Air Asia – Down The Road

Manila Costs 2012

I flew in to Clarke with Air Asia. At 12.15am the immigration queue was only an hour long. In the arrival concourse I could see the Philtranco and Victory Liner coach booths were not only shut but folded away. I pondered the situation. I hadn’t booked a room for the night, anticipating a night of coach travel and general faffing around. Now it appeared the faffing around was for certain and the coach travel off the radar.

I overheard a western guy request a taxi of a lady sat in something like a converted wardrobe. I hung some faith on him and explained my predicament. He knew the lie of the land. I needed to get to Dau (pronounced Da-oo). At Dau there was a bus station with regular buses into metro Manila. At the wardrobe I echoed my western experts words, 400 peso, she said, and I received a piece of paper that had a, not accidental, tear in it. There was nothing written or printed on the paper but a least I felt I’d entered a process.

In less than a minute another lady, with a walkie talkie, arrived by my side. She must have spotted my torn paper. Where you going? She asked. Dau bus terminal I said. She beckoned me to follow her. We began in the direction of several taxis but at three paces she was in demand from a man speaking aggravated Tagalog. I ambled on toward the leading taxi. A driver opened the trunk and I heaved my bag in. I took up residence in the front passenger seat. A different driver appeared. Where you going? I told him as if I did this every week. 500 pesos he said. 400 I said. The door slammed and he walked away.

The walkie talkie lady turned up and ushered a couple into the back seat. Another different driver slotted in and we were moving. I’m tired, irritable and irritated. So this is a shared taxi I said into the black night air inside the cab. It brought a grunt of acknowledgement from the driver who was clearly another expert at welcoming new arrivals to his beautiful land, removing any anxieties they may have and cleverly anticipating questions with the content of his friendly chatter. I looked over to see if he had a mouth. How much is my fare? I asked. Two. He said. He had a mouth, on rations.

Jump in a taxi

I felt a curious internal warmth during the early morning Air Asia flight from KL to Clarke International Airport in Pampangas, Philippines. A warmth, I think, derived from pleasant memories of previous trips to Manila and the friendliness of almost every acquaintance I have made in that heavily populated, hot, busy, polluted city.

Previous visits had either been made on business or to stay with friends. This visit was going to be different. Situations change. My close lady friend of previous years had chosen to find a marrying type and another friend had finished a work contract and downsized accomodation while he looked for another work opportunity in the region.

I was an independent traveller again fending for myself completely on the transport and accommodation scene in Manila.

I had pre-booked the first night at the Isabelle Royal Hotel which is actually more of a Condotel at the northern end of Makati Avenue.

From Clarke International airport the routine is straightforward. 350 peso secures a comfortable seat on a Partas or Philtranco bus terminating at Pasay. About the nearest point to Makati on the route into Metro Manila.

The fun starts at Pasay. There is no shortage of taxi drivers desperate, for some reason, to take me to my desired destination. I have two simple questions for them. Can you take me to Isabelle Royal Hotel, Makati Avenue and will you use the meter. The answer to the first question is always yes. The answer to the second question is either 200 or 250 peso. So I walk away from them. One youngish Manny Pacquaio look alike (they all try, but this one seemed more successful than most) came after me calling ‘Sir, SIR’.. I looked round and he said ‘OK we use the meter’. In the car he is less than amiable presumably because he has to use the meter.

I don’t think we did a particularly long, round about tour of Metro Manila to arrive in Makati Avenue possibly because I had make a couple of remarks designed to suggest I knew where we should be going. As the 20 minute journey progressed it appeared I had more idea than he did of the area and location of the Isabelle. He tried so hard to be unhelpful it was laughable.

We got to within what I thought was a couple of streets of the hotel location and I said ‘stop please, I’d like to get out here’. I knew we’d never actually get to the street where the hotel was. The meter showed 150 peso and I didn’t feel the slightest inclination to give him a peso more. Unfortunately I was not well prepared and the closest I could get was a 500 peso note. Manny went one round ahead. He has no change of course. ‘Never mind… Hang on’ was my response and grabbed my valuables bag but left my clothes bag in the taxi and visibly enquired at a couple of the nearby outlets for change of my 500 peso note. The first couple of enquiries couldn’t help.

I heard a car horn and the taxi was trickling toward me with another fare on board, possibly a stooge. The nearside front window was down and I looked in to see wad of notes in his hand. Manny said ‘200?’; I replied..’the meter said 150′. He said ‘ok’, took my 500 note and passed me four notes in change… three hundreds and another note tucked in between the hundreds. I opened the door and took my clothes bag from the front passenger seat with a ‘Jeeez, I don’t need this shit’ air about me. I dropped the bag to the pathement and peered down at the cash through a haze of carbon monoxide exhaust gas. There was 320 peso in my hand! Manny wins on points. My internal warmth had evaporated. Welcome to Manila from your average Philippino taxi driver.

Isabelle Royal was around the next corner and twenty paces down the road. Please let this be a pleasant experience.

Air Asia – loathing increases

Air Asia…get organised!!! As a consumer I have a love Hate (little l, big H) relationship with you that continues to slither toward hate.

Travel within South East Asia definitely took a leap into the era of accessibility with the advent of Air Asia. One of the first Air Asia flights I remember taking was from Hat Yai in Thailand to Kuala Lumpur almost five years ago in early January 2005. The plane was two hours late arriving into Hat Yai and 3 hours late departing. There were leather seats, I remember, but they were a mixture of shapes and colors that gave one the impression the plane had been purchased at a used plane dealer and then ‘souped up’ to fit the demands of it’s new owner which, I suppose, it probably had!

