The Wandering Salesman

When was the last time you checked into a hotel and the first thing you noticed when you arrived was the smell of the place, both inside and out?

I’ve stayed at a lot of airport hotels. The convenience is obvious.

But the Sheraton JFK takes the cake. To be honest, it was a bit of an effort to get there. United lands in Terminal 1 at JFK, which means you get on the AirTrain thing and hoof it 3 stops to the hotel shuttle pick up point.

It’s where the rental car offices are located.

Fair enough. Easy to figure out.

Then you hit that “Noo-York” attitude. Which I love by the way, but it’s been a while since I’ve been here so you have to remember where you are.

It’s the attitude that no one is bigger than the city. If you complain, the average service worker will get back up in your face.

The other thing you have to remember about JFK and New York is that this is the mecca of opportunity.

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I’ve always wondered why people sleep in airports (apart from the obvious).

I mean, assuming you’ve had the means to get organised and buy an international plane ticket, then surely you would think when you looked at your final itinerary “gee whizz, look at this itinerary – it looks like we have a layover of 8+ hours in Changi. Lets worry about where we’ll sleep later”

Or something like that.

I mean have a look at this guy. Does he really look comfortable? This is about 4.30am in the morning.

And as I wandered through Changi airport at o’dark hundred this morning, there were people everywhere. I had no idea that there was a whole other side to plane travel. But more on that later.

Maybe I’m getting too old. But I’ll tell you what I’m getting too old for. It’s the itinerary I’m on right now.

SIN-MEL-SIN-HKG-SFO-JFK

To the travel newbies and to explain the above routing, I flew from Singapore to Melbourne for a 2-hr presentation, turned straight around and went back to Singapore, transited for 6-hrs, and then jumped on a flight to New York, via Hong Kong and San Francisco.

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