Grausigkeit-Flug nach Singapur

I know, I know...why am I entitling this entry with a German title, when Singapore counts English as its main language, followed by Malay, Tamil and Mandarin?

First, NEVER QUESTION ME! Many mortals have made that mistake and few are left to tell the tale. This is the Book of Jon, not the Book of you. Second, although 恐怖飞行向新加坡 falls off the tongue trippingly, there is no other language on the planet that expresses Dark Side emotions better than German. I took it for four years, so I know what I'm talking about. (And for the record, it means "Horror Flight to Singapore".

You know those stories they tell little boys at night to frighten them away from being business travelers, about multihour waits IN planes on the runway? Trust me, it's all true...imagine, if you dare, being in an MD-80 for six hours on the tarmac in sweaty, sunny Austin. Our pilot, an otherwise very nice guy, made the monumental mistake of thinking he could beat approaching storms in DFW, where we were headed. This was not Good Thinking.

The funniest thing about the experience was observing people's reactions on the flight during the wait. The flight attendants, angels all, did their best to prevent a revolution from breaking out (I could see it now, the People's Republic of Runway 13E). Being a 30 minute flight under normal circumstances, the plane wasn't stocked with many luxuries like, say, "water". In the end, though, people were far nicer than I would have thought possible, and we pulled into DFW around 5 PM (original arrival time: 10:30 AM).

Needless to say, my previously straightforward plans to go to Singapore via DFW through Narita were lying in smouldering, smoky shambles. Around the fourth hour of our captivity, I got on the horn to AA and begged for some kind of alternate routing; they came up with DFW > SFO > Kong Kong > Singapore. FUN! I arrived in SF a very bleary, tired man; it was the first time I'd been in their International Terminal, though, and seeing the Ultra Modernity of it all perked me up a bit.

Cathay Pacific was an amazing airline to fly on. Not only were the flight attendants courteous to a fault, but the amenities were flawless - from the AV entertainment (including the "Serenity" channel, full of calming music, meditation routines and relaxation techniques) to the food, which was fantastic. The only note of discord was about two-thirds of the way to HK; some bastard in the rear of the plane decided to rough up his wife, leaving her with a nasty bruise on her arm and some very understandable emotional trauma. She ended up sitting in the empty seat between me and another passenger; as her story trickled out via talks with the flight attendants, my blood was boiling - he had done things like that before, including leaving her in the middle of another trip for the airport after a fight. PSYCHO! That's not a relationship, that's a book in the making on dysfunctionality.

Hong Kong airport was beautiful; a variation on the Denver International Airport theme, but done right this time. We got in very early; the only store open was Starbucks. And this is yet more proof that STARBUCKS RULES THE COSMOS. Not only were they the ONLY shop open in the entire airport when I passed by, but they gave me a warm fuzzy comforty feeling by giving me the same anomymous, mass market drink I could have gotten in Austin. The 21st Century is so beautiful, I'm crying.

Now that I'm in Singapore and finally getting over the jet lag, I'm starting to take some pictures and will post those this evening. This is a beautiful island that's busting out in a million directions at once.