Posted by Seth on December 13, 2009 under News | 
The negotiations of the USA-Japan open skies treaty have been ongoing for quite a while now. This latest round of talks, held last week, was actually extended by a day to allow for the final details to be ironed out since they were so close. And ultimately the deal that they struck seems to be a very fair and very good one for the airlines and for customers.
Tokyo Service
With the exception of Tokyo all destinations in Japan are now accessible with unlimited frequencies by all American and Japanese carriers. That is a significant step forward. The Tokyo market, however, is key to pretty much all service to Japan and the agreements reached on that front are quite interesting. Both airports – Haneda and Narita – will remain slot controlled due to the significant demand for service to those airports. And the number of slots that US-based carriers have at Narita will actually decrease a tiny bit. But there’s a good reason for that.
Tokyo’s Haneda airport – the more convenient and desirable destination for most passengers headed to Tokyo – is opening up to more international flights starting in 2010. Some of those flights will be potentially operated to the United States under this deal with as many as four daily flights permitted. That is going to be a very significant benefit for whichever carrier manages to secure those slots. There are a number of restrictions on the new Haneda slots, including late night departure times which aren’t particularly ideal. But it is better than nothing.
Anti-trust Immunity
There are some other interesting nuggets that came out of the agreement as well. Anti-trust immunity (ATI) will be permitted on the US-Japan routes for the first time ever. While there will still be specific applications required for such operations the ATIs will permit coordination of schedules, service and fares for partner carriers on routes between the two countries. The Star Alliance carriers of ANA, Continental and United Airlines are best position to take advantage of the ATI opportunities and they’ve already announced their intentions to do so. The three carriers expect to be able to better coordinate their offerings and streamline operations. In addition to the Star Alliance three, JAL will likely take advantage of the ATI opportunities once they figure out which suitor they’re going to dance with in the bankruptcy/bailout recovery effort. Both Delta and American Airlines are still pursuing the carrier aggressively and being able to apply ATI policies to the operations following whatever deal might be reached will be rather beneficial to whichever partnership comes out of that deal.
Extra Freedoms
Finally, both countries will be removing restrictions on fifth freedom routes. Fifth freedom flights are some of my favorites because the routes seem strange when viewed out of context. They are flights operated between two countries, neither of which the airline is based in, where the airline is permitted to sell seats only on that route. There are a number of such flight in Asia particularly, such as Air France flying between Bangkok and Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City. And there are a few in the USA, like Cathay flying from Vancouver to New York City’s JFK airport. As part of this agreement fifth freedom flights will the permitted without restriction by Japan or the United States. This is great for carriers that want to grow their route maps onward from Japan or the USA. These “add-on” segments generally help to make flights that might otherwise not be profitable happen, so there is an increase in service between markets. Plus there is the opportunity to grab the “other” flight generally rather cheap and have some fun flying on different carriers.
The loser on this bit is most likely Delta which acquired a number of route authorities ex-Tokyo when they bought Northwest Airlines recently. That purchase gave them a number of slots and authorities from Tokyo and now all the other carriers who desire such will be able to get in the game on those flights, assuming they can find the slots. Also, the third country will still need to approve the fifth freedom flights so it isn’t completely open, but there are many more opportunities now for many more carriers.
Mostly good, but potential gotchas
Overall, agreements such as this are generally a good thing for passengers. The increased opportunities for carriers to provide service generally means that where they think there is a market airlines will try, at a lower cost than if they had to buy route authorities to provide such service. The ATIs are always a bit of a toss-up as they essentially permit collusion and price-fixing between partners. As long as there are enough non-partnered carriers in a market that generally isn’t a problem but it is something that always causes a bit of apprehension as it can lead to higher prices due to less competition. Still, there’s a lot of potential good news out of this agreement. Now we just wait to see how it actually plays out.
Posted by Seth on August 24, 2009 under Uncategorized |
I love postcards. Really, really, really love them. I love sending them and I love receiving them. Sadly, however, it seems to be a dying art.
