month ago... and the mind tends to embellish things, right? :p

We finally arrived at Narita airport and after a near-perfect touchdown we taxied to our gate. After we disembarked, those who were transitioning were greeted by Narita airport attendants... I was very impressed with the effeciency of the Japanese system. Apparently there are almost NO incidents (passengers/baggage getting lost, delays, etc...) in the Japanese airports (I could be making that up as well :p) regardless of the fact that Narita is massive compared to Vancouvers piddly airport. I wish I had the frame of mind to snap a shot of the attendants that greeted us *sigh* They even had our names printed out on a large signboard :p

After the attendants confirmed who we were, they also verified that we had our tickets so that we could get our boarding passes at next check-in. We all did... that is, all of us except my dad O_o The Check-in lady in Vancouver tore off the wrong coupon when she issued his boarding pass in Vancouver. My parents had to catch their connecting flight in the next 1/2 hour or it would leave without them. Crappy. This was Narita's chance to shine... and a perfect example of how systematic and effecient they were. The Attendants immediately took out their ticket books and drew up a manual ticket with the proper details. Within 10 minutes, they (mum & dad) were on the way past the security checkpoint making their way to their gate (along with me) in one of the shuttle busses. On the bus... we looked around and saw this...


ya... I'm not sure what to make of that either...

Anyways... more to come ;)