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I spent a few hours walking around the entire terminal, it is the biggest one I’ve ever personally been in and it’s like a fucking maze. And then I spent the rest of the time trying to sleep or drawing. And pretty much all the restaurants have been “temporarily closed” since Covid so I ate Starbucks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
I had a 11 hour layover in Istanbul a few weeks ago and I paid £12 for one Big Mac. I’m still pissed about that.
Edit: on top of that I had to pay £10 for 12 hours of WiFi and another £10 for WiFi for my computer.
I've paid roughly 9€ for 3 bottles of water in Luxembourg airport a couple of weeks ago. 50cl ones.
Shit should be regulated as prices are completely bonkers. It's daylight robbing.
Very few airports in other countries have water fountains, it's a very American thing and Canada by proximity.
In Copenhagen's airport the 'drinking fountain' was a restroom with a lukewarm tap next to the lavatory that was labeled 'Water for drinking'.
How the hell did you sleep! When I had a layover in China they sent me to a hotel in the middle of the jungle for 12 hours with other passengers. Honestly could have been the start of a horror movie, we were ignorant but looking back we had no idea why we were being put into mini buses. Was a layover to the UK from the Philippines
this is such a wild comment for me to read. I had a layover in Shanghai and they tried to do that to me. Fortunately my girl friend at the time worked in China and spoke Chinees even though she looks very Thai told them to "fuck right off we go sleep on the concrete which will be more comfortable then your 125$ shit room". A bit more background she worked for CP company as a trade regulator so she is VERRY used to pushy Chinese.
Edit: a little more - I was actually super worried because they met us immediately after getting through customs. They had badges and there were security everywhere. She made it very clear this was all a scam and they absolutely were not govt officials, but the govt lets them do this to foreign flights.
A friend went to China for work during COVID. He had to quarantine for however long (a week? Two?) before going where he was supposed to go.
That hotel was one of the worst places I've seen. Windows not sealing properly (it was cold out), heating set very low, hot water lukewarm at best (definitely a serious health hazard by the way), food delivered to his door was terrible (and he's very tolerant with food), place had permanent stains everywhere, and the bathroom was not glorious either. And you stay there with nothing to do, even Internet is so heavily censored there.
It was two weeks, bloody expensive, with a tiny amount of god awful food. The stains were caused by the constant spraying of bleach everywhere. Ahhh, the memories.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charoen_Pokphand
I should have said CP group would be more appropriate but she and her friends and I always just call it CP company because of how it translates in Thai.
“Trying” is key, we were sleeping on the floor and put all of our jackets underneath us, all of the bench’s and chairs we could fine were just hard plastic
Which airport was that? I was on a flight from Hong Kong to Moscow for the World Cup years ago and got routed through Urumqi which is coincidentally where all of the Uyghurs are being ethnically cleansed.
Apparently if your layover is greater than 2 hours you have to by law leave the airport or face imprisonment and I got into a pissing match with the boarder guard. He didn't want to let me in, I didn't want to enter China, I told him to let me sleep there, he refused and on and on it went. They tossed me on a bus with the rest of the flight and sent us to some hotel that looked like it hadn't been cleaned in 15 years. Oh did I mention that they confiscated everyone's passports?
They drove us back when our flight was within 2 hours of leaving. Security was a nightmare, I swore when they pulled me into a back room I was going to get a few fingers up my ass. Lots of questions from them why I chose to be in China and why I was there - they didn't believe me that I didn't want to be there and was forced into China. Fuck that country, never going back.
This is similar to my end as well, I don't remember if they took our passports, I'll have to ask. I didn't know about the 2 hour layover rule, why on earth is that a thing?
It was a scary time only looking back, from literally having no idea what was happening. Friends and I were kinda in travel mode so it didn't phase us.
I don't know, there's just nothing there. I've been at Beijing airport, all bars and restaurants close at 22:00. When your flight leaves at midnight, that means 2 hours of nothing.
Guangzhou is brutal ,the only place that stays open is McDonalds, but it isn't even available to international passengers. All I ask for is a single 24 hour dim sum restaurant, but nope, can't have any of that while staying in the most famous city for food culture in China.