I seem to be alone (or in a rapidly shrinking population) in my love for the post card. They seem to still be readily available in some places but impossible to find in others. In Norway we were able to find (rather expensive) cards in the over-touristed town of Geiranger but stamps were another endeavor entirely. The hotels all simply have postage meters now rather than real stamps. The card will arrive just the same but it isn’t as much fun.
In Hong Kong I actually struggled to even find post cards. I asked at several hotels and looked in the various stores I passed as I wandered the island. None had cards. Once I finally found cards there was the next adventure – finding stamps. It wasn’t quite as difficult as in Norway, but it certainly wasn’t simple. Fortunately the cards all found their way to the intended recipients.
In India we had quite the adventure getting our post cards home. The post offices there are quite efficient normally and we actually weren’t too troubled with lines or even figuring out how much postage we needed to add to the cards. But the stamps apparently had no glue on the back of them like we’ve come to expect. We did our best with saliva and I’m honestly not sure how they actually made it back to all our friends, but they did. And we came out of it with a great story of wandering Goa and licking (and re-licking) stamps for a couple hours to get them on the way.
One of the current iPhone commercials these days is showing off their “app for that” for sending postcards. They have a picture of Paris and some “wish you were here” text and the person taps and it is sent. That just isn’t the same. Sure, at least one of those services (shootIt!) actually prints and sends a physical post card, not just something electronic, but you don’t get the fun of the random stamp, trying to figure out how much postage you need, the cool postmark from a foreign land and the anticipation of waiting for the cards to arrive at their destination. The fact that postcards generally arrive well after the trip is over actually adds to the fun for me.
There was also the discussion we had with the others in our group as we were on the fjords in Norway. Someone mentioned something about simply sending a text or SMS message when they’re abroad. There’s no sense of place from such an action. I’m not a fan at all.
I’m a huge fan of many things digital. I live online in many ways, both for work and leisure. But when it comes to travel there is still one bit that I’m happy to keep offline: my postcards.
Want to receive a random post card from somewhere around the world? No guarantees, but drop me a line and I’ll see what I can wrangle.
Posted by Seth on March 29, 2009 under Uncategorized |
First a loud bang, followed by a bright flash out of the corner of my eye, over by the window. Then another one. Not really what I was expecting sitting in the hotel room this evening while enjoying a bit of a siesta and getting ready to head out to dinner. So the wise-assed comment slipped out. The good news is that they certainly were not. It was an impromptu fireworks show, right outside our window. So I grabbed my camera and held down the shutter button:
The five minute long flurry was actually pretty impressive. Nothing close to the Hong Kong New Year celebration or a typical NYC show, but considering the fact that they were launched by some guy standing on the median in the middle of the road outside our hotel while traffic was still flowing normally and that they didn’t get up much higher than 100 feet in the air, a pretty good show. Certainly better than anything else I was expecting to see tonight.
Posted by Seth on April 8, 2008 under Uncategorized |
Oasis, the Hong Kong-based carrier that took on Cathay Pacific and British Airways on routes to London and Vancouver, is reportedly closing up shop today. It is already well into tomorrow in Hong Kong and the inbound flights appear to still be operating and the outbounds are still scheduled rather than cancelled at this point, but the rumors are running pretty strong that the end has come.
I’m really trying not to focus on all the bad in the airline industry these days, but when that’s all that is out there, it is hard not to…
UPDATE (4.9 8:33a EDT): It is official now. At least Oasis has rumblings of someone wanting to buy their assets to gain a foothold into the Hong Kong airline biz, but who knows if that really means anything at this point.
Posted by Seth on March 27, 2008 under Uncategorized |
A slightly surreal experience yesterday evening reminded me just how important it is to remember that we are really all in a global community now, not insular and isolated. And I didn’t even have to leave the island of Manhattan for this “trip.”
