Ah, air travel. It’s just superb at finding ways to annoy you. Halftime in the football I go to check in for my flight. The travel agent’s website gives me a check in reference, I find the Singapore Airlines site, go to their check-in page and it tells me the check in reference is the wrong format.
I find the booking reference for the whole trip, give that a go. It takes me to another page that asks for the same information, then rejects that booking reference.
I try the Virgin Atlantic site but their check-in form can’t find the flight. I log onto my frequent flyer account, look for the booking. It shows all three remaining flights and has a lovely big red ‘Check In’ button which I press. This redirects me to a page telling me that I’m on another airline, press this additional big red Check In button to check in on their site. I press the button, it takes me to the Singapore Airlines check in form. Déjà vu!
The Virgin page did though tell me an e-ticket number. Armed with this I try the Singapore Airlines form again. Nope, wrong format e-ticket number. I can get a different outcome if I enter the booking reference to get to the second check-in form then try and use the e-ticket number on that page. Instead of rejecting everything outright it tells me “Just a moment… we’ll take you there soon.”
It lies. It hangs on that page, a repeating image implying action, ‘errorKey=CKINGP4028’ in the page URL revealing the bitter truth.
The Singapore Airlines website does have a ‘Chat now’ button. I pressed it, was asked what my issue was, typed it in. A bot replied telling me the format of the e-ticket number. I replied that this wasn’t helpful and the bot asked how it could be improved. Singapore Airlines are not going to like my answer.
The football didn’t go so well either.
I slept through past 9, for breakfast drank the last of my cheap water, made sure everything was properly packed. My phone demanded a system update which it got, I’ll need it to tell me where to find my hire car and hotel in Australia.
I remembered that there should be four flights, not three. I checked the travel agent site, it shows four but two have the same check-in reference. I dropped them a note, just in case, although at 2am local time they’re unlikely to read it. I’ll have to wait for a response, but it’s nearly four weeks until the flight so plenty of time.
I check the dance schedule in Sydney, find out that I’m there on the only day all week there’s nothing on. That’s unfortunate but I can’t stay the extra night, I have a four hour drive through a national park to get to that night’s hotel. There is dancing on the 6th though, when I return to Sydney, and again on the 22nd though, when I get back from Papua New Guinea. So I do get to upset some Australians anyway.
My preference is to minimise public transport with a full suitcase. When the nearest stop is a half kilometre walk away and I’d need a change to get to the airport a $15 taxi feels great value for money. The driver was quiet, unusually not pointing out the sights of Singapore as we passed them. Maybe I was written off as a loss, flying away and offering no further contribution to his city.
His city has a dual carriageway to the airport, a broad central divide supporting extremely pretty trees for several miles. Shaped like an ice cream wafer, a triangle pointing down with a curved top, all different yet sharing that same attractive silhouette.
I got to the airport at around noon, plenty of time to check in for my 8.40pm flight. Check in was a pain, self-service kiosk to print a boarding pass, self-service luggage deposit. Getting into the departure area needed the boarding pass scanning, the passport, the boarding pass then a manual check of the passport. That doesn’t include any actual security checks, nobody’s taken a look to see what’s in my bag or my pockets.
Changi is a destination in its own right, set up to cope with passengers trying to get somewhere else, stuck in the airport for hours between connections. They offer a free movie theatre (but it’s closed all afternoon for maintenance), a free five hour tour of Singapore (which is tempting) and other attractions, such as the butterfly garden.
I have photographs of butterflies. Very pretty ones too. Unlike a butterfly house in the UK this one isn’t artificially heated, mesh netting the only barrier to the Singapore weather, offering a lovely warm humid environment for the butterflies. Offering a soaking for anybody stood there when it starts to hammer it down with rain outside. Luckily my camera is weather sealed, and survived.
The tranquility was broken by a family of five, the eldest still young enough to call, “Mummy mummy mummy! Look Mummy, look! Mummy, look!” Mummy feigned interest, the middle child broke clear then turned to his father.
“Look! My favourite butterfly! There, see.” The bush was full of them. He saw a second. “There’s another! Look!”
I think he saw the rest then, was awed into silence, the family stood there in the rain looking at damp butterflies, except the youngest who sat in a pushchair, looking disengaged until they left, kicking her legs high to clear the plastic chains stopping escaping insects.
