It Was Cheap, And It Was Chinese: Our Experience Flying Hainan Airlines

When we booked our Spring Break trip to Shanghai and Hong Kong Disneyland Parks, we chose Hainan Airlines almost entirely because of price.  We had read online reviews of China Southern Airlines that were less than favorable, but the ones of Hainan were pretty good.  We were willing to take a chance in order to be able to afford an exotic Spring Break, but would the flight be pleasant in addition to being affordable?  Would there be any movies in English?  Would the English movies be ones I wanted to see?  How would the food be?  Would the flight attendants be able to speak and understand English? 

We needn’t have worried.  As soon as we boarded, Hainan set themselves apart with the most entertaining safety video since Delta's safety video with the Finger-wagging flight attendant.  I have never seen bikini-clad actresses in a safety video before, but I counted no fewer than seven of them in this one.  I was both stunned and completely entranced with the absurdity of it.

The movie and TV selections exceeded my expectations.  I watched a British movie called The Bank Job  and Woody Allen's Blue Jasmine with Cate Blanchett.  I started The Hurt Locker but quickly decided that my already-frazzled nerves couldn't handle the suspense and then watched something else that was apparently entertaining but was also forgettable.  Josh watched a season of Elementary, and the kids watched family-friendly options.

Upon boarding we were given an amenity kit with a toothbrush, toothpaste, socks, headphones, and an eye mask along with a menu of food options.  Each of the two meals served had both Asian and western options, and we all found things that we were actually looking forward to eating.

Knox's child's meal included pasta and some yummy junk food.

My meal of teriyaki beef was fine, not delicious but also not tasteless.

Note: We always ask for a child’s meal for Knox when we fly internationally because they serve the special request meals first.  He’s a super slow eater anyway, so getting his food early helps him have more time to sleep after meal service.  But if you want to get your meal early on pretty much any airline, even adults can call or get online a few days ahead to make special meal requests.  Airlines differ in their offerings, but most offer vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, and allergy-free options.  Of course, you don't have to prove that you're a vegetarian or anything, so you can request a vegetarian meal with the sole purpose of getting your food earlier than everybody else.  

There are also some really unusual special request meal options on some airlines.  One is called Jain.  It’s kind of vegan plus no root vegetables, with the idea that you don’t eat anything that kills the plant when you eat it.  Pulling a root would kill the plant, so no carrots, potatoes, onions, etc.  Anyway, you can ask for that on some airlines, though why you’d ever want to subject yourself to that is beyond me. Other unusual options are carb-free, low-sodium, diabetic, Muslim (no pork and all meats are Halal), Kosher, Asian vegetarian, or Hindu vegetarian (which actually sounds spicy and kind of delicious).

Speaking of food, Hainan put out snacks in the galley in the back of the plane that guests could go and grab whenever they got hungry (or bored).  There were sandwiches, Oreos, chips, pretzels, coffee, a selection of teas, and soft drinks.   Can you imagine an American carrier doing this in economy class?  They don't even always give you the full can of Coke, so I doubt they'd put out a buffet of free snacks for passengers to graze on for 13 hours.

Josh helps himself to some snacks during the flight.

The crew replenished the snack baskets frequently during the flight.

The thing that impressed me most happened repeatedly on both the flight to Shanghai and the flight home.  Recently, I have begun drinking warm water as my drink of choice.  It's calorie-free and keeps my hands warm as I hold the cup.  Each time drink service came by, I asked for warm water.  The flight attendants on both flights remembered my request for hours and brought me cups of warm water without my reminding them.  As far as I could tell, they never wrote down my seat number or anything, but they still remembered.

Overall the staff was kind and helpful (though it bewildered them when I was taking pictures of the snacks in the galley), and their English was what I'd call good enough.  It wasn't fluent by any stretch, but it was good enough.  My biggest critique is that the English announcements were difficult to understand.  It was almost as if they chose the flight attendant with the most seniority to make the announcements instead of the flight attendant with the best English pronunciation.

The verdict?  I would definitely fly Hainan again, and their service far exceeds what you'd expect for such an affordable price.  Here how I'd break it down.

Service A
Price A
English B-
Food B+
Entertainment A
Aircraft A+
Leg Room in Economy B+
Safety Video A+
Flight Attendants' Uniforms A- (I can't help it.  I'm a sucker for a well-accessorized flight attendant uniform.  I'm sure they're terribly impractical and uncomfortable, but I've found that the quality of an airline's service is directly proportional to the style and impracticality of the flight attendants' uniforms.)

