Tag: flying

Flight shaming is taking off?

Flight shaming is taking off (nice pun), can travel be more ethical? Is something I read and think about quite a bit (the flying bit of course).

I’m guilty of flying a lot, for example a few months ago I flew to Amsterdam and back in the same day. Besides it being a bloody long day, I did spare a thought about my carbon mileage for the day. I did fly on one of those e propeller planes there and back, which I gather is better than a jet airplanes? But the flight shaming isn’t going away.

I think its a balance of understanding and conscious decisions. I agree with the writer of the guardian piece, that a family of 4 on a train to Spain isn’t at all practical and I personally can’t think of a better way to get there with kids. Yes going somewhere local is a nice idea but thats ignoring the cultural benefits of going to other countries.

Weirdly enough this came up in Re:publica, which I need to blog about fully. Johan Rockstorm’s talk was super sobering and someone asked him how it got to Berlin for the conference (maybe consciously or non-cons iosuly) flight shaming him.

He’s reply was good and balanced.

…so how can you get you know the world to transport itself in a sustainable way I think that the that the solutions is therefore not to go out and simply say stop flying I mean that that would be like the only message because I think that that just just creates a deeper rift between the aware environmental movement and everyone who just says oh no I’m not gonna I’m not gonna sacrifice that and therefore I rather put my head in the sand and and create my own little fake news story of something that will somehow make this not happen so therefore I think the solution for us to succeed to really have even the in does indifferent majority to surf along with us is to you know show that sustainability is the entry point for a better life that we can achieve better quality of life not just through by consuming and unnecessarily flying when we don’t need to yeah of course of course as in all forms of excessive consumption…

I’m actually in Tokyo

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It feels like I have only been in Tokyo for less than a day but gone through so much already.

The flights were great. I left Manchester airport about 2pm on Wednesday then got a flight to Dubai airport on the Airbus A380, which I didn’t know till then, is one heck of a plane! I went economic/standard class but bagged myself the front exit row with nobody sitting besides me. While flying above London, I discovered Free Wifi and in chair usb and mains power! Well as you can imagine, I was set. The Free wifi was free up to 10meg but after that it was 80p for 500meg, which isn’t bad seeing how its “WIFI on a motherfcuking plane!”

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Anyway once we hit Dubai, it was time for a change to a boring/boeing 777. Exit row and wifi again but only USB charge this time. I did grab some food at Dubai which was a good time to try my allergy card. It worked as they changed the menu item from a nutty teriyaki chicken into one without a trace of nuts (replaced them with garlic).

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The flight to Tokyo was ok (bit of crap after the epic A380) and I did manage to get a bit of sleep here and there (more like 2hours over all). Wifi was available but very sketchy and when crossing China, they had to turn it off. By the time we hit Japan I’d lost about a day and half it felt like, as it was Thursday night. I unfortunately got pulled to the side and had my luggage searched by customs. My thoughts was the new luggage was too big for a 2 week holiday. Funny enough they were not interested in my laptop bag at all.

14 day JR Pass, pocket wifi (myfi) and Rebecca all crossed off the list, we headed to Tokyo on the train. Finally found the Airbnb host (swear we were wondering for about 20mins) who did a little tour of the neighbourhood before showing us the place. Still pretty hungry we went out looking but most places seemed to be shut or shutting. In the end we ended up at a store buying bits and Rebecca cooked something veggie and I popped some already cooked plain chicken into it. Pretty much went to bed as I was dying on my feet. I don’t know if I got lucky but I slept right through till midday on Friday, while Rebecca got up at 8am I think? I somehow switched to Tokyo time over the two flights.

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Today when I got up we wondered around the area and decided to check out Shinjuku. Didn’t really get a chance to check out the shops but I did have my first proper off the menu meal in Tokyo. It was ok, more a starter than a main but I guess its kept me going till 9pm ish. No allergic reaction and the allergy card worked. Also finally spent some Yen (I bought stuff with my card in the shop before)

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Now time for dinner… this will be interesting!

Off to the land of the rising sun

And the craziest crossing in the world… I actually won’t be staying that far from there even.

Sometimes I wonder…

I’m currently sitting in Manchester airport terminal 1 (at Starbucks) waiting for the flight to Dubai’s gate to open. Sucking down on a tall mocha frappichino, while considering what I’m about to do.

7hrs to Dubai and then 7hrs to Japan, that’s a lot of flying and its the reverse of my preferred way to fly the earth (prefer east to west). I’m very conscious I know little to no Japanese and may have checked in too much stuff for a 2 week trip (26kg in one suitcase).

The accommodation is a worry as its airbnb and although I have hosted people, I have never actually stayed somewhere let alone the other side of the world! I feel slightly in prepared for the culture shock and the problems I face with food allergies. I keep saying if I had a little more time? But there will never be enough time, isnt this the point?

Regardlessly I decided to just do it and theres many reasons but mainly the importance of living life. How ironic that its almost 5 years since my brush with death.

Anyway time to stock up on chewing gum (makes the descends bearable on my ears) and some food for the flight (you don’t want an allergic reaction on the flight)

Bon voyage! I’ll hopefully be tweeting and posting to flickr.

53° 21.681 N -2° 16.515 W

The mistletoe drones are a lie?

https://twitter.com/cubicgarden/status/545687613475405824

So me and Claire were expecting buzzing flying drones in TGI fridays tonight. However we were told the flying mistletoe drone happens only once in a while when the guy who flies it is available.

This means the bet laid down to me by Tom Morris, looks like it won’t happen now. Don’t worry I enjoyed a nice dinner with Claire and heck I even paid… yes shock horror! I remember last time I did that as I was telling Claire.