United Flight From Hong Kong to Singapore!

Planes, trains, buses, automobiles and boats led us from Macau to Hong Kong International Airport. Again I will remind you how I love this airport. Miki and I shopped, went to a spa, went to the Red Carpet Club and killed 3 hours without missing a beat.

But this is not the story. We boarded our 747 to our upper deck business class seats (yeah!) and nestled down for our 8:00pm flight to Singapore. A lovely evening flight with dinner and the service of a Singapore based flight crew. Right after take off the purser introduced herself, the pilots and the flight crew. She then in a very "teary" voice let us know that this was their last flight from Hong Kong to Singapore as a flight crew ( the flight attendants only), they were being laid off due to the financial problems of United and from this point on the flights would have American based flight attendants. The pilot came on and asked each of us to thank them for their years of service with United. Needless to say the 4 hour flight was filled with tears from not only the flight attendants but from passengers including Miki and me. Corporate business travelers got together and we all had pictures taken on the upper deck and many executives were giving the ladies their cards and saying "keep in touch."

Now the rest of the story - I know that alot of people are getting laid off and as an American I want to keep our country working and our people employed. But let's make sure we want the jobs. There are some great US based flight attendants - but as a serious frequent flyer there are many that could care less about us - the road warrior. Just 2 weeks ago on a flight between Chicago and LAX in first class I simply asked the flight attendant who was picking up the already read newspapers if I could see the USA Today she had in her hand. She looked at me as if I were the enemy and stated very clearly, "when I am done reading it you can have it." Well to her surprise the passenger who she had just taken the paper from looked up and said, "no way - give it to her first and when she is DONE you can have it." This would have never happened with Singapore flight attendants - I know that for sure. I have flown throughout Asia for over 20 years and have never experienced that rudeness. So guess what - bring the jobs home to the USA, but let's not forget why we work - for the customers.

When I askd the ladies if they had interviewed with Singapore Airlines they said that in the past they had even worked for Singapore Airlines but they loved the culture of United. They explained that United lets their flight attendants interact with the customer, enjoy their job and they make you part of a family. They told us they would wait for business to get better and for United to ask them to come home!

Let's all work together to get out of this economic mess...work harder, be strong, stay calm and beyond everything - have a positive outlook of the future.