Standing in a deli on 68th & Broadway, waiting for my sandwich to be heated up, I overheard an older woman (typical stereotype – hunched over on the cane, barely able to speak loud enough to be heard, etc.) try to order a bit of provolone cheese to go. She didn’t want a sandwich or anything, just some cheese. The guy behind the counter wasn’t sure how much to charge, so he asked another guy, who asked another. None of them knew. Eventually one of them called out to the boss to ask what the price should be. The boss answered and all was well, or so I thought. See, the entirety of that conversation happened in Spanish, and the woman ordering her salad at the station between the boss and me was NOT happy about it.
This woman starts to lecture the boss about how he needed to speak English because the employees needed to learn English and how no one ever spoke to her immigrant parents in Croatian when they came over. She carried on for a couple minutes, while the boss was rather amused and kept brushing her off. He finished the conversation with a comment about freedom of speech and walked away from her, back behind the counter. I was still waiting on my sandwich and he saw me standing there and asked if I needed anything. I replied that I was all set and that I appreciated the free entertainment while I was waiting, to which we shared a calming smile.
All of the guys working there speak English. They all clearly knew what was going on, and they were rather shocked that this lady was so arrogant about the issue. I, too, was shocked that she was so caught up in the issue. I was tempted to offer to hail a cab for her to get her back to the airport to go somewhere she’d be more comfortable, but for some reason discretion seemed more appropriate at that point (which is strange for me) and I just let it go.
Looking back on it, I think of the various trips I’ve taken where language was an issue. There was the driver in Ecuador who spoke almost no English, and I speak almost no Spanish (at least not correctly) and yet we still managed to get by for an hour or so talking about his family and mine and our vacation and the things we’d seen and the plans for the rest of the trip. There was my trip to Hong Kong where there was plenty of English spoken, but this guy at the butcher shop didn’t speak any and I have no Mandarin or Cantonese (and couldn’t begin to guess which one he was speaking), but we managed to negotiate an arrangement that had me pay for taking some pictures of him and him not attack me with his large knife.
Moral of the story is that there are a lot of people out there who aren’t the same as you. And they probably don’t want to be the same as you. That’s what makes travelling to experience their cultures so enjoyable. Remember that when you’re on the road, and life will flow much more smoothly. Or you can be the obnoxious woman in the deli that no one wants to deal with.
Posted by Seth on February 13, 2008 under Uncategorized |
I love watching a city at night. The glow of the buildings always has a somewhat eerie quality to me, knowing that they are functional by day and artistic by night. Hong Kong is no exception; it is possibly one of the greatest cities to view at night, with a bunch of buildings lit up, a harbor in the middle with views from both sides and a light show every night.
Throw the Chinese New Year into the mix and you also get a phenomenal fireworks show to add to the fun. The 22 minute show featured 8 “acts,” all set to music. Some of the shells were “special,” showing the character for the olympics or a horse, representing the 2008 olympics and the equestrian events that will be hosted in Hong Kong later this year. They also had a bunch of “8″ shells, a lucky number in Chinese. Regardless of which shells they were, the skyline illuminated by the fireworks was an impressive sight.
I got out on the waterfront promenade at 4pm for an 8pm show, and it was already crowded. And the fact that it was the coldest New Year celebration in 12 years didn’t make it all that comfortable waiting the four hours for the show to start. But it was definitely worth it. I took 300+ pictures in the 22 minutes. These are some of the good ones, with more here.
This one is my new desktop wallpaper. Click on it (or any of the others) to get a larger version.
Posted by Seth on February 12, 2008 under Uncategorized |
One nice thing about visiting cities is that they generally have at least some mass transit options available. In the case of Hong Kong, the question was really what mass transit options weren’t available, not which ones were. There is the Airport Express train in from the airport, the MTR (subway/metro), trams, busses, green mini-busses (green = go) and red ones (red=stop; don’t use them) and the Star ferry back and forth across Victoria Harbor. In the five days I was in Hong Kong I actually managed to use all of them (and a taxi or two, for good measure), except the red mini-busses. The best part about the options in Hong Kong was the frequency of service. I never waited more than 3-4 minutes for the MTR or more than 10 for a bus or mini-bus. I never experienced the crazy crowds on the MTR, though I was there during a holiday period. Things did start to fill up more towards the end of the trip, and I can see how it would be very crowded, but with the frequency of service I’m not sure it’d be too big an issue.
