Shanghai to Hong Kong in Dragonair's economy class

Flight: KA 859 (CX 6737)
Route: SHA - HKG
Aircraft: Airbus Industrie 330
Date: Apr. 24, 2011
Class of service: Economy
Fare: Q

Check-in at Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport, Terminal 1.

It was a flight scheduled at noon. I arrived at the terminal well in advance and received a NotiFly SMS while waiting in the line. It's Cathay Pacific's flight notification service. However, I later found that it does not provide updated flight information, such as delay or cancellation. (At least, not in my case.) 

I am not a member of Marco Polo Club. In fact, this was my virgin flight on a Oneworld carrier. So everything was a wild adventure. I have heard a lot of good things about Dragonair and Cathay Pacific, even for their coach product. And Dragonair was awarded by SkyTrak as the best regional airline. That's why I still have very high expectation, though the booking experience was sub-par at best.

Nearby, ANA and Japan Airlines were also checking in passengers. When it was my turn, I was ushered to a counter that checks business passengers. Great. First thing I asked was whether this flight is overbooked. Yes. KA 859 was on this Sunday, but, unfortunately, this is the only KA flight out of SHA and I had a hotel booked in Hong Kong. I told the agent to go ahead to assign a window seat for me. I ended up in 46A.

The A330 that took me to Hong Kong.

I walked around the departure level. Terminal 1 was a very old facility. It's not among one of the gleaming airports you would normally see today in Asia. In it's prime time, United 747-400 was still in grey livery. Now, Terminal 1 only serve a few international routes to Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong. The rest of the facility was taken over by a local budget carrier.

It's not a facility designed for plane-spotters. Actually, it's the most photo-unfriendly airport I had had the displeasure of visiting. Lounges looked old and unappealing from the outside. There was not enough outlets for laptops and Wifi coverage is pathetic. I couldn't check my email prior to departure.

Once settled into the cabin, it was another world. Dragonair's flight attendant on this flight caught my attention. They are so gorgeous! I couldn't take my eyes (and mind, until today) off them. Their uniform is such an elegant masterpiece. I was greeted with smile, good eye contact and professional service. A flight attendant helped me with carry-on luggage.

Visibility was not great. Smog is a problem in China.

We pushed back on time, after JAL 82 to Haneda. I noticed a lot of Japanese business travelers on that flight. One reason maybe both SHA and HND are located closer to city center and, thus, give businessperson faster access to hotel/conference.

JAL Boeing 777-200 looks much cleaner than my KA bird.

Once airborne, the sky cleared up. Anyone who had been in China for awhile could tell you the same story about smog. Clear blue sky at low altitude is not guaranteed. Smog sometimes could go from bad and then straight to worse, for no obvious reason, and wouldn't clear up for a week.

En route to HKG!

Shanghai to Hong Kong and Beijing to Hong Kong are the equivalent of San Francisco and Los Angeles to JFK in terms of the importance of the route itself. Dragonair didn't named the service between these city pairs Premium Service but these two routes they operate feature new products introduced earlier this spring. And I was fortunate enough to be an early bird to try this product.

 

Menu for economy class. Two selections offered for entrée.

I ordered Chicken in Burgundy Sauce, Potatoes and Vegetable, then began to check the seat. It is somewhat worn. The IFE is old and the screen is small and has no anti-glare. Videos are not on-demand. Selections are okay and I am not very picky about movies in general, and the flight itself was too short for any movie. So I didn't bother watching anything. Legroom is about average.

Chicken in Burgundy Sauce, Potatoes and Vegetable

I was a part-time food critic for a publication in Shanghai at that time. So I consider myself a quasi-professional when it comes to food. In terms of airline food, this dish was not the most creative. Presentation was, well, just okay. Anyways, it still looked appetizing to me. I have seen those horrible turkey sandwich served on Continental/United flights before and, considering the fact that this was served on a two-hour flight without additional charge, I wouldn't complain. For this particular dish, before even tasting it, I would give a base score of 3.5 out of 5.

The main course was actually not bad. I finished them all. Chicken was nicely marinated and very juicy. Veggie tasted a little mild but the potato was cooked perfectly, crunchy on the outside and tender inside.

Very cute wine cup.

Time to wash everything down with some white wine. And finish it off with a dessert. Dragonair's solution is Haagen-Dazs ice cream.

No need to scream for ice-cream!

Financially, this ice cream service in coach class works favorably for Dragonair. It has actually become one of their killing public relations advantage against competitors who do not offer ice cream. Since Haagen-Dazs is among some of the over-priced western brands in China, rumor has it that there are people in Shanghai and Beijing dying to fly with Dragonair just to get a chance to enjoy a free ice cream at 30,000 feet! The same thing would cost RMB 78, or roughly $10, at sea level in a 7-Eleven in Shanghai. If KA's fare is competitive, people will fly KA for their service.

A nice, warm Easter Sunday down below in Hong Kong.

Approaching was uneventful. Announcements were made in three languages, or, to be more exact, two languages, English and Mandarin, and a dialect of Mandarin, Cantonese. I especially love the Cantonese version. Those Hong Kong flight attendants use phrases different from Mandarin to describe a similar thing. For example, aircraft is "hang-gi" (航機) , instead of "fei-ji" (飛機).

Finally, I arrived in Hong Kong!

Nathan Road, near MTR Tsim Sha Tsui Station.

