Miscellaneous


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Virgin Atlantic LHR Lounge

Image: VirginAtlantic.com

Why are most airport departure lounges so terrible? In short, it’s because the airlines want to ensure that premium flyers receive better treatment than the regular people. If everyone were allowed “amenities” like friendly staff and clean restrooms, then no one would want to pay more money to upgrade to a higher class of service.

Tim Harford has a nice essay about this in his Underground Economist book, and persuasively argues that airlines even go out of their way to provide bad service to Economy travelers so that their Premium travelers receive “better” service. In other words, says Harford, a lot of Premium flyers travel in First Class not because it’s wonderful (especially on domestic flights; it’s usually not), but out of fear of being mistreated so badly in Coach. This process naturally extends to the way that travelers are treated in airports, including access to the lounges.

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Famous CellistA little knowledge is a dangerous thing…
Alexander Pope, 1709
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Thanks to the use of Frequent Flyer Miles, I flew back to New York City from Bucharest last year in Delta’s nice BusinessElite cabin. Hanging out in the airline lounge before the flight, I met up with another traveler, a professional musician from New York named Hannah Chang.

Hannah was the only person I had ever met that was carrying tickets for two confirmed BusinessElite seats all to herself. Technically, she didn’t use both of them for herself—instead, one was for her and one was for her cello, which traveled with her wherever she went.

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Long JourneyIn September 2006 I first considered the idea of trying to visit every country in the world, and I decided to write a short essay about everywhere I’ve been so far. Over the next year I’ll be posting one of the essays each week until I catch up.

The compilation below is a short summary that is meant to be used as a reference for more detailed trip reports. As I complete the reports and post them on the site, countries I’ve reported on thus far will be linked in blue.

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