Ho John Lee’s Weblog

…because I have a job for him. It looks like our washer needs a new drain pump, because yesterday afternoon it started trying to spin with a full tub of wet clothes and water, accompanied by unusual noises. There’s lots of good information online for do-it-yourself repair, including how to disassemble the washing machine and various diagnostic procedures. The hacker/engineer side of me wants to start taking it apart just because we can. But the weather is great outside today and I’d rather spend my limited time on fun stuff outdoors and leave the pump replacement to trained professionals. If I could find one. There are no Maytag repairmen anymore, only authorized service providers, who are apparently quite busy. It might end up being easier to just buy a new washer, I can get one delivered today.

Singapore’s Changi Airport is one of my favorites for long haul travel, as they have everything you need within the security perimeter, including the equivalent of a shopping mall, two gyms, two hotels, assorted restaurants, and excellent, inexpensive internet and telephone service. I wrote about it a while back in Camping out at Singapore Airport, and it looks like there are a couple who have more or less taken up residence there, according to AsiaOne Travel.

SINGAPORE may have its own version of Tom Hanks in the 2004 Steven Spielberg-directed comedydrama, The Terminal. This time though, it’s an Asian-looking pair apparently living and camping out at Changi Airport Terminal 2.

Assorted comments in the AsiaOne forum.

I’m quite pleased that the British authorities managed to foil the attempt to blow up multiple airliners last week. On the other hand, I’m probably not alone in wondering how long-haul business air travel is going to work out.

If a ban on all liquids, gels, and personal electronics stands, a lot of air carriers will need to start competing on in-flight service again. In recent years, I normally bring my own water, food, work, entertainment, and a change of clothes for air travel to China and India. On a trip to India, it’s about 30 hours in transit, which is a lot of time to watch the 6 movies that United usually rotates each month, along with putting in a full day or so of work. I usually fly United since their Asian routes are all based here, but I wouldn’t want to rely on them for food, water, and entertainment. Might be time to book on Singapore Airlines, which flies with a huge video- and audio-on-demand library and Nintendo video games, never seems to run out of food or water, and consistently provides attentive cabin service.

Overnight, British authorities arrested 21 suspected terrorists planning to blow up several airliners on Continental, United, and American by mixing liquid explosives carried onboard in hand luggage.

At the moment, all liquids are banned from hand luggage, except for baby formula and medicine.

All in all, it sounds like great work by the UK authorities, although this quote leaves me wondering a little (since they’ve only arrested 21 so far):

“A senior U.S. counterterrorism official said authorities believe dozens of people — possibly as many as 50 — were involved in the plot.”

More from Counterterrorism Blog here, here, and here

I’ve been on flights through bumpy weather many times, but am happy to have missed this one. The nosecone (which houses the radar) came off, and there were cracks and holes in the wings and windshield.

‘’I could not see anything through the front windows because they were shattered. So I checked side windows when I tried to land the plane.'’

All 200 passengers, including 177 elementary school kids, were uninjured.
Link, with video. (Reuters)

My passport expires in a couple of weeks, so I’m about to send it off to get a new one. This one has been well used, I had an extra set of pages inserted a few years ago. This time I’m going to request a 48-page passport to start with, instead of the standard 24-page version.

The photo in my current passport is ten years old. Since then I’ve gotten rid of my eyeglasses and lost around 30 pounds. Between not looking exactly like my passport photo, and an ever-accumulating set of entry and exit stamps, it can sometimes take a while to clear passport control. I usually explain that I’ve taken up marathon running.

I’ll use this week’s no-GYM theme to go with something completely different:

I’ve travelled between the US and India something like 20 times in the past few years. From the Bay Area, it’s roughly equidistant to go via Europe or via Asia. I often have other stops to make elsewhere in Asia, but one reason I like to go westbound is because of the facilities at the Singapore Changi Airport. (Another reason is that I find the Frankfurt airport vaguely creepy, but that’s another story.)

I typically fly on United from San Francisco, connecting in either Tokyo or Hong Kong, and arriving in Singapore at midnight. There’s a connecting flight to Bangalore at around 7:30am, which leaves just enough time for a few hours sleep, a workout in the gym, breakfast and e-mail at the business lounge, and picking up any last minute items at one of the many stores.

I usually fly on United Airlines, but today I ended up booked on ANA from San Francisco to Tokyo. I haven’t tried ANA in several years, so it was interesting to see how their service compared. On this trip I was also upgraded to business class at the last minute as the flight was oversold in coach. This flight was on a 777-200.