Another nice thing about the HK transit options is that they all run on the same smart card system, called an Octopus card. It is similar to the system in place in Atlanta, Washington, DC and Chicago with a card that you can add value to as necessary and then just tap it on the sensor every time you get on or off one of the rides and the fare is deducted automatically. The card also can be used at all the 7-11 shops around town and a number of other retail establishments. You can get a card at the airport and use it for the duration of your stay. There is a HK$50 deposit that you get back at the Airport Express station when you get back to the airport. When you’re adding value to the card it is done in HK$50 or 100 increments, which I thought was going to leave me with some unused value on the card that would be part of my donation to the Hong Kong Mass Transit system. I was pleasantly surprised when I was actually given the cash back for the remaining balance, in addition to the HK$50 deposit, when I returned the card. When getting the card there are a few options, including a “tourist” pass that allows for three days unlimited use of the MTR in addition to a one way or round trip Airport Express fare. Thanks to a combination of jet lag, confusion and not paying attention, I didn’t realize that the unlimited was actually only for the MTR and not all the Octopus-enabled transit options, which left me in a very confused state trying to get off the tram at one point, though fortunately I did have the fare available in cash to avoid a real problem. I also managed to get an extra day of MTR rides somehow, I think, though maybe they don’t charge for the first day you ride the Airport Express, or maybe I got some special deal because I came in after 9pm or something. Still, at HK$70 for the unlimited MTR for 3 days, and the fact that you’ll get back whatever money you don’t spend, the tourist card is actually a pretty bad deal unless you’re taking a lot of rides (they’re ~HK$4-6 per ride in the main areas of town) or taking some longer rides each day. Others had told me that this was the case, and I should’ve listened to them. Lesson learned.
One thing I wasn’t prepared for is the size of the MTR stations – they’re huge. I think that the largest station in the NYC subway system is Times Square, with three different sets of tracks spanning a pretty large area underground; Hong Kong’s stations dwarf it by comparison. Each station has a number of exits all over the area where the stop is, which is great as you can pretty much stay inside to get to where you are going. On the down side, there are a ton of steps between the various levels and entrances and exits, making it rather difficult to navigate with luggage. Getting from the street on to a train platform could take up to 10-15 minutes it seemed, depending on which entrance you use and how many different levels of escalators you have to use to get there. There were a number of trips on the MTR where I think I walked farther to find my way to/from the trains than I would have if I’d just walked where I was going, though I’m sure that wasn’t really the case.
Posted by Seth on February 12, 2008 under Uncategorized |
My first few meals in Hong Kong were decidedly on the budget side of the ledger, with street food being a major component. After a few days of that, however, I decided to give some real restaurants a try. In the SoHo (South of Hollywood) neighborhood on HK Island there are several block packed with restaurants of just about every regional cuisine I could think of, and the mix of patrons was similarly diverse. I tried two of them, an Italian/tapas restaurant called enoteca and a steak place called CraftSteak.
enoteca has a lot going for it, including seats at the bar (my preferred dining location when on the road alone). Upon taking my seat I was surprised to see Prosecco draught:
I’m not sure why that is so impressive to me, but it is. Beyond that the menu is a collection of small plates – about 20 to choose from – ranging from garlic bread to steak cooked in a chili and garlic sauce (delicious and tender). There was a feta & zucchini something that tasted very little like feta nor zucchini, and the blackened salmon was prepared with a collection of spices that I’ve never experienced before, but it was all rather tasty. And, in a nod to the type of service I like to see, it was obvious that the bartender and the floor manager both knew their regulars and made sure they were taken care of. The prices were fair for the food provided and the overall atmosphere was definitely enjoyable.