Thirteen hours after leaving Seattle, we arrived in Shanghai, more well-rested than we expected to be (thanks to those empty seats on our flight that I mentioned in my last post) and ready to face the immigration officers that were the last hurdle in our visa exemption plan.  And it was a good thing we were rested up because immigration in Shanghai was not a cakewalk.  My next post will tell that story plus fill you in on the Toy Story Hotel!

Here's a little Toy Story Hotel Preview!

Chicago to Shanghai via Seattle

After frantically changing our travel plans hours before our trip was to begin, we quickly packed and hopped in the car headed to O'Hare a day earlier than we'd planned.  Once we were within an hour of the airport, I decided to look online for a place to park our car for eight days.  And lo and behold, we found we had made yet another travel mistake.  Evidently, unlike the airports in Indy, parking at O'Hare takes more than an hour's preplanning.

As I Googled "long-term parking O'Hare," I quickly realized that spaces are limited and fill up quickly.  In fact the only parking space (I don't mean parking lot; I really mean parking space) available anywhere near O'Hare for the eight days we'd be gone was $160 at a place called WallyPark.  I don't know if O'Hare parking is always like this or if it was because it was Spring Break, but the only other option started at $430 and wasn't close to the airport.  I had to use a website called SpotHero to reserve the one available space which was also a new experience for me.  Lesson learned.  Book your O'Hare long-term parking days in advance.

We got to the airport with some time to spare and noticed a cool looking eatery on our way to the gate.  When I read the name on the sign, I realized that this was an airport location of a Chicago restaurant I had pinned on "My Chicago 'Must Go' List" pinboard on Pinterest!  It was called The Publican, and we had just enough time to pop in for a snack.

We ordered pork rinds, French fries with a delicious aioli, and toasted bread with some sort of spread.  Though not as good as the Purple Pig, it was a nice way to start our week of vacation eating.

                               

From there it was on to Seattle via American Airlines.  Josh and I had used frequent flyer miles for our two tickets, but we had paid for the kids'.  Anyone who knows me well knows that I don't love domestic airline carriers (because they don't pamper you or treat you very well) and that I love domestic flights even less.  Give me a 13-hour flight on an Asian carrier over a 2-hour flight on an American one any day and twice on Sunday.  But, fortunately, I was exhausted, so the flight to Seattle went by quickly as I slept.

Here was my impression of Seattle from my one-night stay.  I've never seen as much athleisure wear on people in my whole life.  The entire airport was populated with people of all ages who must all possess frequent buyer cards at The North Face, Columbia Sportswear, and REI. I mean, seriously.  Whether the people were 4 or 94, they must have thought that their trip to the airport was going to require some serious trekking and mountain climbing in unpredictable weather.  I tried not to stare, but, you know, I was tired.  And I kept thinking, "My friends Patrick and Heather Ward would love it here."

We found the hotel shuttle and made our way to the Marriott for the night.  The next morning, we shuttled to the airport and went to the Hainan Airlines counter to check in.  It's a really good thing that we changed our tickets, because no fewer than three different agents went over our itinerary with a fine-toothed comb to be sure it met the criteria for the 144 hour visa exemption.  After watching a lengthy discussion in a language we don't speak that included the use of a calculator (to calculate the hours we'd be in Shanghai and make sure then number was less than 144?) and the consultation of a supervisor, we got the nod of approval.  We were good to go!

As we boarded, we began to realize that this flight wasn’t going to be anywhere close to full.  As it turned out, the 787 Dreamliner was less than half full, meaning that Kinley was assigned a middle row of three seats all to herself!  Josh, Knox, and I were to her right in a row together, but I later moved to another empty row to stretch out and sleep.  There were MANY empty rows, so several other passengers had the same idea. 

I think the last time I was on an international flight that was this empty was a 1993 British Airways flight from Harare, Zimbabwe, to London.  Airlines today, especially American ones, oversell flights, so a string of empty seats is rare.  And international flights with multiple rows of empty seats are like unicorns in my experience.  Ok, maybe not unicorns.  But at least a giant panda in the wild.

(See what I did there?  Pandas are Chinese.  And we were on a Chinese airline on our way to China.  Yeah, I get kind of proud of myself sometimes.  Clearly, I'm still jet-lagged.   Cut me some slack.)

I’ll admit that I was a little bit worried about flying a Chinese airline.  Would there be any movies in English?  Would the English movies be ones I wanted to see?  How would the food be?  Would the flight attendants be able to speak and understand English?  To find out the answers to those questions, you'll have to read my next post!