I’ve been on the road and in the air many a times, but on a party flight, it was my first! I’m waiting to get the few hours of sleep time which I can eat into and post all I want to tell you guys here, and it shall happen soon. But for those who want to gather all the live action, Gary Leff from View from the Wing is blogging all at www.megado.com/blogs! So go ahead and find out about the party in the air which happened DFW-SEA-LAX. Including a 2-hour tarmac delay when we all boarded SEA-LAX and the flight needed a new part to fly next segment. AA was a gracious host, the beverages were flowing and we cancelled the meal service, with the AAdvantage President Susanne Rubin on board! No one was complaining since everyone was engrossed in the charity auctions, and this delay allowed for a few more swipes on the credit card machine before we wheeled-up.

A quick update on the swag giveaway I rolled out before leaving home. It is still time till I get back to my home, and you can participate at this post here.

I am adding new prizes to the giveaway. Which means more random.org drawings to pick more people for the prizes. Here are the original prizes which were going out:

  1. A full set of MegaDo swag
  2. A Fly-for-Cure t-shirt from the MegaDo

The new prizes on board are:

  1. An Admiral’s club day pass, which you could also use to get 100$ off your membership if you signed up there
  2. A oneworld lapel pin

And, like always, I reserve the right to add more goodies to the bag. So go on, and get your chance at this goodie bag by participating here.

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Revealed at the OWMD was the new cabin of the Boeing 777 that will be taken up by AA soon. All I can say is this is going to be swanky!

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The entrance to the B777300 with a self serve galley
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An improvised first class flagship suite with a 17 once IFE
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The new biz class

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More comforts in coach!

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After a lovely welcome by American Airlines, a little party in the Flagship Lounge at JFK, a shower at the American Airlines Arrivals Lounge in LHR, we were all set to go over to British Airways. We received an interesting email a few days ago from BA, which had a boarding pass in a PDF file. I got seat 2A, I am sure they looked me up from my handle on MilePoint and Flyertalk which is A2A!

Some of us wanted to check out if we could check in at Terminal 5, LHR. Here is what they got Winking smile

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But we sure did manage to check-in on the staff bus of British Airways and find our way to the Waterside HQ of the airline.

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We were checked in using our boarding passes by some very smartly attired British Airways crew.

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After a quick cuppa, we were all set for a few sessions with British Airways executives. And yes, there were about 50 of us out there!

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British Airways gave us an update on their plans for upcoming years and how they were reinvigorating their product and services to bring back the touch. In my opinion, to appoint a person from the hospitality industry with about 25 years in the bag of working with IHG and the Jumeirah group (DXB) should help the airline bring the service element back. Yes, that is Frank van der Post, the MD of Brands and Customer Experience.

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British Airways has been actively working to bring the customer experience together, what we call, convergence in today’s world. They’ve been working to empower the flight attendants to know about your prior experiences with BA and your preferences via iPads that are being rolled out across the board, so that the consistent brand experience can be provided.

Read More…

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The American Airlines flight AA 104 was uneventful at the back of the plane, with a largely empty cabin which accommodated a lot many passengers from the MegaDo bunch onto their own fully flat seats by occupying a whole row to themselves. All the action was in the First Class where there was a special [...]

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As soon as the Finnair presentation got over, there was a light reception, this one, at ‘ The Bridge’, where JFK based crew of American Airlines were invited to participate along with the attendees of the MegaDo’s Transatlantic trip in London. There was food, music and a lot of good chat. But then you already [...]

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I am used to being pampered by the airline I fly a lot, and they’d accede to  my demands sometimes. But to have an airline go all out to make an impression is  a little different. American Airlines is the backbone to the inaugural oneworld  MegaDo, and they are up to their best behaviour on [...]

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The MegaDo is a sea of aviation experiences, or so am I told. And to come into the MegaDo will be marked by experiences like the British Airways Denial of Service and a fuel-stop on a non-stop flight was only symbolic. I was reading a few days back on the Wall Street Journal that Transatlantic [...]

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I was at Mumbai Airport (BOM) earlier today, to take the first leg of my flight to New York. Middle of the night flights are quite my forte, but it turned out that this time my usual flight to Brussels 9W228 was taking off at 03:00 AM. The schedule to bring it to BRU late [...]

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Its here, tonight. I’m off to my 28,600 miles, ten days, nine airports, meet three airlines and make 171 new friends trip and it is called the oneworld MegaDo. I’ve been chronicling my preparation for the MegaDo over the past 10 weeks, and you all could read it here. It should be exciting, and I’ll learn a [...]

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If you read the visa word and came over, take note this is not a credit card hawking post. Just a simple rant! Now that we have that out of the way, lets begin. For the upcoming oneworld MegaDo, I signed on for the optional segment across the pond in London. A few days ago, [...]

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A lot of ink has been spent worrying about Indian airline companies in the past few months, with all the $ costs of their plane leases, jet fuel and other expenses going up 20% on one side for no fault of theirs, and they being forced to sell tickets on a low cost to compete [...]

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