Following that dinner would prove to be rather difficult. For me, CraftSteak was the attempt, just a few doors down from enoteca. I had a twinge of regret about eating there when I realized that there was no bar to sit at. Still, I took a seat at a table for one and settled in for my meal. The steak – an Australian ribeye – was delicious and cooked just right, which is to say barely at all. They also have a choice of ~10-15 different sauces that you can add to the steak, including a shallot butter that melted on top quite nicely. The appetizer and side dishes, however, were a bit blah. Considering the price I was a bit disappointed in the meal overall, but wouldn’t skip if I was looking for a decent steak and didn’t want the Morton’s or Ruth’s Chris experience in Hong Kong.
Posted by Seth on February 11, 2008 under Uncategorized |
A couple people told me about it, I’d read a bit about it online and I went in with pretty high expectations. And the men’s room at Felix’s bar on top of the Peninsula Hotel is absolutely, totally and completely that cool. While I was in there three women actually came in, past the protesting attendant, just to catch a peek. Basically the bathroom has one of the best views on the Kowloon peninsula, a floor to ceiling wall of glass almost thirty stories above the ground. The night I was there it was still a bit hazy, but the view was still pretty amazing. And, Yes, that is a urinal in the foreground.
You don’t have to actually buy a drink to visit the bar and see it for yourself. Actually, the bar is pretty small and crowded (though it also has decent views from its windows) and the drinks are on the pricy side so I wouldn’t plan on spending much time there at all, but it is completely worth going up the elevator ride to visit the loo.
Posted by Seth on February 7, 2008 under Uncategorized |
In addition to street food, there is something to be said for comfort food, especially when traveling. After 8 days in India, there was something refreshing about showing up in Goa, the old Portugese territory, and finding shrimp sauteed in butter and garlic on the menu. I’m certainly not far enough into this adventure to be really jonesing for some comfort food, especially when the street food is so delicious. Still, when one of my friends who lives here recommended a brunch place run by an American expat, and I had some time to kill, I decided to give it a try.
I’m sitting on a leather chair in The Flying Pan on Lockhart Road here in Hong Kong, enjoying Challah French Toast – and it is the real deal. The menu is decidedly American bruch, with eggs, waffles, pancakes, french toash, blintzes and all the breakfast meats you can handle. As an added bonus, there’s a reasonably well stocked bar and draft beer available.The food reminds me of a decent diner in NYC, though without the surly staff or extra grease normally included in an order.
This particular location is the second one they have here in Hong Kong, and it is in the middle of the Wan Chai neighborhood, which is known for the hostess bars, among other things, so I would assume that the business remains pretty steady even into the night; they are open 24/7/365 (why isn’t it 24/7/52? but that’s a different rant). They’ve got a juke box with a pretty good music selection and free WiFi, too.
Definitely worth a visit if you’re in town and looking for some comfort food. Don’t just take my word for it, either. The NY Times agrees, and so does this reviewer.
Posted by Seth on February 7, 2008 under Uncategorized |
I get the feeling that going to China for Lunar New Year is a bit like tourists coming to New York and sitting in Times Square for the ball drop on December 31st. The folks here are in to it, but I get the feeling that none of them are local. That being said, they put on a pretty impressive show for the celebration. Around mid-day the lion dance teams started performing. I caught a show at the Excelsior hotel completely by accident (right place at the right time, I suppose) and these guys did some amazing work. They were leaping all over the place, including up on to those platforms that were about 6 feet above the ground, and then jumping between them with coordination and accuracy that was quite impressive. The same troupe was also at a department store a couple hours later and in the annual parade at night.
Speaking of the parade, it was definitely interesting. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but for some reason Salsa dancers from Spain werent’ part of my expectations. Neither were the San Francisco 49ers cheerleaders nor the UCLA marching band and dance team.
I think I was expecting a bit more of this sort of stuff – local folks dressed up and dancing for the crowd.
Not quite local, this group is from Thailand:
It is the year of the rat, after all, so Mickey & Minnie were right at home in the parade.
Another local dance troupe.
And one last dragon to close out the show.
Happy year of the rat. May it be prosperous and joyous (at least I think that’s what they were all saying).
