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Spiderguy252 Member
Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 4259 Location: Indian Ocean
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Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 4:36 pm Post subject: Jazeera Airways KWI-BOM |
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Sorry that this is another picture-less TR. I have been flying the KWI-BOM sector quite often over the past few weeks, so I've used quite a few carriers, including EK and WY. Both those flights were not great so I was hoping that this J9 flight would be good.
INTRODUCTION:
Many of my friends in Kuwait fly to India regularly and Jazeera seemed to be a convenient option for most of them of late. With Jazeera you could get a KWI-BOM ticket for as low as KD 33/- (1KD = Rs. 145 approx.). I had not flown an LCC in my whole life so I decided that this would be my first time. I booked the tickets online; they have a simple and efficient website, for KD 41/-, for the 27th of June. The ticket told me that the flight would depart KWI at 11:59PM(weird!)
CHECK-IN:
I arrived at KWI 2:30 hrs before departure and checked in immediately. Jazeera has a separate section of KWI's for all its flights. It has a fleet of 5 A320 aircraft and has ordered 30 more. The Jazeera class check in counters were coloured in Teal and the Jazeera Plus check in counters were in Purple.
The queue was long even though there were as many as 20 counters. When i looked up at the departure board, there were J9 flights to COK, BOM, DXB, Beirut and Cairo.
I was finally directed to Counter#3; the check in agent was a smiling Kuwaiti man, presumably in his 40s. After placing my 20KG suitcase on the belt I saw a brochure on the counter. It was a check in complaint and suggestion form for J9. Neat, I thought!
Within a couple of minutes, the agent handed me my boarding card and said:
"Enjoy the Jazeera Airways experience"
BOARDING:
Since I had over 2 hours to kill, I took a walk around the airport. KWI can be a boring place, especially if you have been there for 14 years. True, the airport authorities have tried to create a mall like atmosphere, but it's just not the same as DXB.
I walked into Debenham's and bought "Good Morning Revival", a CD by Good Charlotte for KD 2/-.
By now, all the Indian flights of KU were starting to board and final calls were starting to play overhead. I then decided to complete immigration and have a meal in Pizza Hut or McDonalds at the other side of Immigration.
Immigration at KWI is usually a speedy experience and I managed to finish it in 5 minutes. I then looked up at an LCD TV showing individual departures outside a cellphone store. My flight was displayed with the departure time being 12:20. Underneath was a message:
"This flight has not been delayed. It has merely been advertised as 11:59 in your ticket so as to prevent confusion between night and day"
All gates were packed and the final departure calls were starting to hurt my ears. KU has these golf carts used to transport late pax. One of them, like me was making it's way to Pizza Hut. The Arab in it was shouting:
"Kuwait Airways Momby Final call Momby Momby!"
The 10 Aerobridged Gates in KWI were packed to capacity, with KU flights to BOM, DEL, MAA and HYD; an EK 773ER had just come in from DXB; in addition there was also a J9 about to leave for Cairo; an LH to FRA; KU to BKK/MNL; and a UA 777 to IAD. I sat watching the UA pax get off as I ate my Chicken Pizza.
11:30 and I was starting to get worried, none of these planes had left the gate save for the KU to HYD. an EY 320 had replaced it. I was expecting the departure board to announce a delay but it read "Scheduled".
Just then 2 KUs to BOM and DEL, a B777 and an A300 had left, and I thought my J9 aircraft would fill one of these gates, #24 and # 26, but I was wrong. An IC 320 (in the old livery) and an AI 310(obviously in the old livery) had filled these positions at the same time. I was kicking myself for not having carried my camera in hand baggage. My cellphone did provide me with some low quality pics though. In between these , at Gate #25 was a KU 310 to MAA.
At 12 Midnight the KU left delayed by over an hour and finally a J9 had come in from Damascus. The AI and IC on either side were flying to COK and GOI-MAA respectively. At this point, the Departure hall seemed like it had more people than the population in China and the LH 332 had apparently gone tech. so that was 9 gates left for a/c now.
At 12:20 AM, scheduled Departure time (well you can say that), we were allowed to enter the gate(25). The gates at KWI are extremely small and can't seat more than 50 pax. But luckily this was an A320, so it wasn't that crowded. Two sleepy pilots entered the aircraft soon after and I was hoping they wouldn't fall asleep mid flight like on AI and fly me all the way to MAA
At 12:40 AM, came the first Boarding Call for Jazeera Plus passengers. Many pax had got up and began charging at the door but halted when they heard the word "Plus". They blinked and sat down embarrassed.
Just when the J9 Plus pax started boarding, the AI and IC aircraft left the gate simultaneously, just like they had come . Now that's called a merger!
At 12:45 AM, it was our turn to Board and, heck, there was this stampede as usual, but we managed to get outside the aerobridge, where there was a long queue. The boarding cards were put into a machine and the stub came out the other side, some contraception I have only seen at KWI. 2 minutes later well inside the aerobridge, I heard this animated conversation behind me:
A: Are we using a Bus?
