China - never a dull moment!

[mushez]

Love the last line:

 

[TheEmu]

Never thought I would see a sign like this, but never is not a word when you are in China:
View attachment 68619

Been in force in NKG for a year or so now - works a treat!
Now, if they could disable all the car horns and show them the little stalk that activates the indicators…

 

[mushez]

Been in force in NKG for a year or so now - works a treat!
Now, if they could disable all the car horns and show them the little stalk that activates the indicators…

They would have to re-write the road code first before they did that....

 

[mushez]

Not sure why I am hitting so many interesting situations in my current trip - but you take it as it comes.

Well staying at a hotel near Shanghai Hongqaio T1 - 20 minutes walk, nice stroll to catch my flight tomorrow.

Anyway - went down to lobby and was more of a zoo than normal - but was a guy from Doha who was getting frustrated and venting with staff just brushing him off.

Thought I would see if I could help him and got talking - in short, his MU flight from SHA-CAN had been canceled and rebooked for tomorrow and was being put up in the same hotel for the night. He had been allocated a room, but was a room with twin single beds, and was being forced to share it with some other random stranger he doesn't know - and was not wanting to accept it nor felt it was acceptable to be paired up to sleep with some stranger for the night off the same flight.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

that's what travel insurance is for

 

[mushez]

that's what travel insurance is for

I know, what is crazy in my mind is that I booked my room via Ctrip for 119 RMB ($24 AUD) and when I was talking with him, looked and could have booked him a room as they still had plenty available for 179 RMB ($35 AUD) if he wanted to - but he wasn't having a bar of it an expecting them to just put him up in one.

 

[moa999]

He had been allocated a room, but was a room with twin single beds, and was being forced to share it with some other random stranger he doesn't know - and was not wanting to accept it nor felt it was acceptable to be paired up to sleep with some stranger for the night off the same flight.

While not great I suspect it's better than a camp bed on the terminal floor.

Not always possible that there are enough spare rooms, particularly if lots of flights impacted by weather

 

[Foreigner]

Bad behaviour on airplane:


http://loyaltylobby.com/2016/05/03/...onto-the-floor-onboard-china-domestic-flight/

 

[mushez]

Bad behaviour on airplane:


Grandmother Lets Child Pee Onto The Floor Onboard China Domestic Flight! | LoyaltyLobby

That does not surprise me one bit. Seen it a zillion times, and will see it a zillion more. The older generation in China see no issue with this type of behavior. Letting a kid pee or cough anywhere is part and parcel of life in their minds in China.

 

[mushez]

Finally recovered from - but experienced a long wait on Monday.

Had flight with CZ on Monday - BKK-CAN-SHA - took a break from China to BKK for the weekend.

So departed BKK on Schedule at 8:40am to arrive on Schedule of 12:40pm into CAN. Through customs etc and ready for connecting flight of 15:00 to arrive 17:40 to SHA. Arrived at departing gate at 14:00 to find notice flight is delayed until 17:00 and was - um ok - but doubt we are going to depart at 17:00 as yet to have them openly admit any delay until well after departure time and clearly they know this is going to be a bit of a wait/delay.

After a number of notices of another hour delay here, two hours there, finally boarded at 8:30pm, departed at 21:45, and arrived a few minutes past midnight into Shanghai.

Was nice to be on a new CZ 777-300 - delivered to them in February and had that new plane smell, didn't know what I was going to be flying on, and had assumed 737/A320 types. But boy was it annoying - they have hooked up an auto voice message to scream out to people to fasten seat belts each and every time the pilots flick the seat belt sign - which was around a dozen times during the 2 hour flight. One time they flicked it three times in a matter of 20 seconds, so you had the message rattling out over and over.

6 hour + flight delay, $200 from Mr. Insurance company here we go.......

CZ offered no food or anything, but then I didn't bother trying to hang around the gate after the first notice of delay, and got updates from customer counters around the airport and flight info monitor boards.

 

[mushez]

Long Distance Bus Terminal - Shanghai Pudong (PVG):

As much as I have traveled to and from China through Shanghai, the elusive Long Distance Bus Terminal at PVG has evaded me. I found this mythical creature on my last trip to China, having 6 hours transit at PVG between my flight departing - so I set out in my transit to find this elusive creature, and yes it took me about an hour to find it.

One has to go out of their way to get to it, as upon arriving at PVG, the arrivals on both terminals head people down either the North or South Wuzhou paths, and one needs to go out of their way to get onto the Middle Wuzhou path and there is lacking and conflicting signage towards where the long distance bus terminal is.

However with this following map - I think most would find it with eze:

Note - this map indicates more where the elevator down to it is, rather than the correct walk down door is, but it gives one a good guide of where to head directly for. The normal escalator/stair way down - is on the north side of the Wuzhou Middle Path and a little closer to T2.

And the doorway to the stairs looks like this:


For Completion, will add this other picture of Signage to help one mentally plan their orientation to get there:

 

[mushez]

4 is a bad number in China, because to incorrectly pronounce it, would read the word death as they are similar. Chinese will avoid 4 like death itself.

So you see some crazy things like the avoidance of 4th floors, and then situations like this in elevators:

 

[mushez]

Next time dep T2 and post immig just head right to security channel 26 - it's way down the end.

Thanks for that - yep security channel 26 was just sitting there at PVG, T2 waiting for me tonight - through like a charm. No queuing 10 pax long. Plus they rolled their eyes at me getting all my batteries out - like every other airport in China this trip has demanded I should do.

 

[mushez]

Dinner tonight, street food boss and chef was sporting a wicked as scar and overall physic not to be messed with combined with tats to boot.

But after talking in ordering, seemed a friendly fellow. So asked after his scar, and said it was a result of a knife in a bar fight, and asked if I could take a picture after comparing scars, and he obliged and agreed, but is way bigger and wicked than the picture shows:

 

[Cruiser Elite]

Part of food offerings in CZ J lounge CAN:



And in in case you can't read description a close up:



And inside the box:



See - spuds and beans - they are from different crops - put them inside the same box and you get ........... 'mixed crops'!

 

[hummel]

Part of food offerings in CZ J lounge CAN:

View attachment 69855

And in in case you can't read description a close up:

View attachment 69856

And inside the box:

View attachment 69857

See - spuds and beans - they are from different crops - put them inside the same box and you get ........... 'mixed crops'!

Flying China Southern CE?

I only got back last week but I'm off again tonight on TG.. ugh.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I only got back last week but I'm off again tonight on TG.. ugh.

will all be better from 1 July with the a350 ex Mel.

 

[hummel]

will all be better from 1 July with the a350 ex Mel.

Oh?? I missed that news! In the SQ lounge, J full MEL-BKK tonight except for 2 seats!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Oh?? I missed that news! In the SQ lounge, J full MEL-BKK tonight except for 2 seats!

TG465/466 from 1 July and TG461/462 from 1 August.

 

[hummel]

TG465/466 from 1 July and TG461/462 from 1 August.

I relayed your news onto the other J passengers as we got the bus to the terminal this morning. There was some happy faces.