#7 Flight Plan

Today did not start well. I was awoken rather rudely at approximately 7.30am by a phone call, which had stopped by the time I fumbled to find my phone and forced my weary eyes open to see an unknown, foreign number. I called it back, and was directed to the company HQ in Japan. After being put on hold for quite some time I was put through to someone who told me that my Certificate of Eligibility, which I bring to the Embassy in Ireland to get my Japanese visa, will be sent out shortly. So things were looking up.

For such a simple form it causes mucho stress

I went back to sleep and around 11am I woke up again and checked my emails, to see that my flights have now been booked. By some miracle, I have been put on the flight I wanted - Emirates Dublin to Dubai, and from there to Tokyo. I am now a very happy camper.

I will depart Dublin in the afternoon of the 20th August, and after a 7 and a half hour flight I will get in to Dubai shortly after midnight on the 21st. I will proceed to wander aimlessly around the airport for about 3 hours until my next flight, nearly 10 hours to Tokyo. All going well I should be in Narita International Airport in Tokyo by 6pm on the 21st of August. Splendid!

Oh, and I will be leaving from terminal 2 in Dublin. A very important but admittedly very petty detail which had been bothering me.

Dublin Airport Terminal Two. . .the place of dreams!

I was on the Emirates website and I was able to look up the planes I'll be on and their facilities, although I am travelling economy and not first class it still looks pretty swish. For the slightly longer journey from Dubai to Tokyo I'll be travelling on the A380, the largest passenger plane in the world (apparently it can fit 555 people). It has two levels - the first being for first and business class, while the lower deck is for the plebs in economy. The economy layout is three seats - aisle - four seats - aisle - three seats. If you follow. More chance of an aisle seat, but less chance of being seated at the window. I'll try survive though!

Check out this badboy! [credits: Emirates]

The next step was to look up luggage requirements, which is thankfully 30kg and not the 23kg I expected. Although the first 30kg is free, I am only allowed an additional 2kg (which will cost €100) so I spent a few hours today doing a trial run on the weight of my suitcase. It looks like I will be needing to cut back a little, but generally you will fit a lot in with the 30kg.


And finally, I will be doing the same trip home on the 21st of December. It will take me a total 16.8 hours flying time to get from Dublin to Tokyo, but strangely enough it will take me 20.2 hours in a plane to get from Tokyo to Dublin.


It seems after months and weeks of waiting things are starting to move very fast, before I know it I will be there and back, and on to Sweden.

Soon. . .