Review of Turkish Airlines flight from Istanbul to Hong Kong in Economy

Hello everyone, welcome to the second part of the trip to Asia. This report will cover the flight from Istanbul to Hong Kong with Turkish Airlines. After we stepped out of the plane, we immediately found a FIDS and our connecting flight to Hong Kong was assigned at F17. That was the closest connecting gate I have ever experienced before. Our plane that took us from Munich would continue its flight to Bangkok later.

Our plane to Hong Kong. B777-300ER. TC-JJH delivered to Turkish Airlines in December 2010. This was also the same plane that took me from Istanbul to Hong Kong in 2019. It carries the name Rumeli.

There was no particular boarding sequence. Apart from the priority boarding, the rest was divided by seat number. I was sitting at 37K so I queued at the line for seat number 28-56.

The waiting area in front of the boarding gate.

At 1:16pm, boarding was started.

My seat 37K. The last row in the front economy class section.

Pillow, blanket, headphone and amenity kits were placed already on the seat.

View of the cabin during boarding. Like the previous flight, there was no air-conditioning and the cabin was very hot.

Back of the economy seat. Just like the previous plane, the printings on the screen button were already diminished.

View outside the window. There was a Turkish Airlines A350-900, TC-LGG waiting for its flight to Jakarta as TK56.

Pushback eventually started at 2:04am.

With some minutes of taxi, we took off from RWY36, which is located right next to the terminal.

Minutes after take-off, the cabin light was turned on. For long-haul flight, Turkish Airlines provides headphone instead of earphone.

I started to watch my first movie, A Quiet Place: Day One.

Menu was then distributed 15 minutes after takeoff. Menu contents were written in Chinese, English and Turkish. The were two choices for the first meal and only one for the breakfast before landing.

At the same time, the cabin attendant was giving out amenity kits again, this time I got the purple color. I was really surprised that I got two on the same flight.

Content of the amenity kit. This included a slipper, eye mask, earplugs, a pair of socks, 

About an hour into flight, dinner was served. I opted for the beef option with an orange juice.

At 4:20pm, I finished the movie and switched to the flightmap. We were flying over Caspian Sea. There were more than 7 hours of flight until we arrived in Hong Kong.

After the dinner, a bottle of water was provided.

Then I watched the second movie of the flight, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. A few minutes later I dozed off…

20 minutes later, I suddenly woke up and realised that the sky was getting much brighter.

I looked at the flight map, by this time we were flying over Turkmenistan.

Then I continued with the movie and about half an hour later, I noticed that the clouds below began to disperse and I could see the landscape below.

The Köýtendag Range at the border between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. 

Soon we entered the Northern part of Afghanistan.

some unknown towns in Afghanistan. Passenger in front of me was also taking pictures with his mobile phone, soon a cabin crew came by and asked us to lower the window shade.

While enjoying the movie and the beautiful landscape I started to get sleepy and slept for one and a half hour. At 8:07am, I woke up again and went to the lavatory.

Returned to seat and we were already flying over east India.

I also checked the aft galley for some snacks and drinks. The only thing available was the biscuit, and some water on request, which was quite disappointing.

At 8:50am, I slept for another 90 minutes and woke up again at 9:46am, the cabin light was turned on. I checked the flight map again, and we had just entered Yunnan Province in China.

30 minutes later, breakfast was served but there was only one choice. I opted for an orange juice as the complementary drink.

At 11:04am, our captain announced that we would be landing in 40 minutes.

Passing through Guishan Island.

Flaps down for landing.

Seconds before touching down. Total flight time was 9 hours and 24 minutes.

Reached our final parking position at gate 26

Total flight route. We flew through Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar and China.

Thanks for reading!