The tour was fully booked until 4pm, technically not too late for my flight but pointlessly close. Worse, I found out that two of my reasons for coming to the airport early were in the public area, to which I could no longer return. They have a four storey slide (and adults can go on it) and in a different terminal a kinetic sculpture, a display in motion that I wanted to see. I shall use on of their feedback machines to share my disappointment.
I caught a train from Terminal 3 to Terminal 2, found another tour kiosk, another cinema, a row of playstation games consoles free to use, more shops, another garden, this one small and in the middle of the concourse.
This cinema was open but showing no films I was interested in, giving me time for a relaxed lunch and some coffee. I turned down the chance of a $38 burger and found what was described as Beef and Pepperoni Flatbread. Looked like a pizza, had jalapenos and cheese on it, good enough for me.
Another stroll through the terminal, another garden, yet more selfish selfie takers. This couple stood there for a while, he made to move off and she pulled him back, changed the phone to portrait and went for another three shots, needing a minute to frame each.
I begged a second from the man in the black fez (which is what his friend was wearing too, the plant growth sadly isn’t actually part of his hat) seeking to replace them, stepped up, took a photo, thanked him and left. It wasn’t hard.
The glass thing was in a garden with a pond, koi carp in this one.
Seeing a sign I went hunting for another garden, this one outside.
It gave me a chance to prove I was actually in an airport.
Happy to sit for a while I found a small cafe, a range of coffees on offer. Americano $4.50, cappucino or latte costing more, or a kipo for $2. I asked what that is, found out it’s the name for local coffee, served thick and black, optional condensed milk. It was a no-brainer, and I went for the condensed milk, no sugar. It feels weird that the nicer coffee is less than half the price – although airport staff get a discount, only $1 for them.
Back on the train to Terminal 3, a walk, flowers by the train to Terminal 1.
Another train ride and I was in there. This was the most dull of the three terminals but did have a nice outside area in to which I was followed by two armed men.
I think they went to see the cacti too.
Over a hundred varieties on display. No idea how they survive the torrential downpours.
Another train ride and I was back in Terminal 3, and I finally found the Koi pond.
Fishies! 🙂
Still over three hours to the flight so I found a cheaper burger (which I ate instead of photographing) and more coffee. I fear I may not sleep on the aircraft, which is unfortunate when it gets in at 7am.
I’ve now finished my book (Emma, by Austen. Moderately interesting for historical reasons, fairly bland otherwise, rushed and convenient ending), caught up on the world, posted my phone’s photographs, written all of this and it’s still 2 1/2 hours before I can go to the gate. In other words my best source of entertainment is the ever welcome people watching.
Chinese girls in pretty skirts, even the ones in cut off shorts wearing shin length lace over the top. Caucasian women in jeans, all taller, broader and heavier build than their Chinese counterparts. A man in a skirt chases a tiny girl in trousers across the concourse, her giggling suggesting she’s enjoying this. The white men are all in work shirts, collars and occasionally a jacket. The other men are dressed comfortably or in their national or religious attire, the geographical variety demonstrated by a sign on a stall in the toilets: “Caution: Squatting hole and water hose”. I didn’t go in to check.
A man sat next to me waits patiently for bitlocker to give him access to his laptop. At the next table an elderly man with white hair looks at me with suspicion so I hold his gaze until he looks away. Small children escape their parents and run to the carp pond, none of them falling in.
A man stands up to leave the cafe, the waitress thanking him for his custom. “Can I put this in your bin?” he asks, thrusting a manky banana at her. Whatever he’s done to it is uncertain but it drips on the floor, she takes it from him, puts it in his empty beer glass and walks off with that.
The airport is busy but never crowded, sufficiently large to hold the waiting passengers, plenty of nooks with comfortable secluded seating next to plug sockets. Apparently there are 360 stores between the terminals but they blur together after a while. Asian food, western food, electronics, clothes, duty free, expensive luxury items. Do people buy £12k watches at airports?
A reply from the travel agent, promising the flights are booked, blaming the airline websites. I guess I’ll find out on Christas Eve.
While it’s still daylight outside I’m going to post this as today’s update and include any boarding or flight related news or observations in tomorrow’s update. No hotel tonight, I’ll be sleeping on an Airbus A380.