It is so nice to be home! Even though I am sitting in the San Francisco airport for a layover as I type this and it took no more than two minutes for me to be completely and utterly fed up with the airlines and security and immigration and security of the air transport system in the United States. Gosh.
But...Yay!
The diversity of this country never ceases to pleasantly surprise me when I come home. In my jet lagged half asleep state, I had a bit of a jolt while going through security - I thought, wow, there are so many Asian customs and border guards here! And then realized, duh, there are a ton of Asian people in America, not to mention in California. But in Hong Kong the airport personnel would have all been Asian.
I don't know how to explain it without sounding stupid, really, but I kept marveling at how many different kinds of people there were just streaming by me in the U.S. citizen and permanent residents line. It's lovely.
In other news, I am going to be semi-facetiously obnoxious for a second. I totally forgot that my flight from San Francisco to Phoenix (visiting the lil sis, woot woot!) is in economy class. I booked my flight on reward miles from Hong Kong and just enjoyed a heavenly twelve hours in Cathay's premium first class cabin. I was so bummed when I finally looked at my ticket (I have a very bad habit of not checking my flight cabin, departure time, boarding gate…).
It is such a rude awakening to plummet from the plush surroundings of first class... to a domestic U.S. Airways flight. Eeesh. No lounge access, no free checked bag, no easy and swift boarding… this is so rough. ;)
Some blurry pictures from my flight of some of my food (it was a very turbulent flight):
My own bread basket!
My blurry tuna nicoise salad!
The really salty caviar with egg and sour cream and blini. I don't know the first thing about caviar but I liked this alright. They served it in a very chilled clear tray. I got a kick out of the mother of pearl spoon.
This was the entree… um, I got through about a quarter of that. The flight attendant laughed and said that the serving sizes on the US flights are always crazy huge. I had to agree. Maybe my stomach has shrunk from living in Asia.
I really enjoyed breakfast. I was surprised when they offered me my choice of egg to go with my sausage, bacon and toast. I kind of figured this was not going to be a powdered egg or pre-cooked deal. No joke, the stewardess had a frying pan and was cracking fresh eggs and scrambling them for me! Amazing.
Also, I am now the proud owner of a pair of ugly purple maroon Cathay first class pajamas. They look like clothes that a Communist peasant would have worn… but they are comfortable. And the tag informs me they are 100% organic cotton. (I think I would have preferred their previous Shanghai Tang silk pajamas.) But on the plus side (remember how much I like hotel kits and amenities?) they do offer the most fabulously fun leather kit with lovely, adorable, miniature Aesop hand cream, lip balm and face toner.
But...Yay!
The diversity of this country never ceases to pleasantly surprise me when I come home. In my jet lagged half asleep state, I had a bit of a jolt while going through security - I thought, wow, there are so many Asian customs and border guards here! And then realized, duh, there are a ton of Asian people in America, not to mention in California. But in Hong Kong the airport personnel would have all been Asian.
I don't know how to explain it without sounding stupid, really, but I kept marveling at how many different kinds of people there were just streaming by me in the U.S. citizen and permanent residents line. It's lovely.
In other news, I am going to be semi-facetiously obnoxious for a second. I totally forgot that my flight from San Francisco to Phoenix (visiting the lil sis, woot woot!) is in economy class. I booked my flight on reward miles from Hong Kong and just enjoyed a heavenly twelve hours in Cathay's premium first class cabin. I was so bummed when I finally looked at my ticket (I have a very bad habit of not checking my flight cabin, departure time, boarding gate…).
It is such a rude awakening to plummet from the plush surroundings of first class... to a domestic U.S. Airways flight. Eeesh. No lounge access, no free checked bag, no easy and swift boarding… this is so rough. ;)
Some blurry pictures from my flight of some of my food (it was a very turbulent flight):
I really enjoyed breakfast. I was surprised when they offered me my choice of egg to go with my sausage, bacon and toast. I kind of figured this was not going to be a powdered egg or pre-cooked deal. No joke, the stewardess had a frying pan and was cracking fresh eggs and scrambling them for me! Amazing.
Also, I am now the proud owner of a pair of ugly purple maroon Cathay first class pajamas. They look like clothes that a Communist peasant would have worn… but they are comfortable. And the tag informs me they are 100% organic cotton. (I think I would have preferred their previous Shanghai Tang silk pajamas.) But on the plus side (remember how much I like hotel kits and amenities?) they do offer the most fabulously fun leather kit with lovely, adorable, miniature Aesop hand cream, lip balm and face toner.
No comments:
Post a Comment