Click here to part 1
Click here to part 2
Welcome back with my trip to Hongkong! This time, I want to share the inbound flight to Indonesia from Hongkong (via Singapore) with SQ 857.
We took taxi from hotel in Causeway Bay area to Chek Lap Kok International AIrport. We arrived around 6.30 AM, and there weren't much activities in the airport, even SQ check in counters were not opened yet.
The FIDS near the check in area
We waited nearly half hour until the counters opened. When we were waiting, an agent opened "Web Check In " counter, so we could move there and processed directly. After checked all our luggages and got our boarding pass, we walked to immigration which weren't busy that morning.
We just walked around the mezzanine level (?) of the terminal, which have a lot of restaurants and Disneyland Shop, before went to the gate. I wanted to know which aircraft would take me to Singapore, so I walked to my gate.
This 14 years old Boeing 777 (9V-SQK) would bring me to Singapore
At the next gate, SQ1 from San Francisco have just arrived, and would depart to Singapore an hour later (one hour earlier than my flight)
I went to do some plane spotting around the terminal. There weren't much planes in early morning, mainly Cathay Pacific and Cathay Dragon
Garuda Indonesia, PK-GMN, preparing for morning flight to Jakarta as GA873
I went back to my gate, and saw SQ1 have just departed. At 8.25 AM, the ground crews started the boarding from PPS Club, Business Class, and Kris Flyer passengers first. The last group were Economy Class passengers. I was greeted by male purser and a Singapore Girl who wore green kebaya (The Leading Stewardess if I'm not mistaken).
I was surprised when I saw the seats, because it has different colors than before, and when I passed forward seats, I saw the IFE were the newer one, like in the A330. Yeahh!
Cabin condition were hot. I didn't know what happen with the air conditioner system, but it was like in sauna that morning.
After all passengers seated, the door closed. Not long after, the captain informed about the problems in the engines, so we couldn't depart on time, and must waited the mechanics team fixing the engines. The captain said sorry for 1 to 1.5 hours delay.
Cabin crews started distributing drinks for all passengers. They offered juices, soda, and water. When a stewardess arrived at my row, she didn't offer anything, and just gave us 3 glasses of water and walked away. I felt very dissatisfied with her. How can she just gave us water, even we haven't said what we want to drink?? Not long after, I called the crews and ordered Singapore Sling, and the male crew said he would delivered it to me after take off.
One hour passed, we were ready to take off. The plane started the engines and taxiing to the runway, which was quite far from the gate. I saw a lot of airplanes I've never met before, like SAS with A343, Delta, United, American AIrlines, HK Express, and the most beautiful narrow body airplane, Boeing 757 of Air Astana which taxiing together with my plane.
The plane took off from HKIA at 10.05 AM, exactly an hour late from scheduled 09.05 AM. The crews started the service with distributing menu, and a girl came to my seat with my Singapore Sling.
I started exploring the IFE, and chose to hear songs until the meal came.
As usual, there were 2 choices of meal: Seafood Bee Hoon and Omelette. I chose Bee Hoon, which was very delicious
My mom chose omelette
Cabin condition after the crews clear the meal
The lavatory were clean
We enjoyed ourselves with the IFE. My mom was very happy, because she could watch a movie with this kind of IFE, and so do I. I could say this newer IFE were sensitive enough, and as usual, the content were very complete.
The crews weren't as cheerful as my outbound flight. I didn't know what happened, but some of them looked cold and indifferent (like the girl who gave us water).
The flight itself went smoothly, no turbulences that morning. We started descending around 12.45 PM, and landing in Singapore at 1.30 PM, and parked at Terminal 3, beside "Big Mama"
The crews also ended their job here, they went home after this flight. My mom and I went to the transfer desk to check our connection flight with SIlk AIr to Surabaya.
Thank you for reading this report!
Kevin
ig: @kevin_jo00
HI,ITSKEVIN. Thank you for your report.
The refurbished seat seems much better than what you experienced on the inbound flight, and 3-3-3 layout in a low is even better.
I don't care much about the attitude of the cabin crew on the usual flight. However, I would be sad if I was treated as one of the cargo under such a stressful condition.