I left Phoenix on Saturday, February 1st evening on a red-eye flight to New York City's (NYC) JFK Airport. The flight took less than 4 hours. I don't sleep well on planes so I did not get any sleep at all. Fortunately, JetBlue has DirecTV on the flight so it was easy to pass the time away.
We landed at about 6 am and as usual I take the AirTrain to the Jamaica Station, then take the E Train to mid-town and finally the No. 1 train to Shawn (my son) and Ella's apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, arriving at about 7:30 am. It's a very efficient way to go from the airport to Manhattan. The total cost of the trains is $7.50. Taking a taxi would have cost $60 and maybe save me 30 minutes.
After a couple of hours' nap, we were ready to have lunch with Cynthia's (my daughter) friends in Chinatown. When we got there, a Chinese New Year Parade was going on and we had to take a detour to get to the restaurant, called Sunshine 27 on Bowery Street. Chinese New Year was on Friday, January 31st. Three of Cynthia's close high-school friends have decided to move to NYC. They were all at Cynthia's wedding recently and I told them that I will let them know when I come to NYC. As evidenced by the crowd at Sunshine 27, this is a popular Chinese dim-sum restaurant. We had to wait for more than an hour to get a table. But, boy, did we eat! Since Christie, Alyssa and Jay have not tried real good dim sum, this was quite an experience for them.
We ordered so much food that we had to take some home. The best thing was the bill came up to only $61! I gave the waitress a $10 tip and she was elated. She kept wishing us Happy New Year! Being able to speak Cantonese with the restaurant staff was definitely an advantage. In typical Hong Kong style restaurants, it's normal to yell at the wait staff to get their attention. I certainly did my share of yelling to order the variety of food.
It was snowing on Monday morning when I walked out of Shawn's apartment to the subway station. I think this is where taking public transportation is an advantage because the taxis may be caught in a traffic jam during rush-hour, especially in the snow. The subway trains just move along as usual and I arrived at JFK airport in good time. It didn't surprise me when the South African Airways gate agent announced that we will be late boarding. There was quite a bit of snow already as you can see from the picture below.
After we boarded, we had to wait for the plane to be de-iced and then wait for our turn to take the runway. We were about 2 hours late departing JFK.
This is the longest direct flight I have taken - 14 1/2 hours. The plane flew across the Atlantic, then along the coasts of Europe, then Africa. The service was average for an international flight. I always use Singapore Airlines as the standard-bearer for airline service and so far no airline has been even close. Again, I was not able to sleep much on the plane but I kept myself busy watching the movies on the monitor behind the seat in front of me. This is a great way to keep passengers occupied. I remember the days when everyone has to watch the same movie on a large screen. Nowadays, you can watch movies, TV shows, listen to music or even play games on the entertainment system.
We landed at Johannesburg (JNB) O. R Tambo Airport at about 10 am (local time) on Tuesday morning. My first order of business after I landed and cleared through Immigration and Customs, is to find an ATM. I still see long lines at the Foreign Exchange counters. Even if they don't charge you a commission, the exchange rate is so low that you pay a very high fee to exchange money. I found a financial institution (Schwab) that has a no-fee ATM card and I use that exclusively when I travel outside the US. Before I leave, I make sure I deposit enough money in the account and let Schwab know what countries I will be traveling and using the ATM card.
The next thing I do is get a SIM card for my cheap phone. US mobile phone companies like AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, etc, lock their phones. This means that their phones can only be used for their network in the US. You can use their phones overseas but be prepared to pay a bundle. I bought this cheap phone for about $10 when I first went to Vietnam and it has been exceedingly useful when I am in other countries. You can usually get a SIM card for about $10, which gives you about 30 minutes of talk time. All I want is some way for the locals to get hold of me and for me to call a local number.
Now I am ready to leave the airport to go to my friend, Ashir's house. They have a modern train system that right now stops at only 3 stations. I called Ashir from the train station and when I get off at the last stop, Sandton, I waited for him to come and pick me up. Ashir and I met when we were both working for IBM in Vietnam. He was based in Singapore then, but he moved to Australia, and now has a 2-year assignment in South Africa (SA). I will be staying with him when I am in JNB.
As expected, I was very tired after I arrived at Ashir's house and took a 2-hour nap. I spoke to Mackenzie, another of Cynthia's friend, and we plan to meet tomorrow. I brought her some American snacks that she has been craving here. I have a few days in the JNB area before leaving on Monday morning for the first safari at Kruger National Park.
