Last impressions of Perth

I left packing until the last minute of course. Stayed up until 2am the night before, making sure nobody said anything stupid on the Internet (they did), and checking YouTube for new videos of monkeys riding pigs backwards (a disappointing no). Flight wasn’t until mid-afternoon, so I planned to sleep until ten to start the time zone adjustment process. Yeah, that’s why. Naturally, the day started with a 6.30 am call from work, asking whether I could help them do the thing, you know, the important one that we like. Checking people onto airplanes or something. I dunno. Anyway, talked them through some troubleshooting with a minimum of spelling lessons (“No, I said s-r-v…no, ‘R’, as in ‘I’m on leave here, give me a Rucking break,’”), and handed off to the site crew just in time to prevent me getting all Internet-rage on them.
So I was a little vague when I got up and threw the last few things together. Despite repeatedly uttering the halfway-out-the-door mantra of ‘travel docs, hotel voucher, passport’, I still managed to make it to the gate without my passport. I’m usually more organised than this, but…yeah, YouTube and 6am work calls.
One small backpack, probably just inside 7kg. Taxi was right on time (a Prius; those things feel like the unnatural offspring of Bob Brown and a Playstation 3), hit the airport waaay before check-in. International was quiet at that hour. A nice British woman checked me in, giving me a weird smile and a half-laugh when I said “New York. And yes, this is my only bag.” She acted like I’d done her a personal favour when it came in under 7 kg, I had my ESTA visa papers ready and I didn’t whine about her typing the tenth chapter of her Fifty Shades fanfic novel or whatever the hell they take so long to type in.

Done, up the stairs. Lunch in the departure lounge Dome, surrounded by surfers, backpackers, dough-bellied middle-agers in hats (there was a Bali trip leaving before mine), and old couples with luggage that took up more space than they did. A few quick emails to people I hope to see a bit of on my return, a couple of texts to people I hope to see a lot of on my return. Update Facebook (hi all; thanks for playing along with the Look At Me post), check bag for the essentials (laptop, laptop charger…yup, good to go). Time to head for customs and security and the usual affronts to personal dignity required to get on an airplane since some blokes took a few liberties with the privilege of flying a while back.

Did I just get x-rayed?

Quiet up here. Lots of folks pawing through their duty free, dozing, staring out windows at the country they’re about to leave. It’s nice to look outside and not see the four horsemen of the predicted Abbottpocalypse riding through the lands, torches ablaze and jagged swords on high. Still, probably taking them a while to find a horse big enough to stick under Hockey, and brave enough to stay under Sophie Mirabella. I’m sure I’ll get back in time for the New Regime to tattoo ‘Facebook Subversive’ across my forehead.
Clock’s ticking. Time to pack up, get the seat-pocket must-haves in hand and the laptop buried deep enough in my bag to survive twenty kilos of someone’s duty-free bourbon lying on it for seven thousand kilometres. Looks like we're on a 777. That will do.




Boeing's 777. Spacious, and equipped with non-exploding engines

  I seem to be over India. At least that’s what the little map tells me. It also tells me the plane is roughly the size of France, so they may be taking some liberties with scale. The plane’s two thirds empty, my row’s completely empty, so I’ve expanded to fill the space available. Laptop’s close of course, but the book’s two seats away, the little toothbrush-and-eyemask complimentary is jammed between seats three and four, and I’m not sure where my shoes are. Some nice touches on this thing: decent seats, big overhead compartments, and the plane’s ceiling is dotted with tiny glowing stars. A lovely effect, but I’m not sure of the wisdom of the illusion that we’re in a convertible.
Now flying over Thiruvananthapuram, apparently. Looks nice in a sort of invisible-from-forty-thousand-feet way. There are orange ribbons of roads, spans of soft white suburbs, flickers of red that might be emergency services, might be traffic lights, might be sacrificial bonfires lit in the name of Shiva for all I know. And one bright green light. I can’t even guess.
And like that, I’m no longer over India. Just over a billion people below and behind me. There are cameras available on the flight path seat display; one forward, one down. Right now I have the choice of black sky ahead or black ocean below. I’m going with season 11 of Family Guy with the sound down.
Hosties are wittering away enthusiastically behind me. Far back seat of the plane has many advantages: nobody whines when you recline, it’s usually less crowded, you never get a bored four year old kicking your seat back and it’s three steps to the toilet. Given I’m losing about a litre of water an hour in this atmosphere I don’t know that the latter is all that useful. Still, it’s a comfort to know I’m good if the lamb tagine with traditional Moroccan spices served with mint couscous and cumin flavoured carrots tries to make a speedy exit. So far so digestible.
Turbulence. Handy when they keyboard comes up to meet my fingers. There’s a noise coming from the galley like a kid loose in a Tupperware cupboard. Although there are lifted notes of panicked homosexual over the top of it.

