Outside InCathay Pacific has an arduous flight ahead before it can hope to silence its armchair critics
It can also expect the competitive backdrop to become ferocious as mainland airlines become stronger and more ambitious
If I discovered last week that the subject of dog poo could stir deep and powerful emotions among literally hundreds of readers, then that is as nothing compared with emotions stirred on the subject of aviation.
Almost all of us in Hong Kong have made many air journeys – which of course means that we all regard ourselves as experts, and have armloads of anecdotes and battle scars to illustrate our pains and indignities. An air journey brings together a unique combination of stress, aggravation, tedium and fatigue. This unique cocktail often generates dreadful experiences that are only amplified by each airline’s preposterous marketing claims.
Look no further than United Airlines – I wonder what the American Chinese doctor David Dao feels about United’s “Fly the friendly skies”?
This angst-laden process begins with the challenge of packing the coming week’s or month’s necessities into a 20 kilo suitcase – and knowing, for example, that airlines like Emirates now strangle your hand-carry wiggle room by limiting that to 8 kilos.
Then comes the scramble to the airport, with fears of delay, worries over whether anything important has been left behind, and the lower lumbar stress of lumping the weight of a large dead dog on and off buses, trains or into and out of a scruffy taxi trunk – only to join the economy-line scrummage once you have found check-in.