Second Trip to Singapore, First Class Back

Now that I've got an expanded role at Cisco looking not only after Australia and New Zealand, but also having the PR leads for Japan and Korea report into me plus joining the Asia Pacific Corporate Communications leadership team so gaining regional responsibilities as well I've been spending more time in Singapore.

On this, my second trip to Singapore I'm supporting our first Partner-led Conference. With over 50 media and analyst from Asia Pacific and China, it was a very busy week (Nov. 13-19) and after several days of keynotes, business presentations and panel discussions we headed to the Singapore Flier for some sight seeing.



Then we head to Coup d'Etat for drinks. I get a bit closer to the infinity pool at the Marina Bay Sands and still hope to some day actually swim in the pool at the top of the world.



One evening after the media/analysts had head home, I checked out the original home of the Singapore Sling at Long Bar at The Raffles Hotel. It's the one place in Singapore you can throw peanut shells on the floor and not get arrested :)



And on the day of my departure Miin was a wonderful host and showed me around Sentosa which is a very upscale, 2 km island.



On my flight back to Sydney, I was very, very lucky to be upgraded to First Class on British Airways. I'm not sure how this happened , but think it was because I checked in on the late-side (an 1:15 before my flight was due to depart, but since Singapore International Airport is the gateway to Asia my friend Miin says you don't have to check in the typical 2 hours in advance) and economy was already checked in so I was informed I'd been checked into Economy Plus.

As I was settling into my seat, I heard my name called over the intercom to identify myself to the steward. So I headed to the front of the plane and was surprised when informed my seat was being changed to...she pointed to seat 14B...at the same time I realised I was standing in first class. And it was weird, there were all these "pods" that were set up in pairs with one facing forward and the other towards the back of the plane.

All of a sudden I had a stewardess asking me what newspaper I wanted (no Singapore Straits Newspaper or Sydney newspaper, only UK pubs) and if I'd like a glass of champagne (which I only got a few sips of before they had to take it away as we were taking off, but they quickly got me another as soon as we were up in the air). Then another was trying to get me to take my seat, however, what stumped me was there's was no place to put my purse as there was no "under the seat in front of you". Then I got shown the drawer, of course how obvious, a drawer.

The other thing that befuddled me was if I sit down and recline how does the passenger in the pod along the window get in and out - he steps over my feet/foot stool - which is rather inelegant.

Once we're up in the air, I have a chat with my pod-mate (you feel compelled to say "hello" as you're basically lying right next to each other, face-to-face with only a plastic divider that moves up and down as he's passed his meal/drinks) and find out he's the architect of the Surry Hills library just down the street (we commiserate on the rather useless kitchen in the front of the library and the need for more seating) as well as new Parliament House (I compliment him on the great symbolismy of having the roof open to public picnics, see my previous blog post on this).