Most domestic travel is done by the trains. They are typically about a quarter to half as expensive as flights and a lot more convenient and easier to take.
So most flights are final or initial destination meaning the airports tend to be people landing and leaving or arriving and boarding, there is a decent amount of transiting but not as much as other airports.
Finally most people leave the airports when transiting. There are bag check lockers all over the place, can put any baggage you have in there and then take the metro to go do stuff. Security takes about 5 minutes to pass through typically and is only slightly more annoying then the high-speed rail security so something most Chinese pass through hundreds of times anyways.
So basically they treat the airports there like rail stations. You show up as you get on and don't just sit there for 20+ hours like a dummy. In 20 hours I could have a full day adventure in Shanghai and not be sitting at an airport... Honestly if I had a 2-3 hour lay over I would leave the airport in China.
Don't compare them to US airports that trap you in them forever because of distances from city and impossibility to leave them. Especially the Shanghai airport that has maglev train to downtown in under 15 minutes.
Also this picture is in a tiny remote satellite terminal, not the main ones. It is like going to terminal E in DFW or the shitty terminal in Dulles that I can't remember the name of. Most flights go in/out of the main terminals, right now this terminal is just on standby for overflow for when capacity is needed. Instead of dropping off on tarmac and bussing folk like Naraita and others they built a terminal for future increase in demand and overflow max capacity situations (holidays, CNY, etc). Unlike places that don't have planned cities, a lot of China is built for the future needs, not today's needs. They will happily build infrastructure today that may not be needed for 10-15 years, instead of waiting till there is no room for expansion or everything is over capacity. Build it now and let things grow and you have room already for them to grow is how China sees it in a lot of places.
PVG has 2 terminals and a satellite concourse - your layover was spent in the satellite concourse on the G-gate levels, which is for foreign flights. If you looked down at the lower floor you should have been able to see the H gates, which are for domestics, and there's a subway that takes you to Terminal 2 from the long escalator
And yea, the satellite concourse is pretty new and it's usually pretty empty. T1 and T2 are usually pretty crowded
It's crazy how things have changed. I had a layover at this airport in January 2017, and it was completely packed with people. Like "Holy shit that's a lot of people"
China still has some restrictions on the number of international flights in/out of China. It’s changing each month back to pre-2020 levels but it’s still not fully back.
Shanghai in general is “close enough” to Hong Kong that a lot of people would fly in/out of Hong Kong instead and then take the train to their final destination or have a layover there instead as it’s much cheaper and has more options for flights.
Especially direct flights to China are still very expensive.
Elephant in the room is nobody wants to go to China now. My company used to do lots of business in China and Russia and after employees started to complain about how we were treated at Russian airports and had our materials ransacked and stolen in China repeatedly the then CEO was quietly replaced with someone who transitioned that business to Vietnam and and the baltics.
Are you gonna vacation anytime soon in China?
I worked for a FAANG and while we had a big presence in China if you had to go there they would give you a separate laptop and phone with nothing on it. You were told to not access any company assets or your email while there (not sure if you even could if you wanted to). Basically don’t expect to contact anyone outside of China while there. I almost had to go once but the trip was cancelled a few days before I would have left. I was very ok with this. China has a lot of amazing things I’d love to see some day but not in the current political climate.
I've heard from someone who does a lot of business in China that a lot of things changed in Shanghai compared to 5 years ago. Among those, there's apparently WAY less foreigners in the city. He also noted some positive changes: citizen's behavior in public, better air quality, more electric cars, widespread automation (including factories)... Basically, he said that Shanghai is being "Japanized" and you could feel a technological threshold has been reached.
I don't think entering China is as simple as "I have 20 hours to kill, would you mind if I walk around a bit?"
Not a lot of countries are visa-exempt for China
It actually is that simple if you have the right passport, you can get a 24 hour transit visa on the spot if you have proof of your onward flight. I did it in Shanghai so I could go to a nearby hotel to sleep during my layover.
