On my recent flight from Urumqi, China to Almaty, Kazakhstan, I gained a new perspective on air travel and carry on baggage. Coming from the Arctic of Canada where air travel is unique in itself, luggage restrictions are still enforced fairly strictly. So on this recent flight to Almaty, I was somewhat amazed.

I arrived to Urumqi via Bejing and was pleased to see myself step into a large beautiful, new terminal building where I had to wait some three hours for my flight to Kazakhstan. As I watched the large, modern display board, I found it strange that no check-in time was being listed for my flight. But seeing as I had plenty of time to spare, I wasn't worried. But after an hour, I thought I should ask about the check-in location and was told I had to go to the international terminal downstairs. Somewhat confused I troddled down to the first floor, where I had first arrived, wondering, where is this international area? As expected I saw no sign and even stepped outside....nothing. So back upstairs to an annoyed info desk person who told me again downstairs, outside and to your left. So back I went, my pack now feeling substantially heavier, going outside and hanging a left. Wandering out there still somewhat perplexed I finally saw the International Terminal sign on a building about half a block away.

Quickly walking there, I then entered a building which was a scene of slight chaos. Not only was this "international terminal" a whole lot smaller but it seemed packed with people carting around tonnes of luggage and parcels. After assessing the chaos, I realized I had to go through a gate blocked by people trying to sort out all of their packages. Managing to get by them, I handed my ticket to a guy who waved me through to where on the floor was a big x-ray machine. Assuming I had to put my pack through, I placed it on the conveyor and since the apparantly lone security guy was focused on some lady and what she had in a bag, I just took my pack off on the other side of the machine and headed to the check-in mass. I say mass because although there were apparantly two counters checking people in for Almaty, there was just one mass of folk and their tonnes of bags.

Undaunted I stood there and slowly inched my way forward until surprisingly it was my turn. Handing over my ticket and putting my luggage on the conveyor, the agent soon gave me a boarding pass without a word and tagged my bag. It seemed the seating was arbitrarily assigned but I was happy at least to have a seat. Deep down, I was wandering if this assignment really ultimately ended up making any difference.

I then proceeded through to another area of chaos where everyone was attempting to get through another gate being manned by a lone Chinese guard with counter space on either side of the entranceway. Seeing that people were writing something at the counters, I inched my way forward so I could at least grab one of the papers...an exit form. Quickly filling this out against an adjacent wall, I then tried to get to the Chinese guard who was busy with a throng of Russian speaking ladies trying to convince him to let them through. Eventually he had them move aside at which point I handed him my form and them was waved through. Now I had to stand in line for the final stretch whereby I was given my exit stamp and allowed to proceed into the official waiting area.

This was actually all just part of the same large room except that there were about 6 rows of plastic molded chairs with enough seats for probably 100 people. On the right side was a row of counters laden with everything from battery powered toys to cigarrettes to large wine bottles containing entwined snakes and lizards. After quickly perusing these duty free items I opted to remain unburdened by more stuff. However, that was quite the opposite for most folk. And on the other side of the room was a table where people could buy boxes of strawberries, huge bunches of bananas or kiwis and large boxes of pears or apples (mayby more like apple pears?). These also appeared to be popular items and I saw one person having two boxes of the "apples" and two boxes of strawberries all being taped together into a nice 3 foot high "parcel".

As I watched these proceedngs I also noted that "thankfully" the designated smoking area was by the washrooms, a partially enclosed area containg a half dozen chairs. Of course the smoke just poured into the main waiting area. And at the far end of the room, next to the gate area, was a little bar partioned off by a 2 foot high plastic fence.....here of course smoking was also permitted.

As the wait continued (of course the flight was delayed) I watched more people enter the waiting room, one woman with a three foot long painting covered in cloth and a little boy carrying a three foot high stuffed tiger. And then there were the boxes of fruit and battery powered toys.

After waiting forever, and a couple false alarms, eventually the gate was opened and everyone surged forward.....no lineup here. And as for the disabled, small children and first-class passengers, there was no special treatment....we were all just one mass pushing to get through the gate. Fortunately, because I had been standing around the gate area for about 45 minutes earlier, I had a pretty good position and made it through quite quickly. Of course some of the smart ladies with many, many packages also pushed in early so they could fill up the overheard compartments with their bounty.

Once in my seat, I watched the toys, fruit boxes, painting and stuffed tiger all file by. Where all these things went I have no idea. But eventually the carrying capacity was reached so if they couldn't put the item in front of them (no worry about being required to slip under the seat in front) then the flight attendant took the bags to be checked. It ended up being a little battle at times and I really felt for the attendants who had to fight to keep the emergency exits free of bags and explain to others that there bags were going to be checked in. I think there were at least a dozen bags that were probably eventually checked into the cargo hold.

So of course this all resulted in further delay but incredibly, it was all sorted out and I had to commend the excellent and professional flight crew of China Southern Airlines for the job they did. From then on, the flight went as scheduled and other than those who had no leg room because of their excess bags, we arrived in Almaty quite comfortably....at least I did.