B: No Dummy, this leads to the plane
A: Precisely what I meant! Airbus
We finally managed to enter the A320 and were warmly welcomed by the cabin crew, who offered to stow your cabin baggage into the overhead bins. There were 3 rows of Jazeera Plus seats in the front. After entering the Jazeera cabin, I realized that the Jazeera Plus seats were not different at all! The seat pitch was the same, the legroom was the same, the only difference lies in the fact that the centre seat is a coffee table, and you get a light snack. That's a rip off considering the prices are close to a hundred bucks!
I was allotted 16D, an aisle seat, A maid later occupied 16F.
IN-FLIGHT
At 1:00 AM KWI started to empty a bit as no aircraft had come in to fill Gates #24 and #26. We began push back and safety instructions were played on drop down LCD screens, in English and Arabic. There were 4 FAs for the flight, 3 Filipino and 1 Indian. 1 Filipino was the head FA and she was dressed in Purple, the others in Teal. AFter the security instructions had ended, she picked up the PA and said that it would take 3:45 hrs to BOM, enjoy the service, and they speak Hindi, English, Tagalog, Telugu, French, Japanese, Urdu, Arabic, Persian, Malayalam, Tamil, German, Spanish and Kannada. 4 FAs!
Cabin lights were switched off. The captain made a quick announcement. We were closely tailed by the UA 777 as we taxied to our runway. The sole lights in the cabin came from the LCD screens were there was a 3D Airshow. Dotted lines joined KWI and BOM, and a Jazeera 320 kept taking off and landing at BOM when the sky lightened up. Clever! Moreover, there were monsoon clouds over BOM in the map.
We were 2nd in line for take-off, behind the EK 773ER. At 1:20, we finally pulled on to the runway and began our take off run, as we passed by the aircraft that had followed us, I saw a/c that I had never seen in the terminal - a 9W 737, a GF 320, and another EK 332.
The absence of the cabin lights meant that you could get a good view of Kuwait City and all the skyscrapers. Shortly after, as we pulled into the Persian Gulf the lights came back on and the Airshow showed the aircraft static off the coast of Kuwait. The camera circled around it. The Indian FA came on line and made a quick announcement in Hindi and said that headsets were available for 0.500KD and that there were 12 Audio and a movie on the LCD, which would be Om Shaanti Om.
Now I really didn't want to see Om Shaanti Om for a third time but everybody who had flown Jazeera had told me about the amazing headsets they sold on board. I bought a pair, and listened to some music.
These headsets were top quality, something SQ could be proud of. They latch on to your ears, and the aircraft noise drains out immediately, like you have become temporarily deaf.
The seat was cleverly designed, with a hammock headrest. The pushback was great and legroom spacious. The pillow was conspicuous by its absence, but what do you expect from an LCC?
30 minutes into the flight, the Indian male FA and a Filipino female FA came around for selling food. Prices were pretty reasonable but I had eaten enough at Pizza Hut, so I declined.
I then visited the toilet, there were a couple at the back. On the way back I saw that the last 2 rows on either side were completely empty. Since the maid had taken the middle seat to stretch out, I headed back towards the Galley and asked the Indian FA if I could use the last row. He looked up from counting cash and accompanied me to were I was pointing.
"No I'm sorry Sir, the last ones are reserved for cabin crew. You can use the ones ahead of them, though.
So I had an entire row to myself. After plugging the headset here, I read the inflight magazine. It was a solid 100 pages full of travel articles. The last few pages had the inflight menu and the very last one was the food offered to Jazeera Plus pax. There was a purple and a white box. The purple one was presumably used for longer flights such as this one as it had a sandwich, a chocolate a salad and a can of Pepsi; whereas the white one just had a croissant and some noodles.
Soon after, I fell asleep. When I woke up, 2 and a half hours later, the pilot came on the line, and said that pax on the left side of the aircraft can view the sun rising from the left of the aircraft. It was a beautiful sight with the sky coloured in orange.
By then, the movie had got over and the LCD was back to the airshow. A bright horizon was passing from East to West slowly on the 3D map. The aircraft was dangerously close to the monsoon clouds over BOM. At this point, it seemed as if everybody wanted to visit the toilets at the back. The Indian FA directed some of them to a toilet up front. A Filipino FA joined him at the back. Apparently, she was new to J9 and I managed to catch an interesting conversation:
Indian FA: Hey, how are you doing?
Filipino FA: I'm Fine. But Can't we serve a complimentary cup of tea?
Indian FA: No, but the management is planning to have every passenger get a complimentary bottle of water and a light snack from October.
Descent began 5 minutes later and by now, the aircraft on the map had hit the clouds over BOM, as was visible outside the window. Another guy had brought a camera and sat on the opposite side of the row. (an A-India.net member? I thought)
The aircraft had begun to shake violently as we made our way through the clouds and the aircraft on the map was shaking in sync with it. Exciting Stuff!
We then flew lower, over green fields, when suddenly:
Filipino FA: What's that smell?
Indian FA: Oh, nothing to worry about, you get the same smell if you stand outside the aircraft near the engines
Filipino FA: !?
Indian FA: The AC is switched off just before landing and just after take off, i guess that's the reason.
