Travel mysteries, part one.

1. How does Whitcoulls in Auckland airport manage to sell any coke for $4.99 when the Burger King opposite it sells refillable cups for $2.10?
2. Is the copy of the Economist's World In 2010 in the hands of the Dutch guy sitting near me, who seems to be making the same trip I am, the same copy I accidentally left at security in Auckland?
3. Why are airports so stingy with offering power points? Surely they can afford to let people charge their laptops and phones.
4. 
   

Desiccated, exhausted and only half-way there.

For some reasons the three exclamation marks gave this sign at Auckland an earnest urgency I felt the need to capture. As Terry Pratchett in Maskerade noted:

"And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head."

The sign would have been fine without the exclamation marks. With them? It starts to seem a bit silly. Security checkpoints shouldn't be silly. It's just not right.

I have now been in Kansai airport's departure lounge for four hours. Curiously I was told in no uncertain terms by the Air New Zealand flight crew that all people with a transit time of more than two hours had to fill out a full customs and immigration declaration. This turned out to not be true.

Apparently I collect my boarding pass from the departure gate but being the fretful traveller I am I am highly suspicious of this arrangement. Although, since my flight to Amsterdam has been delayed 35 minutes already, I wont need to test this theory for a while.

On the point of delays, my Wellington - Auckland flight was delayed 15 minutes, and my Auckland - Osaka flight sat on the tarmac for 30 minutes while they did 'paperwork'. A poor run of luck so far.

Although since I have free wifi and a free power point, I should really stop complaining.

On internet and airports.

Wellington airport made me sad. I had come stoked at the thought of being able to access free wireless internet while waiting in the lounge. Unfortunately this turned out to not be the case. Imagine my disappointment when I opened my laptop and discovered that the internet was not going to be available until Auckland (the unprotected Koruclub wifi was no-deal either).

I was hence distressed to learn that internet was ten dollars an hour in Auckland. As a price-sensitive consumer, I again missed out. Damn monopolies.

The above is to explain why I have waited until know to make a post.

Luckily I have managed to find an unprotected network at Kansai, where I am currently whiling away a six hour transit time. It's flaky, it's slow, but it's free so I'm a happy chappy.

Transit has been a slightly haphazard experience, although Japanese customs did have helpful signs. What trip passing through Asia would be complete without some government-produced Engrish?

"In Japan it is prohibited to bring social evil goods."

Just in case you were thinking of smuggling a pack of social evil through.

Unless you bought it in Duty Free

As a final comment, I will note that the wifi wasn't the only thing missing at Wellington airport. Here is a picture of my gate, five minutes after boarding was due to start.

Air New Zealand did apologise for our inconvenience. The hummus on board was tasty too.

Introduction.

Well I finally decided to enter the blogging fray by reporting and recording the going-ons on my 29 day trip to Europe. The goal of the trip is mostly to faff-about and hopefully get some debating done, and so this blog will focus on those two things.

Mostly it's a convenient way for my mum to know that I have not fallen in any harbours/seas/canals.

The general format will probably consist of general status updates and any photos I took on the way. Given that the first updates will consist of a lot of air plane travel, don't expect a cavalcade of hilarity and excitement. Instead expect me to be grumpy and bored, which you can share vicariously.

Once debating at Worlds gets under way I shall endeavour to do full reports on each round, which I hope will be interesting for people wondering what the tournament is like.

Otherwise expect a lot of holiday shots and hopefully the odd witticism.