Thailand - The Flight Out

I am back. Back from Bangkok and Koh Samui. It was some of the best 2 weeks of my life. Mainly because no one planted any drugs on us causing us to be imprisoned in Thailand for 30+ years, and no one made a blatant attempt to steal our kidneys. However, one lady did try to steal my arm, but more on that in a later entry.

We departed on Monday January 12^th at 9:55am. In order to make the flight Shelly and I decided to pull an all nighter on Sunday. No mercy, no sleep. That was the motto. So we stayed up all through the night. I catnapped at 2am to 3am. Shell remained busy packing throughout the night.

At 6am the car picked us up, and we were officially off on this crazy adventure. Once we arrived at the airport we went straight to the Cathay Pacific counter. Earlier in the week, I had been reading on the internet on how one can score an upgrade. The consensus was that there is no way to do it in these lean economic times; airlines just didn't care to do it. Their only advice was to just ask directly, once, and be nice about it. You most likely won’t get it.

When we got to the counter, I asked the fellow Indian Cathay gate agent named Pushpa S. It was direct, once and definitely nice. She indifferently agreed to look but that was it. She handed us two tickets for economy. Shell and I were bummed. But on closer inspection that was only for tickets from Hong Kong to Bangkok (a 3 hour flight). She kept typing away. Then she handed us the tickets to seats 24D and 25D. Business Class from NYC to Hong Kong (a 16 hour journey)! I definitely heard trumpeters trumpeting, angels singing, and for car with license plate number "SMUTHLVR" to move or be towed.

Pushpa S. working the Magic

It felt like a bank robbery. Pushpa only winked at us and told us to enjoy the flight. We felt like it could be a mistake. We didn't want to ask any questions, so we just ran for the gate despite the fact we were 2.5 hours ahead of the departure time. But, nonetheless, we tempered our reaction until we were sitting in the two seats assigned to us. We didn't want to think we had the seats and then get to the gate and find out that they botched it and we were back with the rest of the herd.

The look of not believing it's true

To describe the Cathay Business Class section, let me put it to you this way. If God came down and said, “I can guarantee one of the two things for this flight. I could either guarantee that this flight you are on lands safely, or I could guarantee you a seat in Business.” I’m not kidding you when I say you have to think it over for at least 10 minutes. And after those ten minutes, I’m not sure what you would pick.

Shelly getting comfortable with the setup

This is me enjoying the seat as well as all the economy people passing us with envy in their eyes. Sure it's not the right thing to do, but I'm loungin'.

The seats went into a bed position. They gave you a down comforter. The food was outstanding. There were like 3 flight attendants that attended to your beck and call. This is the life I should be living daily.

One thing I love about Business on all airlines is that they have the ice cream sundae cart. Due to our all nighter, I missed ice cream sundae cart due to exhaustion. That's the rockstar way of saying I slept like a baby. I’m still torn up about this ice cream sundae fiasco.

However, I still managed to watch several episodes of 30 Rock (which has totally grown on me), even more episodes of Curb your Enthusiasm (which I’ve always loved), the movie The Dark night (which I love but still fell asleep during), the movie Bangkok Dangerous (which was as bad as expected but we were going to Bangkok, damnit), and a complete greatest hits of Michael Jackson songs. Also I kicked butt at Roulette on Al Casino’s. So yes, 16 hours on a plane allows you to try a lot of different things.

And in case you were wondering, "Is Kevin grateful to Bombay Sapphire?" I hope this picture gives you a clear answer. And the fact that we posed with Bombay Sapphire bottles at least 5 times a day during the trip.

Give me Life, Liberty, and Duty Free Bombay Sapphire!!

NEXT: Landing in Bangkok, getting to the Peninsula, and starting the tour.