We landed at about 6 am and as usual I take the AirTrain to the Jamaica Station, then take the E Train to mid-town and finally the No. 1 train to Shawn (my son) and Ella's apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, arriving at about 7:30 am. It's a very efficient way to go from the airport to Manhattan. The total cost of the trains is $7.50. Taking a taxi would have cost $60 and maybe save me 30 minutes.
After a couple of hours' nap, we were ready to have lunch with Cynthia's (my daughter) friends in Chinatown. When we got there, a Chinese New Year Parade was going on and we had to take a detour to get to the restaurant, called Sunshine 27 on Bowery Street. Chinese New Year was on Friday, January 31st. Three of Cynthia's close high-school friends have decided to move to NYC. They were all at Cynthia's wedding recently and I told them that I will let them know when I come to NYC. As evidenced by the crowd at Sunshine 27, this is a popular Chinese dim-sum restaurant. We had to wait for more than an hour to get a table. But, boy, did we eat! Since Christie, Alyssa and Jay have not tried real good dim sum, this was quite an experience for them.
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| Dim Sum Lunch at Sunshine 27 with Cynthia's HS friends |
We ordered so much food that we had to take some home. The best thing was the bill came up to only $61! I gave the waitress a $10 tip and she was elated. She kept wishing us Happy New Year! Being able to speak Cantonese with the restaurant staff was definitely an advantage. In typical Hong Kong style restaurants, it's normal to yell at the wait staff to get their attention. I certainly did my share of yelling to order the variety of food.
It was snowing on Monday morning when I walked out of Shawn's apartment to the subway station. I think this is where taking public transportation is an advantage because the taxis may be caught in a traffic jam during rush-hour, especially in the snow. The subway trains just move along as usual and I arrived at JFK airport in good time. It didn't surprise me when the South African Airways gate agent announced that we will be late boarding. There was quite a bit of snow already as you can see from the picture below.
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| South African Airways plane that I flew on at JFK |
This is the longest direct flight I have taken - 14 1/2 hours. The plane flew across the Atlantic, then along the coasts of Europe, then Africa. The service was average for an international flight. I always use Singapore Airlines as the standard-bearer for airline service and so far no airline has been even close. Again, I was not able to sleep much on the plane but I kept myself busy watching the movies on the monitor behind the seat in front of me. This is a great way to keep passengers occupied. I remember the days when everyone has to watch the same movie on a large screen. Nowadays, you can watch movies, TV shows, listen to music or even play games on the entertainment system.
We landed at Johannesburg (JNB) O. R Tambo Airport at about 10 am (local time) on Tuesday morning. My first order of business after I landed and cleared through Immigration and Customs, is to find an ATM. I still see long lines at the Foreign Exchange counters. Even if they don't charge you a commission, the exchange rate is so low that you pay a very high fee to exchange money. I found a financial institution (Schwab) that has a no-fee ATM card and I use that exclusively when I travel outside the US. Before I leave, I make sure I deposit enough money in the account and let Schwab know what countries I will be traveling and using the ATM card.
The next thing I do is get a SIM card for my cheap phone. US mobile phone companies like AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, etc, lock their phones. This means that their phones can only be used for their network in the US. You can use their phones overseas but be prepared to pay a bundle. I bought this cheap phone for about $10 when I first went to Vietnam and it has been exceedingly useful when I am in other countries. You can usually get a SIM card for about $10, which gives you about 30 minutes of talk time. All I want is some way for the locals to get hold of me and for me to call a local number.
Now I am ready to leave the airport to go to my friend, Ashir's house. They have a modern train system that right now stops at only 3 stations. I called Ashir from the train station and when I get off at the last stop, Sandton, I waited for him to come and pick me up. Ashir and I met when we were both working for IBM in Vietnam. He was based in Singapore then, but he moved to Australia, and now has a 2-year assignment in South Africa (SA). I will be staying with him when I am in JNB.
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| Modern train to and from the airport |
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| Entrance to the train station |
I look forward to reading your African blog. I don't envision going to Africa myself anytime soon so this may be next to the best thing of being there myself. I am particularly interested in the latest racial relations in RSA, the beauty of the continent as well as the safari adventures. Have fun!
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like you are off to a good start! Keep the story going! Grant
ReplyDeleteTim: I've been watching that closely as well. I'll inject some observations and comments about race relations into some of my posts. I don't have enough right now to draw some patterns but I am starting to see some already.
ReplyDeleteGrant: Thanks for reading the blog.