After having a really bad night of not sleeping well, I realised that I have become sicker. The glands in my neck had become swollen and I had sensations of being cold a lot of the times and then too warm at other times. I went out and forced myself to eat a masala dosa before checking out at midday.
The taxi took me to Goa’s airport about 45 minutes away from Panaji. The timing should have been perfect but the drive was a little faster and the flight was delayed by an hour, so I ended up waiting a lot. Being ill and not having the internet to do things like blogs and admin, it felt like a long time.
The domestic to international connection at Bombay was time consuming. At the domestic arrival hall, one joins a security queue to be allowed on to a airside bus (which goes around the runway) before going landside amongst public cars etc briefly before being dropped outside the international terminal’s check-in area (my flight from Bombay to Delhi leaves from the international terminal as it is part of an international flight to Hong Kong). Then one goes through formality like a fresh passenger who was starting here in Bombay (except that luggage has been transferred for you). It probably wasn’t as bad as it felt; being unwell didn’t help me.
The flight from Bombay to Delhi was delayed by over an hour but I wasn’t worried the flight to Hong Kong was the continuation of the same flight but on a different aircraft. After a slightly easier same-terminal transfer in Delhi, I was finally bound for Hong Kong on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner.
This time I was seated further back in the aircraft. It was noisier here, but not as noisy as right down the back. Sure enough, it wasn’t as noisy as the B777, but it certainly wasn’t as quiet as some others. There was a high-pitch noise in the background, and the sound of various moving parts (eg. flaps) were high-pitched rather than low-drones. On take-off and landing, there was a lot of plasticky clackety vibrations. It’s a nicer plane than some but it’s certainly not a dream!