In the meanwhile it has become already the end of August and I
finally found some time and motivation to update my blog a bit. There has been
a lot going on the last month so it might end up being a bit of a long blog
this time.
I am not going to waste much time on my departure. We stayed at a
hotel near the airport with the family like last year when I left for the
States. It was the last time we could relax a bit and have breakfast together
before I left. This time I departed from Schiphol, Amsterdam on a Malaysian
Airlines flight to Jakarta with a stop in Kuala Lumpur.
It was an incredible flight, good service and a lot of space in
Business Class. It cost me a heck of a load of money but it was worth it in the
end. Coming back in Economy is going to hurt.
Once I arrived in Jakarta I had to take a taxi to my hotel because
the promised van was nowhere to be found. It was a bit of a hassle because at
the terminal they almost surround you with taxi drivers. On the way to the
hotel it was soon clear to me that Jakarta would ask some time to adapt. The
highways are pretty good but all the other roads next to it are a chaos of
scooters and crappy houses every now and than. Especially the traffic jams are
horrible there, in Belgium it moves at least.
I think I did about an hour for the 2 km from the exit of the
highway to the hotel. Luckily I am already used to it a bit.
The first two days in Jakarta we had some groundschool about
practical items of flying for AirAsia but everything was quite relaxed. You
cannot compare it with the way they work back home. The amount of items handled
in a week is something they would have done in about a day back in Brussels. It
is a bit the general way of working here in Asia in my opinion.
Already after two days Ivo and myself were sent to Kuala Lumpur in
Malaysia. There we received two days of simulator to validate our license again
for Indonesia.
It was nice to fly again in the simulator but the procedures were
a bit rusty after not flying for about a month and a half. The flying part on
the other hand was still good and that is the most important thing.
De Monday after the simulator we started our initial training with
the entire group of 14 people. This training is something everybody that starts
to work for AirAsia has to do. This training was given in the Air Asia Academy
located at the airport of Kuala Lumpur.
We received about three weeks training about all sorts of things.
Going from the emergency procedures of AirAsia to opening/closing and
arming/disarming the doors of the aircraft according to procedures. Also the
“wet drill” was part of it. This meant that we got into the pool with life vest
and trained the different situations (ETOPS and NON ETOPS for the fellow
pilots) that can happen when the plane would ditch in the water.
Further on we received some briefings about the company philosophy
and the future for the company.
There were also some less interesting courses like “grooming” were
we were told how to shave, the haircuts allowed, kind of deodorants to use and
more things like that. Not really you expect to learn on a training as a pilot.
But they spend a lot of attention on how the personnel should appear to the
outside world. We are the living business card of Air Asia after all.
Also teambuilding exercises and stuff like that are part of the
job but this was nice. We had fun and we got out of our chairs for a change. It
takes some time to get used to the way of working here though.
Aside from the course we also had some days of for a few times and
we took advantage of those days to do some stuff. The first day we had a day of
we went to the city center of Kuala Lumpur. We met up with a girl I got to
know. She works at the embassy of Indonesia in KL. We ended up doing quite some
stuff together with our little group of five.
The first day it was just some sightseeing at the Petronas Towers
and the mall and aquarium located there.
The weekend after we first went clubbing on Friday and after a
night of rest at their apartment we went to Templar Park. This is located at
about an hour of KL and from there you can climb a bit in the jungle to find
yourself some really nice waterfalls. This was in the middle of nature and you
could also swim there and take a nice shower under the waterfalls, just
incredible.
We did some more stuff that day like trying to catch the sunset at
the beach but we just missed that so we ended up just swimming and frisbeeing
on the beach.
The weekend after it was a long weekend for everybody here from
Saturday until Tuesday. It was the end of the Rammadan here for the Muslim
community and this is celebrated really big here in Indonesia and Malaysia. We
ended up partying in KL again on Saturdaynight to leave for Langkawi Island on
Sundayevening.
Langkawi is an island all the way in the Northwest of Malaysia
close to the border with Thailand. It is a popular holiday destination partly
because of the taxfree climate over there. For the rest it is also a paradise
on Earth for tourists. With its many islands, beaches and oceans you really
think you are on Tropical Island. That is maybe because it is a tropical
island…
To get there we had to take a bus from Kuala Lumpur for about 7
hours and than a ferry for an hour. The bustrip there was horrible because we
had an ordinary bus to get there because of malfunction of the other one. This
one was not really made for long trips. But luckily it was traveling during the
night so we tried to sleep a lot during the trip.