Dubai. I can see why they call it that. Can’t imagine they like it if you come here and don’t buy. For the reasons I’m here it’s good: get off a plane, sit, stand and walk around until it’s time to get on the next one. But as a ‘shopping’ experience, I can understand why people get all moist about this place. I timed the walk from one end to the next: not far off twenty minutes. That makes it around 2 kilometres. At no time was I out of sight of a retail establishment trying to sell me electronics, booze, cigarettes in cartons the size of Hyundais, perfume, jewellery, live seafood, Irish sandwiches or Whoppers. All I really wanted was somewhere to top up my water bottle; ten hours on a Boeing 777 left me drier than a Wil Anderson monologue and suffering a good solid headache. Found a source of water eventually; two hours and three litres later I hunted down a men's room, finding one with two listless attendants permanently poised within. As each bloke left they would mop around the sink, swipe at the mirror then go back to staring at the marble floor. I guess not everyone over here is an oil sheikh.

Dubai. From an Arabic word meaning "BUY MORE YOU BASTARDS!"

Boarding, second leg. First chink in the Dubai airport armour; the process was a little broken. There was a sort of pre-board thing, where everyone started queuing an hour before official boarding time, gradually shuffling past a straggly group of attendants who glanced indifferently at passports in between gossiping about other crews (apparently Karen on the service desk has been late twice already this week). Then downstairs to a sort of…security check thing? Five or six uniforms standing around checking boarding passes, directing some passengers to tables where the contents of their bags were rearranged to put useful items at the bottom or something. I was waved through, most others were waved through, at least a few stood around a bit, then wandered through when the uniforms didn’t pay them any attention. Into another departure lounge corral where we had roughly eight minutes to read a wide selection of complimentary newspapers and magazines (The Times was a disappointment; the back sports section reached forward to page three) before they warned us that they were about to warn us to get ready to board. When we were finally called there was a weird sort of cattle-walk past two attendants who checked passes and waved us through. It's an A380, so there are about six thousand of us to get on board. They should spend less time on giant aircraft and football fields of duty-free carcinogens, more time on keeping the boarding queues shorter than fairground ride queues.

Back on board. Different plane, same everything. Row 50 last time, row 85 this time. And not at the very back. There are stairs leading up from the back of this thing. Based on movie experiences, if I ducked under the velvet rope and headed up there I’d find Leonardo diCaprio sharing a dream with some Japanese guy, or Christian Bale calling Morgan Freeman to organise a Hercules flyover in Hong Kong. Based on the ads I saw in Dubai it’d be supermodels and stubbly thirty-something billionaires comparing wrist watches and diamonds. Reality says it’ll be blubbery sixty year olds in sweat pants. Either or, I’m happy to save a month’s pay and sit next to a Hindu bloke from New Jersey who watches Bollywood flicks for ten hours straight. Damn, those things are sexist.



Airbus A380. Sure, the engines explode. But isn't that a small price to pay for a 7" LCD and non-stop Bollywood?


Interesting track for this flight. Short way to New York is west from Dubai, but that takes us over Iraq. I’m guessing they’re a little twitchy about six hundred thousand bored ex-Iraqi army soldiers with access to Stingers. Instead we’re going over the length of Iran. Got a great view of Tehran from forty thousand, but I can’t help wondering if international politics might soon deny me that view too.
Feelin’ good this flight. Proper hydrated, headache’s gone, napping a fair bit and filling the gaps with some good fluffy mental spackfilla, namely season six of Big Bang Theory. Four hours of glib science references, occasional dick jokes and blondes in tight sweaters. Okay, the scene when the Aspergers guy tries to punish his girlfriend by spanking her was funny. But that probably says more about me than the show.

Icebergs! Off the coast of Iceland, no less. I think that’s the first time I’ve seen one. Reeeally gotta get out more. Clearly their presence in this particular patch of ocean is a sign that global warming is a genuine threat/conspiracy to frighten the credulous.

Right, there’s America. Sooner than I’d like; now I may never find out whether Leonard dumps Penny and gets it on with Sheldon’s hot assistant. America looks…green. And cloudy. And wet. Weird to look down and see lakes with actual water in them, rather than Australia’s six feet of salt crust and brine shrimp larvae that I see on my usual flying adventures.

Time to shut down. More once New York has shown me something of herself.