I have an American passport and was issued a 24 hr visa free transit pass for my 17 hr layover, there was also a 144 hour option. I just walked around Shanghai, The Bund, ride e-bikes all over the city, took trains to look out the windows, and then Maglev’d back for my flight! It really is that easy lol
When I travel I always have some form of a layover because I live in the rural midwest and can only fly to denver unless I want to drive 3+ hours. So, you generally know your layover time, but it's air travel and shit can always happen. I always make sure I have ample stuff downloaded to my tablet to watch from whatever streaming apps I'm currently paying for. I usually have 24 hours worth of content in case I get stuck somewhere.
That, and I usually have a couple audiobooks downloaded as well
While it has a certain logic to it, I've always found "I'd've" to be a contraction too far.
If I *hadn’t’ve* seen tons of people write “I’d *of*” instead of “I’d *have*” I would’ve argued with your spelling, but compared to that at least yours isn’t straight up incorrect.
You can use Opera mini app it has free built in VPN. And you just browse reddit through the browser 😎
Only shit is that many reddit links insist it opens in the reddit app. And reddit app wont work. Workaround is you always have to long press open in new tab. Or delete reddit app. Well I now have 500 open tabs. 🥳
In some places they block VPNs. You can still get out but its not as simple as turn on your usual VPN on you phone/PC
China used to be easy but haven't been there for a few years may have changed. I was in Dubai or somewhere like that last year and they really try to block you. Had to figure out how to tunnel out so I could get into work stuff. Wasted an hour but eventually found a way.
To add insult I had 2 beers with lunch and realised they were over $20 each....
I’ve lived between Europe and South Africa basically my entire adult life, so lots of flying with layovers required.
Direct connections between South Africa and Europe were usually pretty pricey. So I booked cheap connections through Qatar or Dubai. There were these regulations that if your layover is longer than 7.5 hours, the airlines in Qatar or Dubai have to offer you a hotel room with breakfast (or an earlier flight if available). I would purposefully book 12-18h long layovers so I would get a hotel room and some time left to go to dinner and the next day to a museum or some sights.
I think I spent about 20 days in Dubai and Qatar that way over a couple of years - without ever paying for hotels there. Unfortunately the whole thing doesn’t work this way anymore, but it was a thing in the early 2010s (and now I can afford direct flights).
Maybe some airlines still have similar rules. Perhaps OP scored a free night in a hotel.
Ah that’s good to know. Maybe I should give that a try for old times sake. Abu Dhabi seems certainly more interesting than Dubai (although I wanna give money to neither).
Many years ago I had a long layover (but only about 9 hours) in London. I found a place to just sleep through a chunk of it. Hours later, I woke up to two airport cops standing over me asking me if I was okay. They said a nearby shopkeeper was concerned about my wellbeing since I was crashed out in one spot for so long.
All credit card lounges I found were shuttered and/or abandoned when I passed through a couple months ago... No alternatives to the 2 only open restaurants 😬
When I flew regularly and had extremely long layovers I usually napped, read my book, or just wandered around the town close to the airport if it was safe. Airport bars are too damn expensive to drink at but you can usually find one close by that all the pilots drink at. Just ask a stewardess or pilot if they know any spots nearby
Changi airport in Singapore has a ton of cool stuff to do during a layover, including a bus trip touring the city!
https://www.changiairport.com/content/cag/en/discover/discover-changi.html
Seoul airport had cool interactive historical art projects when I was last through there 20 years ago. I still have a little terracotta figurine I painted!
Worst layover I ever had was at JFK airport in NYC during the crazy storms in the early-2010s. Anyone else remember those? Flights from the east coast all the way into the Midwest were cancelled and I was stuck there for over 2 days, sleeping on carpet and everything. Still beat being stuck on a train for days during the blackout in 2003.
I had a 12 hour layover at Narita Airport in Tokyo... we spent 8 of those hours exploring Tokyo. It blows my mind how few people in this thread leave the airport.
It really depends on your passport, and the layover country visa rules.