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Trip planning: Hong Kong and Singapore on Cathay Pacific, Dragonair, The Mira Hong Kong and Mandarin Orchard

I returned from Singapore via Hong Kong on May 1st, 2011. My experience with Cathay Pacific and its affiliate, Dragonair, was hit-and-miss, but I love Hong Kong and Singapore a lot, especially both their outstanding airports. Since Singapore Airlines is always pricey, and low-cost carriers sells fast, chances are I may fly with Cathay Pacific again.

This trip was not meant to be frugal because I was there to attend a meeting, which lasted for a week, and I already saved some money for this trip. By the time I was about to plan this itinerary, I was still based in Shanghai, going to school and writing for an expat magazine. This was my first job. My monthly salary at that time was 3,000 Chinese Yuan or around $466 U.S. dollar. The costs of the trip will be partly covered by my school, but in order to get the most out of this experience, I had to save as much as humanly possible.

When the details of the meeting and the schedule got finalized, it was around mid-March. I only have about a month and a half to plan for this trip. Popular low-cost airlines such as AirAsia and JetStar were no longer a feasible option because cheap fare had sold out several months, if not a year ago. I shopped around a little on many websites, including Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz, as well as airline websites, and found that my options were pretty straightforward for this simple round trip between Shanghai and Singapore:

1. Fly coach on Singapore Airlines (SQ). SQ operates this route with Boeing 777-200ER and has several departure slots from Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG).

2. Fly coach on China Eastern (MU). MU had bought out Shanghai Airlines (FM) earlier this year. There's the possibility of flying on either MU's old A300 or a FM's equipment.

3. Fly coach on Cathay Pacific (CX) and Dragonair (KA), with a connection in Hong Kong. CX and KA operates PVG (SHA) to HKG with many different types of aircraft, including A330, A320 and Boeing 777-300. For HKG to SIN, CX offers the choice of A330 and Boeing 777-300.

Now it seems that burning 20,000 United MileagePlus miles would have been the way to go. But I didn't pull the trigger because I want to save these miles for another trip I am planning. I am not sure where to go but Guam or Jakarta are on the list now.

Since I only have a little miles banked with Korean Air (KE). I didn't want to redeem them and, at this time, China Eastern is not a full-fledged SkyTeam member yet, though they will eventually join the alliance in June 2011. I used to have terrible experience flying on China Eastern. Onboard one of their A320s, the cabin pressure on this SHA-CAN flight was not adjusted to a comfortable level and my ears hurt like they were about to drop off. That was in December 2009. I searched for their fare and it was not attractive at all. 3,600 Chinese Yuan in their ancient A300? No, I decided to stay away from them.

I have not traveled on any Oneworld airlines before, hence, zero mileage. With redemption out of the picture, I bought the ticket with Cathay Pacific for 2,959 Chinese Yuan, including taxes and fees. I signed up for Asia Miles, only later to find my fare class did not qualify for any mile.

Soon, I hit another, much bigger, problem. The transaction simply did not go through. I got an email from Cathay's e-Service saying they were unable to issue my ticket because of a "technical glitch".

I was very concerned. This meant that my bank account had been debited while I got nothing confirmed. The email from Cathay failed to provide me with any useful reference, like reservation number, order number and so forth.

So I called the e-Service center. The number they listed on the website is always busy. I was put of hold for ages while listening to their theme song, Feel, by Robbie Williams. I tried to call with two different phones, one for English service, the other for Mandarin, just to pick the one that would talk to me first.

Finally, after a horrendously long hold, longer than any other hold I had ever experienced in my life, I got through the English service. I described my issue with the agent and she said that since I cannot give her any reference, she could not locate my information in their system. I asked her to give me a callback after she talks to my bank first, she said she could not do that for me.

So I had to contact my bank, which help me locate a transaction number. Again, I called Cathay and I was put on hold, same background music. Thirty minutes later, I was on the verge of going crazy with Robbie Williams when I was finally connected to an agent who was able to locate my information with the transaction number. I was worried that the fare on my canceled booking may not be honored now, for fare fluctuates all the time. Fortunately, this agent rebooked me on the same flights with the same fare. By the end of the day, I didn't know whether I was happy with them or not.

The next day, I wrote a complaint to Cathay Pacific and I got an auto-reply. It reads:

This is to confirm that we have received your e-mail. We will look into

the matter and revert our findings to you as soon as possible.

I was worried that my complaint will not get anywhere and the issue of long holding at their call center will not be addressed. But anyways, I had a confirmed flight schedule now. I have two stop-overs in Hong Kong. For the outbound leg, I have 23 hours in Hong Kong so I need to book a hotel. And for the return, I have 8 hours. The inbound flight from SIN arrives at midnight, so I might as well just spend the night wandering around the city for some street food in Kowloon.

For five nights in Singapore, I didn't need to worry about accommodations. The host of the meeting booked me in Mandarin Orchard, located in the middle of the city.

So for that night in Hong Kong, I spotted a deal for The Mira Hong Kong three days before departure and I jumped at it. This hotel used to me the old Hotel Miramar, but they renovated it and it's now a Design Hotels hotel. I booked a studio room for $180, which came with complimentary Internet! A last minute three-day advance booking plus Easter Sunday deal secured!

I have heard a lot about this hotel. On the night of its reopening, they invited Katy Perry to sing at the party. And I had never stayed in a Design Hotels property before. So I thought it would be very interesting to try out this relatively new, chic place.

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