I have a shoebox filled with old boarding passes. When I was home recently in Australia I was going through all my stuff (that I will eventually send here to the U.S.) to try and 'mimimise' my junk. But, I just couldn't throw them out - and my other shoeboxes filled with city maps and coasters and restaurant business cards. Both boarding passes and city maps probably won't exist at all in a few years. My boarding pass 'wallet' now looks like this...
I do love my old boarding passes (by the way, I haven't kept them all - the Jetstar flight from Melbourne to Sydney isn’t that exciting). And yes, it may be a little sad, but I have a rather impressive collection even if I do say so myself. Here's just a sample of some either interesting airlines or an interesting story that accompanied that flight… I flew Business Class (or the rather flash-sounding ‘Club Class’) with Uzbekistan airways and the only difference between Cattle Class was that we got a linen tablecloth with our ham and salad roll.
My name may have been Bryn Thacker and Indonesia ranks as one of the worst countries for air-safety records, but boy are they cheap. And at least Merpati have been around a while and they haven’t run out of planes yet. Oh, and ‘Say No To Drug’ – they just don’t specify which one!
The ‘Treasure of Myanmar’ was actually very nice. The plane was relatively new, we departed right on time and the very full plane landed in Bagan (from Mandalay) to let just two of us off, while the rest flew on to Yangon.
To be honest I wasn’t expecting much from Kenya Airways, but the plane was brand new, the food was excellent and the service was impeccable. They could teach a few other well-known airlines a thing or two.
Pan Am. Remember them? I took this flight from London to New York in October 1989. The flight number was originally PA103, but they changed it to PA011 after the Lockerbie bombing in December 1988.
When the flight from Lome, Togo to Lagos, Nigeria landed the whole plane broke into rapturous applause. Not a good sign particularly when the plane was so old. Mind you, they they did do a lovely pasta salad and chocolate mousse.
I do have about another 200 boarding passes, but I won’t bore you any further. There is, however, just one boarding pass that I really want to add to my collection. It’s this….
Eva Air in Taiwan have Hello Kitty planes where everything, and I mean everything, is Hello Kitty themed – from the fuselage to the flight attendants, cushions, check in, baggage tickets, and even the food is Hello Kitty themed (I’m talking pink spaghetti and kitty shaped buns).
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