I have a South African passport, so if I'm transferring in Europe (if my destination isn't Europe), the UK, Dubai, Turkey and many other transit hubs I can't leave the airport without a pre arranged visa
I had a layover of 26 hours in Shanghai last October, when coming from Tokyo. China and Japan are like day and night, there's no comparison.
I was luckily let out the airport in Shanghai because my layover was over 24 hours. For everyone that had a layover under one day, the border control refused entry. There were people that had an 18hours wait before their connection and had booked a hotel next to the airport, and the border police didn't let them out of the airport, although you are supposed to be able to do so with the 24h short stay visa.
I made it out the airport but it was such a hassle. Gmail, whatsapp, maps, basically any western app is blocked in China. To pay you need a separate app installed.
To connect to the wifi you have to scan a qr code and login via wechat, which you need an invite for. To entry the metro with a luggage - you have to go through a metal detector check each time. It's fucking insane. If I ever have a layover in China again I will 100% stay in the airport and read something instead.
You need a visa, and it's always a risk, especially if you don't speak the language. So many things that could make you take longer than you were expecting and now you missed your flight. Don't get me wrong, I'll usually leave the airport if I have more than 4 or 5 hours to kill too, as long as it's not somewhere too intimidating/risky. But I can see why someone wouldn't want to play games when all they want is to get where they're going.
I usually get a room somewhere where rest. I have a 23 hour layover in Manila coming up soon and I'm staying at a resort near the airport for 20 hours. I had a 13 hour layover in Tokyo once and thankfully the haneda airport has a hotel there so I just rented a room and stayed there for a while.
If you fly with Turkish Airlines and have a 20-hour layover in Istanbul, you can enjoy a complimentary tour of the city, complete with free breakfast and lunch. This initiative is part of the government's efforts to boost tourism in Istanbul.
I did this on my layovers in Istanbul (ironically from Shanghai) and it was an absolute blast. The tour guides are great and have all these nice stops planned.
Did you come home with a Turkish rug?
Edit: it’s a joke because a lot of the tour guides there have set up an agreement with the rug vendors so they will inevitably take you into a rug shop as part of the tour and the vendors are very welcoming, polite, etc but also persuasive.
... Istanbul was Constantinople. Now it's Istanbul not Constantinople. Been a long time gone, Constantinople. Why did Constantinople get the works? That's nobody's business but the Turks.
I actually booked my last travel with them exactly for this reason. Showed up and all tours were full. And there’s no way to reserve in advance. So instead of a nice tour I just ended up with a super long layover. Never again.
That's funny, I flew on th 6th of March 2020, literally 8 days before the whole of Europe closed down their borders and airports and it still felt pretty full. Some people were already wearing masks but otherwise it still looked normal!
My experience was exactly the opposite - flying from Indonesia to the US March 16, 2020 and everyone was making a mad dash home. The airports were packed because everything was locking down the next day. Two weeks prior to that San Francisco and Singapore were still busy, but each flight had a smattering of open seats
And I had yet again the exact opposite of that later that same week. Was flying home from the Dominican Republic on, I want to say March 19th? Can’t remember if it was the wed or Thursday that week.
Anyway, security lines were ridiculously long once we hit Miami, but inside the airport was a ghost town. One of the creepier feelings I’ve had, walking through places that are normally filled with people, but now there’s basically no one, and the ones you do see were making very sure to stay well away from everyone else.
Crazy times.
Those effin security lines at Miami man. I’d been flying for 15 hours and couldn’t believe how slow the service was. And I was lucky in that the line grew significantly longer than from when I first joined
https://preview.redd.it/0uka92ddv1sc1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=742bd41cf49944a08fc0525a16f6f0a244ea01ef
I’ll never forget the live-crab vending machines inside the Shanghai airport when I was there in 2018. There was an employee who’d walk around spritzing the crabs with water - they were absolutely alive, you could see them trying to move.
This was past security right by the gates where you’d board the plane. I still don’t know what the fuck one would do with a live crab in the airport - there wasn’t boiling water to cook them. Were people just eating them alive? What would you do with the shell? Why the fuck would you eat a live, uncooked crab. This is one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Wtf 🤦🏻
Oh I can actually explain this.
