Choosing Airline Seats - Etihad
It's less than 30 days before I come back to the Philippines. I'm pretty excited and looking forward to see the family again. I love planning trips and the first thing I do when I get my flights booked is to select my seat in the airplane. I'm flying via Etihad airlines which is based in Abu Dhabi. Flight time from Abu Dhabi (AUH) to Manila (MNL) is around 8.5 hours!
I always select an aisle seat and near the toilets for two reasons:
1) I want to be able to get up without having to wake-up the person sitting beside me and not have to cross between the cramped seats every now and then just to go and pee. Downside to this is in an airline that has a 4 seater in between the cabin makes for a very narrow corridor for flight attendants with their trolleys. Chances are you or your seat will be hit by the trolley every now and then which will be a very annoying thing if you are a light sleeper. Fortunately, I don't sleep much during flight but when I do I tend to sleep with the headsets on (with Coldplay album in repeat).
2) When you are seated far away from toilets, it's difficult to know when it's available or not. If both toilet spaces are occupied, you have to stand there for a while to get your turn. But if you can see from where your seating, then you can time your way to the toilet. I usually try to pee just before the flight attendants serve beverage or meals to avoid the influx of people.
Yes, these are "Economy passenger problems" which business class passengers don't have the pain of experiencing. But these are just workaround that I have deviced in my experience traveling in long hours. So this is the seat I chose:
It would be my first time to sit on the tail end of the aircraft and in the two-seater rows. There are only 2 seats on each side due to the curvature of the plane. I usually choose to seat nearest to the entrance of the airplane in order that I would be one of the first to alight the plane and save some time from lining up in the immigration counter. However, I realized that the time gained from lining up early is lost when you still have to wait for your luggage to turn up in the baggage handling machine.
In this occasion, I made some adjustments by preferring to be the first to come inside the plane (after the business and families with kids). Which means I won't have trouble finding a space for my carry on luggage and the possible benefit of having a wider space (will confirm this after the flight). When you are an OFW, the time it takes to go down that plane seems like forever when you know your family is waiting for you. This is the reason why I'd rather not let them pick me up in the airport. Nowadays, it's very easy to take uber or grabtaxi. Your family has been waiting for 365 days, what is another 1 or 2 hours? :)
Before I end this entry which also happens to be my first post, I would like to say... Welcome to my blog! Have a seat, grab a cuppa and enjoy reading.
I always select an aisle seat and near the toilets for two reasons:
1) I want to be able to get up without having to wake-up the person sitting beside me and not have to cross between the cramped seats every now and then just to go and pee. Downside to this is in an airline that has a 4 seater in between the cabin makes for a very narrow corridor for flight attendants with their trolleys. Chances are you or your seat will be hit by the trolley every now and then which will be a very annoying thing if you are a light sleeper. Fortunately, I don't sleep much during flight but when I do I tend to sleep with the headsets on (with Coldplay album in repeat).
2) When you are seated far away from toilets, it's difficult to know when it's available or not. If both toilet spaces are occupied, you have to stand there for a while to get your turn. But if you can see from where your seating, then you can time your way to the toilet. I usually try to pee just before the flight attendants serve beverage or meals to avoid the influx of people.
Yes, these are "Economy passenger problems" which business class passengers don't have the pain of experiencing. But these are just workaround that I have deviced in my experience traveling in long hours. So this is the seat I chose:
It would be my first time to sit on the tail end of the aircraft and in the two-seater rows. There are only 2 seats on each side due to the curvature of the plane. I usually choose to seat nearest to the entrance of the airplane in order that I would be one of the first to alight the plane and save some time from lining up in the immigration counter. However, I realized that the time gained from lining up early is lost when you still have to wait for your luggage to turn up in the baggage handling machine.
In this occasion, I made some adjustments by preferring to be the first to come inside the plane (after the business and families with kids). Which means I won't have trouble finding a space for my carry on luggage and the possible benefit of having a wider space (will confirm this after the flight). When you are an OFW, the time it takes to go down that plane seems like forever when you know your family is waiting for you. This is the reason why I'd rather not let them pick me up in the airport. Nowadays, it's very easy to take uber or grabtaxi. Your family has been waiting for 365 days, what is another 1 or 2 hours? :)
Before I end this entry which also happens to be my first post, I would like to say... Welcome to my blog! Have a seat, grab a cuppa and enjoy reading.
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