Dear Friends,
I have just flew into Sydney amidst a cold wintry afternoon after sitting alright for 7 1/2 hours via a Scoot flight from 2am to 10am. Sydney is two hours ahead of Singapore.
I guess for budget flight we will suffer somewhere somehow especially if its a long-distance flight of more than 5-6 hours.
If you decide to hop on the next Scoot flight to Sydney in future, do bring along an eye-shape as they kept the lights on for a good long three hours before dimming them off.
I didn’t bring one along so I was kept awake till 5.30am before they shut the lights off.
They kept the lights on as they were serving meals and drinks for those pre-ordered passengers and ordering ones.
I am surprised that the budget Scoot flights served a yummy chicken stew or nasi lemak so please pre-order the food but of course you can order them in-flight but you will have to wait a while for them to warm it up.
If you order them off the menu it costs you $10. Tea, coffee or any soft drink set you back by $6.
Tiger Air served mainly cold hard sandwiches so this is really a pleasant stomach warming surprise…
My bottled water was also confiscated at the security check point but I saw others carrying in empty bottles of their own.
I guess the trick is to bring in a empty bottle and fill it up with water on the plane. I saw many people doing that to save cost.
You can also buy a bottle of mineral water from them which costs around $6 I think.
As there is no inflight entertainment on budget flight, its good to bring along your Ipad to watch pre-downloaded movies to while away the time if you are those – like me - who can’t sleep on a plane.
Scoot is a God-send to me as I visit my family at least once or twice a year. I used to travel by Qantas previously which set me back by $1000 on a return economy ticket.
Now, I can save at least half that amount travelling by budget Scoot airline. If you can schedule your flight earlier, you don’t pay more than $220 one-way with meals and 15-kg luggage check-in.
Be warned however that the seats are rather narrow and stiff so please pay to pre-book either a aisle or window seat to get better leg/buttock room.
I tried to save some money by not pre-booking my Scoot seat and ended up sitting in between two big hulks.
On a sour note, the flight tends to have too many annoucement made on the flight system especially on fastening your seat belt whenever the sign is on and the one who made the annoucement also was pretty unsure initially on some of the messages.
Other than that, the Scoot crew was all professional and friendly – not an easy thing to carry out in the wee morning hour.
I also like their black-and-yellow uniform tee and when I saw their jacket later when they picked up their luggages at the belt – I thought that it was really cool.
Back to the Sydney front, temperature here hovers between 5 to 15 deg C mostly and today there is the promise of a rain which will add to the cold.
I am already sneezing alot and hope that I won’t develop a cold later!
I have also spent the entire day yesterday with my daughter as its her birthday and she had her first taste of wine out in a public place as we had dinner with a Singaporean friend who just flew in for a business trip.
Of course, the hotel staff checked her ID as she looks younger for her age.
Here people celebrated their 18th birthday like its’ their 21st back home in Singapore.
I will update you more when the days progress but its good to be back in Sydney as everything is so different from Singapore.
The space is there plus people tend to walk a little slower than Singaporeans.
I actually suffered from claustrophobia nowadays when I take our MRT trains as there is hardly any space even to move your toes.
People tend to stare into their IPhone or Ipad and there is hardly any eye contact with anyone anymore.
There is this feeling that even if you exist nobody cares…you also feel very lonely in crowded places as no one bothers about you at all.
Despite cries of racism in Sydney, I find that people here are more warm and they take time to talk to you however rudimentary it may be.
For example, yesterday I bought the wrong SIM card for my handphone as I was shopping for a pre paid package.
I bought the Telstra SIM card for the Ipad one instead and have to go back to JB hifi – a retail eletronic giant chain that sells all kinds of electronic stuff to ask for a replacement and the casher was all nice and chatty about it.
I have even tore open the SIM card package but they were more than willing to allow me to get the right one provided you show them the receipt.
If the same thing happens in Singapore, we may get a replacement but the process may be tedious and unpleasant.
Perhaps our stressful cutlure does not allow our kinder self to come out and be gentle with other human beings living around us.
I remembered getting harsher and colder towards others as I was pretty stressed up by things back home.
The congestion almost anywhere on land plus the sweltering heat do not help the situation one bit.
I would press the lift doors for people here but rarely did it when I am back in Singapore. It is as if my whole nature changes when I am in two different countries!
Its a me-first persona that is taking over the whole country right now and sometimes it can be scary.
I heard of the young man who pushed a old lady off a bus and the ah lian who fxxked up the old woman in our MRT train.
We don’t hear of such stuff ten years ago and I guess the social graces of our country are going downhill.
I am also catching up with old friends and hope to rejuvenate my inner self before venturing back home to Singapore later next month.
Frankly its a struggle to return sometimes as the pace is very much slower here and you take time to smell the flowers.
But home is still home and we can’t run away from that.
So long and take care for those living in Singapore…
Gilbert Goh
you said before you haven’t been working for the past 5 to 6 years, but you still have the money to travel abroad every year ….
Hi down under,
Most of my trips are sponsored by friends or well wishers.
The same went for this particular trip of which I am appreciative.
Based on my no-income work with the under-priviledged, there is no way that I can travel to Sydney to visit my family let alone buy an air ticket if someone or a small group did not chip in.
Gilbert Goh
Gilbert, hope all is well. You seems to switch off completely while flying for family reunion. How can we miss the most important subject day in day out? Are scoots cabin crew 100% from punggol, Tampines, Bedok yishun etc? I mean Singaporean lah. Cheers
Dont think Gilbert Goh need to explain for his personal activities and expenditures. So, Gilbert should not obliged to reply to personal inquiry.
patriot
Hi Gilbert,
Many Singaporeans would kill to have the privilege of living and working in Australia. Why don’t you set yourself up permanently in Sydney and forget about Singapore? Really, Singapore is a lost cause. It is so much better to ditch her and start over in another land no matter how tough live in a foreign land may be. I’m sure being away from your wife and daughter must be hard at times.
kanga
I think he is trying to get PR status in oz (just like his family members who are already PRs in oz).
I do not foresee any hindrance. Securing a PR in Oz for Gilbert is just a matter of time.
He can qualify easily via the Family sponsorship category. Life will be well taken care of by the “chenghu” there and he need not worry where his next rice bowl is going to come from.
He is in an envious postion compared to many of us here who have to struggle and work till we drop dead unless we have loads of wealth to back up our retirement years.
I would gladly swop my SG paasport for an OZ one if I can. Regrettably, it is too late for me to intiate an application under the skilled category because of my age and I don’t have the $$$ to pursue my dreams under Buz category. I can only count on my children to fulfill my dreams and that is provided they are willing to help this poor old dad here.
I thought of NZ but the flying time is 10 hrs away. I flew to Auckland twice previously vis Jetstar to get a feel of the culture and lifestyle there. It’s a truly cosmopolitian city and for a moment or two, it appears as if you’re in an Asian city given the large concentration of Asian migrants there – Chinese, Indians, Philipinos and Koreans.
The long flying time is a deterrent. Given a choice, I prefer Perth or Darwin which is less than 5 hrs away from SG.
Do we need to pay for plain water only if we bring our own empty bottles to fill up? Or do we go to the toilet to fill the bottle with tap water? Can we bring our own sandwiches or tibits/ biscuits? Just curious. I haven’t been on a budget flight before. I haven’t been out of sg for the past 10 years. No $$ no travelling.
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