Hello from Bangkok, where I’m sitting onboard a 787-8 as I prepare to continue my journey to Amman.
Royal Jordanian offers a tag flight between Bangkok (BKK) and Kuala Lumpur (KUL) onboard its 787-8 Dreamliner to supplement its service between Bangkok and Amman (AMM). These flights can be sold separately, but I was flying from KUL all the way to AMM.
The flight from KUL to BKK was lightly filled, with less than 50% of the seats taken in each cabin of service. While flight time is blocked at 2 hours, 10 minutes for this 754-mile flight, I was not sure what to expect onboard in terms of product.
I knew, of course, I’d get RJ’s lie-flat seat, which is similar to what you see on American’s A321Ts, United’s 787s, Aeroflot’s 777s, and Air China’s 777s:
But I wasn’t sure what kind of meal would be served. Would it be the elaborate meal I received on my 735-mile regional jet flight from Amman to Kuwait in the middle of the night?
> Read More: Royal Jordanian ERJ-195 Business Class Amman To Kuwait
Turns out, it was a light meal of sandwiches, salad, and sweets. Hardly memorable, but better than serving nothing at all. I did enjoy a glass of Jordanian rosé. Not the best, but certainly not bad.
Service was superb on this short segment and the flight attendants were all of Asian-descent. A Jordanian crew boarded in Bangkok. Perhaps RJ has a special local-based crew to operate the tag flights?
Thankfully, my experience was nothing like Lucky’s Fifth Freedom RJ flight.
Now the real fun starts. Let’s see how Royal Jordanian does on a longhaul flight.
Oh yes, and more bad manners:
What is a freedom flight? What is meant by that term. We use that locally when we take special trips to honor veterans (sometimes called honor flights. I read Freedom Flight with interest, but didn’t see anything @ freedom, just curious.
Bob
The type of “freedom flight” that you are referring to is different than the of legal “freedom” that Matthew is referencing in his review. Mathew’s type of freedom is a legal authority to operate a specific route outside an airline’s home-flag country. There are about 10 types of freedom. Matthew’s RJ flight was a Fifth Freedom, due to the leg between KUL and BKK, with ultimate termination of the flight in AMM. This is a non technical explanation, but I hope it helps.
Here is a really nice, easy-to-follow summary of the “freedoms of the air” of which the fifth freedom is a part:
@ Bob McGurty
https://lmgtfy.com/?q=fifth+freedom+flights&s=
Photo of the barefooted primitive gives a new twist on ‘when pigs fly’. They do, at least the bipedal ones. Disgraceful, uncouth, unsanitary and indicative of the past 50 years of a near total breakdown of decorum, manners, civilisation itself.
Oh honey, cut the drama.
Hit a raw nerve, sis?
Bare feet on public furniture is disgusting. End of story.
Don’t tell Gary about the feet thing.
Speaking of bad manners, I´d love it if you could write about something that is becoming a common things on flights: people watching videos or listening to music on their phones or tablets without headphones! It annoys me so much….
Mmmm I often go barefoot on flights (hate the hot cabin). Didn’t realize it was so bad!
It’s not the bare feet. It’s putting your feet up on things. If I sit on it, or eat from it, or put my hands on it, then your shoes definitely don’t need to be on it, and preferably not your bare feet either.
Well, at least a bare foot is better than a shoe. So one step above rock bottom.
Another post, another glaring error in the very first sentence.
This used to be cheap J fare and a bonus OW sector for QF and BA members; unfortunately it rarely comes up as a cheap option these days . Same for BKK-HKG ( although maybe they stopped flying that now, leaving Kenya as the cheapest OW option).
Kenya Airways is SkyTeam.
Looks nice!
I’ve avoided Royal Jordanian since crossing the Atlantic in one of their 747’s in 1980. The airline was known as ALIA back then; named for King Hussein’s late queen, who had been killed in a helicopter crash. The 747 was absolutely full and I guarantee you, every single passenger (95% of whom were male) was smoking; cheap-tobacco cigarettes that stank to the point that I was headache-y and nauseous throughout the flight.
An off-duty flight attendant at the time, I had a galley conversation with one of the ALIA stewardesses. She was English and on one of her first flights back after a long hospital stay, having survived the terrible crash of ALIA flight #600 at Doha the previous year. She harbored a deep resentment towards the company, telling me about an inflight manager who had visited her in the hospital just days after the crash, to ask when she’d be able to be fitted for a new uniform. (!!!)
I lurched off that plane at JFK swearing “Never again!”