The ferry was also a bit of an adventure; we were all seated in
the bottom of the ship with the air conditioning at northpole-stand. Eventually
we just went to a higher deck to just sit there on some stairs to talk a bit
and look outside.
Once we arrived it appeared worth all the effort, our residence
was located at about 10m from the beach and we immediately went for a swim in
the ocean. Just an awesome feeling to dive in the warm ocean from a white
beach.
In the afternoon we went islandhopping, going from island to
island with a small boat stopping on several islands. It is something touristic
but definitely worth it. It seemed like Expedition Robinson when we were
sailing. On every island we stopped we went to explore a bit and we even did
some swimming in the ocean again.
By the time we got back from islandhopping we took some rest
because it was already an exhausting trip to get there. I went for a walk down
the beach and enjoyed a nice sunset. I could walk there for hours just enjoying
the view, the nice weather, the people doing parasailing and stuff. I will
definitely go back there one day.
In the evening we had some drinks on the beach to celebrate Ivo’s
birthday. It is just nice to be able to do it at night without getting cold.
And the moment it gets dark it is really that dark you can sit on the beach
without people seeing or disturbing you.
The day after we needed to leave for the ferry at 12h to be able
to catch the long busride back to KL. We did have a luxurious bus for the way
back and a spot in front of the dubbeldecker bus. This meant we had a lot of
legroom to travel relaxed. The drive back was really long because everybody
went back home after the long weekend. There were traffic jams at 1 o’clock at
night with the size you wouldn’t even find in Brussels during rush hour. We
ended up traveling for about 16 hours from the moment we left the hotel in
Langkawi to get back to our hotel in Kuala Lumpur. And for this we used taxis,
ferry and bus.
In the end it was all worth it, it was a location I would bring
other people for sure. And since AirAsia has about 10 flights every day to
Langkawi I am pretty sure that will happen.
Outside of traveling a lot of other things happened. We are
already back in Jakarta for about a week and in between classes we were looking
for a place to stay for the next six months. The biggest problem to find a
place was that most people only want to rent for at least a year. But since we
probably will leave after our linetraining we can’t make it to rent for a year.
We have visited a few places and today (Sunday 2nd) we finally
found a decent apartment. Tomorrow we will go and pay the deposit and if the
rent is payed from Belgium we are hoping to move in by the end of the week.
It’s an apartment that I will rent together with Ivo and Yannick.
It is located at about 15 minutes from the airport via taxi. It is also in a
complex right next to a huge mall so we have everything nearby we need. This is
necessary because the next half year we will be living from some sort of glass
bubble. Outside the complex and the mall you enter in a complete other world
and not the nice kind. Jakarta is not really the paradise on Earth but here we
have a decent apartment for an affordable price with everything we need. There
is also a pool, gym, tenniscourt, sauna etc. So we will survive it.
Luckily we received our ID card from AirAsia, which we can use to
travel really cheap in the AirAsia network. So we are planning to use this a
lot and visit some places. Enjoying the places that are worth seeing around
here in Asia.
Our workpermit is also almost ready; we went to get our picture
and fingerprints taken last week. Normally this should be ready tomorrow and
than we are almost ready to start. Tomorrow is also our medical examination so
another adventure ahead! This month we only have a few days of course left and
an air law examination.
Our uniform is also something that should be done by the end of
the month. In theory we can do observation flights already but we need a
uniform for that… we could buy some black trousers and a white shirt by
ourselves already and they would provide a tie and wings so we could fly along.
Long live lowcost!
Normally we would start flying in October but that is still
something we need to see first. I am afraid it could take a while longer
because we are with a big group for a limited amount of trainingcaptains. So
wait and see first. The mentality here is totally different than back home so I
just live from day to day. Everything can change on day to another.
I can manage for the rest, the food is pretty good despite eating
rice all day. Living around here is also cheaper except for the beer. That is
pretty expensive unfortunately. And the internet is even worse that 10 years
ago in Belgium. So skyping is really hard around here for the time being. I was
only able to call home a few times and that’s it. Belgium isn’t so bad for that
matter.
I could tell story’s for hours but I still need something to tell
when I come back one day.
By next blog I hope to be flying but that will take a while I
guess. I am also going to look for something to share my pictures online but I don’t
know yet how I will solve that. It is not that easy to upload with extremely
slow internet and a bad layout on my blog for pictures.
Until next time!
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