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Well, so far, so good. I made it to Doha International Airport in Qatar without incident, after about 12.5 hours in the air. It was both my first flight with Qatar Airways, and my first visit to the country itself.
I was ultra thankful, as per usual, to have an aisle seat. The plane was huge, with 9 seats across in a 3-3-3 configuration. When boarding, we walked through a small business class section that was SO NICE. Fully reclining seats, TONS of leg room, general fanciness. One day.
I was a little concerned when I saw that of the 15 seats in my immediate proximity, SIX were filled with children under the age of 6, but it turned out okay. The babies in front of me and behind me took about two hours to settle down and stop crying, but after that it wasn't bad until about the last 30 minutes. There were three babies under the age of one, a three year old, a four year old and a five year old. The four year old boy and the five year old girl became friends across the aisle and were very cute and entertaining. And when I wanted to block any of the kids out, I could simply tune into the "Oryx Network" which was a totally awesome in-flight entertainment system that reminded me a great deal of Korean Air.
Every seat on the plane had a personal, seat-back, touch screen TV with a remote. You could choose from over 200 movies (in tons of languages), a crapton of TV shows (they had full seasons of shows like Big Bang Theory, Friends, and Community, just to name a few), or games (3D, arcade, cards, and more). IT IS AWESOME. I watched Dark Knight Rises, which I had never seen and watched/napped through Perfect Pitch and Hotel Transylvania. I also watched a few episodes of 30Rock. It was great! They also had a ton of music stations, but I didn't even check out that part. There was more video entertainment than you could go through on 10 flights, let alone one, and it was wonderful.
Just as the plane was about to take off, I was super excited, because in my row of three I was the ONLY one there. I kept my excitement under control as I asked a flight attendant whether or not the flight was full (almost) and finally heard the announcement that everyone was on board and the doors should be shut. COULD IT BE?! An entire 12.5 hours without anyone in my row?! Nope. A woman and her grown daughter, from the exact same seats about four rows back, had asked the flight attendant if they could move. I was not in an emergency exit row, or bigger/better row of any kind, and I'm still not sure why they had to rain on my parade and steal my free row. I grew even more bitter when halfway through the flight I walked back to the bathroom and passed the man who had been left behind, now stretched out sleeping across his entire row. GRR.
Anyway, even with a full row, I probably slept about 5 hours overall. At the beginning of the flight they come around with three stickers and you pick one that applies to you to stick on the back of your seat. They say "Wake me for meals!", "Wake me for duty free shopping!", and "Do not disturb!". It is genius. I chose to be woken up for meals, so sleep was interrupted every few hours as they came around with the cart. We had three meals:
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| Step 1: DC (red) to Doha (orange). Step 2: Doha (orange) to Nairobi (yellow). |
Well, so far, so good. I made it to Doha International Airport in Qatar without incident, after about 12.5 hours in the air. It was both my first flight with Qatar Airways, and my first visit to the country itself.
I was ultra thankful, as per usual, to have an aisle seat. The plane was huge, with 9 seats across in a 3-3-3 configuration. When boarding, we walked through a small business class section that was SO NICE. Fully reclining seats, TONS of leg room, general fanciness. One day.
I was a little concerned when I saw that of the 15 seats in my immediate proximity, SIX were filled with children under the age of 6, but it turned out okay. The babies in front of me and behind me took about two hours to settle down and stop crying, but after that it wasn't bad until about the last 30 minutes. There were three babies under the age of one, a three year old, a four year old and a five year old. The four year old boy and the five year old girl became friends across the aisle and were very cute and entertaining. And when I wanted to block any of the kids out, I could simply tune into the "Oryx Network" which was a totally awesome in-flight entertainment system that reminded me a great deal of Korean Air.
Every seat on the plane had a personal, seat-back, touch screen TV with a remote. You could choose from over 200 movies (in tons of languages), a crapton of TV shows (they had full seasons of shows like Big Bang Theory, Friends, and Community, just to name a few), or games (3D, arcade, cards, and more). IT IS AWESOME. I watched Dark Knight Rises, which I had never seen and watched/napped through Perfect Pitch and Hotel Transylvania. I also watched a few episodes of 30Rock. It was great! They also had a ton of music stations, but I didn't even check out that part. There was more video entertainment than you could go through on 10 flights, let alone one, and it was wonderful.
Just as the plane was about to take off, I was super excited, because in my row of three I was the ONLY one there. I kept my excitement under control as I asked a flight attendant whether or not the flight was full (almost) and finally heard the announcement that everyone was on board and the doors should be shut. COULD IT BE?! An entire 12.5 hours without anyone in my row?! Nope. A woman and her grown daughter, from the exact same seats about four rows back, had asked the flight attendant if they could move. I was not in an emergency exit row, or bigger/better row of any kind, and I'm still not sure why they had to rain on my parade and steal my free row. I grew even more bitter when halfway through the flight I walked back to the bathroom and passed the man who had been left behind, now stretched out sleeping across his entire row. GRR.
Anyway, even with a full row, I probably slept about 5 hours overall. At the beginning of the flight they come around with three stickers and you pick one that applies to you to stick on the back of your seat. They say "Wake me for meals!", "Wake me for duty free shopping!", and "Do not disturb!". It is genius. I chose to be woken up for meals, so sleep was interrupted every few hours as they came around with the cart. We had three meals:
- Dinner: Lamb with couscous, Tillamook cheese (random!), crackers, coleslaw of some description, and cheesecake
- Lunch: A tuna salad sandwich
- And breakfast: A fritatta with chicken sausage, mushrooms and homefries, yogurt, fruit
As well as various drink breaks. The stewardesses were all very sweet, and it was one of the most multi-cultural crews I have seen in a long time. Overall, it was pleasant and uneventful, which is just about all you can ask for on a long-haul flight.
When I arrived in Doha we were whisked off on a bus ride to the transfers terminal. Apparently this airport is undergoing renovations, but it is pretty nice as is. After weeding my way through a large, duty free shopping area and some relatively loud seating areas, I chose to splurge and pay 140 QAR ($39.40 at today's exchange rate) to gain entry into the Oryx Lounge. Worth it. WiFi, comfy chairs, nice bathrooms, showers, free food and drinks including coffee, tea, water, squee little sodas (the cans are only 5oz! so cute), and lockers to store your stuff. I figured that since I was going to be here for like 6.5 hours it was a good idea to hunker down a little bit. Having eaten, video chatted with my mom, caught up on Facebook, etc, I am basically just waiting for a locker to free up so I can stash my stuff, take a shower and relax until my next flight boards at around 1:00am local time.
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| View from my first seat overlooking chairs and tables in the Oryx Lounge. |
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| The new view after I migrated to tables closer to the food and drinks. |
To be truthful, even 20+ hours into my journey, it still doesn't feel real quite yet. I imagine it probably won't until I start work, and then it will feel even more real when I get to move into my bedroom at the end of the month. Until then, I'll just try and maintain my flexibility and enjoy every moment.
*******WILDLIFE FUN FACT*******
If you're anything at all like me, you might have been wondering what the heck and oryx is. Having seen the logo (pictured above) I knew it was some sort of antelopey-deer thing, but I wondered why an animal I associate more with savannahs and eastern Africa was doing as the mascot for Qatar Airways. Turns out there are 4 different kinds of oryx, and one, the Arabian oryx, is native to the Arabian penninsula, including Qatar. In fact, when Doha hosted the 2006 Asian Games, they chose an oryx named "Orry" as the mascot. Learn something new every day.
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| Totes adorable. |
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