Several months back I had, a long time in advance of the travel date, booked a trip back to the UK. It was via a Singapore Airlines night flight departing from Singapore at around midnight. I thought I would try to ease my travel burden from Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia to Singapore by flying Kuala Lumpur to Singapore on Air Asia’s evening flight. The flight would arrive in Singapore at around 21.30hrs if my memory serves me correctly. It gave me a full two and half hours to collect my luggage, transit from terminal to terminal if necessary and check in for the long haul flight to London. Forever positive, I was convinced it could work.
The last piece of the jigsaw for the passage from Ipoh to London was finally pressed into place with the purchase of a YoYo Travel bus ticket for the Ipoh to Kuala Lumpur leg. Everything was fitting together nicely and I was hoping for a pleasant, restful nights sleep before the Ipoh departure.
Air Asia had a different idea! Clearly realising they had a reputation to uphold they chose to press their relationship with me a few more degrees toward hate along that travellers line of emotional imbalance. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr. In the middle of the night (past midnight) prior to my departure Air Asia informed me of the re timing of the Kuala Lumpur to Singapore flight. It was pushed out over an hour and I was informed of it by a post midnight sms!! Fuzz!!! It meant my time for that luggage collection/transit/check in process at Singapore would be reduced to one and a half hours if everything went smoothly. I couldn’t risk it! Between waves of frustration, disappointment and anger that evoked room pacing in a black mood and underpants, I slept very little.
By 08.00hrs in the morning I had embarked on an all or nothing plan B. A different Ipoh bus company made a daily trip to Singapore departing early morning. At 08.15 in their booking office I was able to purchase a ticket. However I had to pay a taxi surcharge to have him race to the second pick up point as I was just too late to make the bus departure from the booking office… the buses start point. I made it. The bus trip was very pleasant. I had to forego my Yo Yo bus fare, my Air Asia Kuala Lumpur – Singapore flight fare but at least I made it comfortable time to catch the long haul.

Karma spurned compensation created an otherwise smooth journey and my time in the UK was fantastic; no thanks to Air Asia.
The image at the top of this article is from Bath… a city of history and architecture not far from my home town in the UK.

Low cost travel or trickery?

Yo Yo provide a bus link from Bercham in Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia direct to KLIA main and LCC terminals. At RM43 for the one way ride it’s an ok deal. The buses are clean, spacious, well maintained and cool. The trip takes about 2.5hrs and Yo Yo recommend allowing 3 hrs to make the trip. So I did and it meant leaving Ipoh on the 1am bus to arrive in KLIA LCCT at around 4am in the morning in readiness for a 7.20am Air Asia flight to Manila in the Philippines. I slept lightly on the bus and ate (Mc D!?!?) to relieve boredom at the airport. Check in opened at 5.30am. With my bag despatched to the dungeonous mysteries of the KLIA conveyors and a boarding pass tucked into my passport I left the main concourse for the departure lounge and a singular duty free task. Terry’s gin aka Gordon’s Gin upon purchase at the duty free shop is sealed into a specimen bag large enough to contain a gaggle of such bottles.
Air Asia have finally ditched the free seating approach to loading the plane. Their reason I guess they would argue is that it’s more orderly to have seats allocated at check in although I don’t think you can request a particular seat or even location such as window or aisle at the check in process. I have however noticed that there is now an opportunity to add Rm10 to your fare for the priveledge of selecting a preference seat at the internet booking process. Low cost travel or trickery, I occasionally ask myself.
I was fortunate enough to have been allocated an aisle seat, allowing me to thrust the parts of my European form not easily located into the pen between seats, out into the aisle. This irritates the stewards endlessly who counter attack by kicking and wheeling trolleys into me at every opportunity. The seats recline one inch in the interests of economy. As if in compensation they are leather and much is made of this in the amateur banter attempted by the leading stewardess in attempts at lifting the moods of passengers depressed by the overpriced, undersized, taste free food portions and the hand dry towels in the toilets that regress to multiple white tacky globules once moist and in contact with skin. Dry your unshaven face with the hand towels in Air Asia in flight toilets and you will appear to have contracted an in flight mucus that if managed properly could do more for the amusement of other passengers than any banter over leather seats.
The eventful three and half hour flight to Clarke Air Base (a hangover from the American occupation of the area) in Pampangas Philippines was concluded with a smoothe landing on a wet runway. As usual people are out of their seats before the plane has come to a halt, hauling heavy and fragile bags out of the overhead lockers and then stumbling with them as the pilot finally hits the brake pedal. One industrious Philippino was fighting his way up the aisle from a point beyond the wing exits to acheive pole position on the start grid for the door openings. Smile I did when it was announced that we would be departing from the rear of the plane to facilitate a bus service laid on to keep us dry in our passage to the immigration and customs area.
The Philtranco coach to the SM Megamall in Ortigas, apparently the closest stop to Makati cost me 300peso. Alighting from the coach was comparable to being submitted to a bear pit. I fended of the frenzy off taxi drivers who are intent on not only capturing my fare but partaking in conversation about where I’m going before I even make eye contact, My God! I recovered my rucksack from the hold of the bus and walked away from the drop point in the opposite direction to that of the taxi rank.
I sweated a little as I walked away but fell on my feet when in conversation with a street vendor discovered that there was an MRT station on the other side of the Meagamall building. I think it was Shaw Boulevard or Shaw Station and the fare to Ayala was 11peso. A bargain compared to the 250-300 that I would have been paying in a taxi.