Kevin Tiller

The flight was good. On time & had my vegan meal & it was excellent. Watched a Chinese film and an Indian film (Bajrangi Bhaijaan), which was really excellent but did make my cry, so was probably perfect for being on a plane. I had bought a little gizmo at JayCar that allows you to use your own cool headphones with the plane entertainment system, much better than their own headphones. I was also lucky enough to have 3 seats to stretch out over and could actually lie down! I listened to music & dozed a bit. I think the air con dried out my sinus out so my head felt a lot better. We, the whole plane (China Eastern Airlines), even did a synchronised set of Tai Chi movements whilst seated ! We arrived in Shanghai at 5am for my 7hr stopover.  Temp was 2C and I was just wearing a short-sleeve polo shirt as it was hot in Sydney yesterday !! I only went outside briefly as that’s where all the smokers were and it WAS cold. Inside it wasn’t a lot better. Virtually everything was shut so I just walked around a lot… lucky its a big airport with connecting terminals!

At past 6am I found the row of local food places and got some rice congee with red aduki beans – very traditional I guess? With a small plate of spicy pickles.

I walked around a heap more.  Decided against going into town as the first train wasn’t until 7am and I didn’t really have time to do more than go there & back. I went thru customs and read a book and walked more and sat around .. typical airport terminal soul destroying stuff. Was very tired indeed. I did some pushups to get my blood pumping although I did a lot of walking as well. The terminals and connecting routes were very long. I had a coffee at Starbucks. I really hate that place as it is the same everywhere and the coffee is not good which is the whole raison d’etre. However it was the only place with anything like good coffee. From past experience, the rest of Shanghai is ok for coffee, just not the airport.