As we passed over the slums, I realized that we were going to come on runway 14 way too fast. I mean, anybody frequent to BOM would. The Indian FA did too:
Indian FA: HEY!! This is breackneck speed, we're too fast for this runway, we're going to overshoot it!!!
Nothing of the sort happened, though we bounced once on the tarmac, and had the reverse thrusters, and engines whining like hell. The spoilers sprang up as well.
We passed Terminal 1A and held to let a 9W 773ER through. The gates at BOM were full, so we waited until an AI 744 moved out and we parked next to an AY 343E and a GF 320.
CONCLUSION:
The LCDs displayed "Hope You enjoyed the Jazeera Airways experience. Thank you for flying with us!"
The FAs were smiling and thanked us warmly as we left the a/c.
My first flight on an LCC was an encouraging experience, if J9 is anything to go by. If they do start serving free food on board as the FA said, they would be top of the game in the Gulf-India route. Given the chance, I will fly J9 again, even in preference to EK's rust bucket 332s. My next flight will be my second flight on an LCC- SG this time on BOM-MAA( I will put up pics on that). Then I will fly QR on MAA-DOH-KWI in early August. Early September, I will also fly KLM to AMS, an airline I have never tried before. Hope you enjoyed the trip report. Here is my assessment:
Check-in: 10/10
Punctuality: 5/10
Cabin Cleanliness: 10/10
Entertainment: 9/10
Seats: 10/10 (For an LCC)
FAs: 10/10
Overall = 90%, a strong contrast to EKs 60 % in my earlier trip report. _________________ Yeah.
Last edited by Spiderguy252 on Tue Apr 06, 2010 1:58 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Nimish Member
Joined: 16 Dec 2006 Posts: 9757 Location: Bangalore, India
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Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 5:12 pm Post subject: |
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Wow - good show from an LCC, though I did not get the logic of printing the schedule as 23:59 if they intended to make it really 00:20! _________________ We miss you Nalini! |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 12:06 am Post subject: Re: Jazeera Airways KWI-BOM |
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Spiderguy252 wrote: | Descent began 5 minutes later and by now, the aircraft on the map had hit the clouds over BOM, as was visible outside the window. Another guy had brought a camera and sat on the opposite side of the row. (an A-India.net member? I thought) |
Err... possible Nice to know that we're not the only people
Good report...
regards _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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sri_bom Member
Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 2365 Location: Singapore
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Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 1:00 pm Post subject: |
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Nice report and good to get an international LCC perspective on service standards.
Sri_Bom |
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 1:34 pm Post subject: |
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Nice report.Pity the lack of pics though.I found the FA conversation to be interesting.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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yash777 Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2007 Posts: 901 Location: Chicago, IL
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Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 11:34 pm Post subject: |
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I had flown them on 12th july....i completely agree with u on ur 10/10 rating for the seats....Amazing seats and awesome legroom _________________ Jetphotos Flickr gallery |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Sat Jul 26, 2008 12:25 am Post subject: |
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yash777 wrote: | I had flown them on 12th july....i completely agree with u on ur 10/10 rating for the seats....Amazing seats and awesome legroom |
For a moment i thought the fellow passenger clicking pics might have been you yash _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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crew320 Member
Joined: 20 Dec 2006 Posts: 301 Location: New Delhi
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Posted: Sat Jul 26, 2008 1:40 am Post subject: Re: Jazeera Airways KWI-BOM |
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Enjoyed it !
Spiderguy252 wrote: | The AI and IC on either side were flying to COK and GOI-MAA respectively. |
I was operating the IC flight that day
aM _________________ M y - J e t P h o t o s |
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Spiderguy252 Member
Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 4259 Location: Indian Ocean
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Posted: Mon Jul 28, 2008 5:29 pm Post subject: |
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Just a few pictures of J9 off google:
A320s:
Jazeera Plus seats:
Jazeera seats:
A couple of FAs:
Route map- They operate to the Maldives too:
LCD screen:
The Airshow I talked about:
_________________ Yeah. |
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yash777 Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2007 Posts: 901 Location: Chicago, IL
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Posted: Mon Jul 28, 2008 11:30 pm Post subject: |
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the_380 wrote: | yash777 wrote: | I had flown them on 12th july....i completely agree with u on ur 10/10 rating for the seats....Amazing seats and awesome legroom |
For a moment i thought the fellow passenger clicking pics might have been you yash |
yeah!! even i thought so _________________ Jetphotos Flickr gallery |
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yash777 Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2007 Posts: 901 Location: Chicago, IL
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Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:05 pm Post subject: |
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Here are some pics of jazeera
After reaching DXB
On final at DXB
Yash _________________ Jetphotos Flickr gallery |
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AirbusA340 Member
Joined: 27 Jul 2008 Posts: 5 Location: Mumbai
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Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2008 11:30 am Post subject: Re: Jazeera Airways KWI-BOM |
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crew320 wrote: | Enjoyed it !
Spiderguy252 wrote: | The AI and IC on either side were flying to COK and GOI-MAA respectively. |
I was operating the IC flight that day
aM |
Excellent TR. Coincidence - I was operating the AI flight that day! _________________ Urban Village!!!!!!! |
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