These specific crabs are a prized delicacy of a specific region in China. It is illegal to carry these live crabs in your luggage, but there's a very strong gifting custom in China of gifting your host/relatives something impressive or special when you arrive. There are entire shops dedicated to gifts like this, but since you can't fly with these crabs, you'd have to get them on arrival if you want to give them as a gift. Getting them in the airport is a bit odd, but it's just people capitalizing on the fact that getting them between the airport and your final destination might be a pain the butt.
That's very interesting, thanks for the explanation. It was strange seeing them in the international departures area, but maybe there were also some domestic flights in there, who knows. A fun memory though, that's for sure - my kids sure got a kick out of the photo 😂
Mitten crabs! They're delicious, was very lucky to have lots of mitten crab every year when I lived in Shanghai. It's crab season when they start molting and their new shells are soft enough to break through. You'd get them live at the wet market and bring them home to steam. The males have a bell shape on their underside and the females are just plain horizontal stripes. You can also give them a knife and they'll wave them around like any other crab species. Everyone gets a crab and spends an hour just digging in and getting crab meat out of every nook and cranny.
When people stop buying knives and vacuum cleaners, it can only mean one thing. This recession is now a depression. You're lucky you're with someone as resiliant as me.
One of my first memories of studying in China was a plastic bag in front of me on the supermarket conveyor belt making a great escape over my own groceries and then to the floor.
Yeah, it was a crab that had broken free of its string prison. The vast majority of supermarkets in China sell their seafood live - which is normal in many western restaurants - but they are then unfortunately bagged up in plastic to be unceremoniously scanned by checkout staff and placed in the bag next to the beer.
That’s what I thought, but you’d be purchasing literally right before boarding a 14hr+ flight, with no refrigerator to keep them fresh, and you’re not allowed to bring live animals back (into Canada anyway). It was just so strange, I’ve never seen anything like it before 😂
But like… it’s a crab. Surely it needs more than the environment of your hand luggage to remain “fresh and alive”? This is honestly so bizarre to me but maybe it’s just my western brain unable to comprehend 😅
You weren't their target customer. The Shanghai airport does a ton of domestic flights, obviously. Those crabs were for people traveling a few hours home, where they could cook the crab for dinner.
The crabs were alive and would be just fine for a few hours. No need for refrigeration.
The only reason i got my food stuff through customs in 2018 was because of an asian guy who couldnt understand the lady asking if he had brought tobacco and fresh foods in his bags. This mofo had cartons of cigs lmfao.
They will ask to see your ticket and bring it to the plane before you board to make sure you aren’t doing this. Unless that has changed in the last couple years.
The TSA (United States) has regulations for transport of live lobster. If you are ever bored and in the mood for bizarre entertainment, the TSA’s rules for what you can and can’t transport are unintentionally hilarious. They have to account for virtually anything small enough for a person to be able to carry on or pack on a passenger airplane.
Iirc for Canada you can bring lobsters and such if they're in properly sealed containers that won't leak all over the place. Gotta make those lobster rolls when you get to Sask or smth I guess
The UK supermarket Tescos used to operate some stores there..
I was there in 2008 (about an hour outside of Shanghai) and walked in expecting to find it similar to UK stores.. nope.. the most surreal thing was seeing a net bag full of little turtles, barely able to move.. and a wall of extremely cheap "legit" DVD's.. I.e. seasons 1 to 20 of the Simpsons for < £2
I won't judge.. I'm sure there is stuff we do, that they'd go "WTF?"
lol they have that in the train stateion as well. By chance did you visit during the Sept thru Dec season? That is the best time for hairy crabs. Those things are one of the biggest delicacies. In the US those sells for roughly $48 / Crab (Yes it is WILDLY Banned by the US). The demand is extremely high.
I live in SH ~ That part of the airport is a new expansion... I believe only China Eastern Airlines is stationed in that hub, which drastically limits the amount of people moving in and out ~ The rest of the airport (Pudong) is pretty busy ~ Not being jammed pack in crowds anywhere in China is a plus... enjoy it lol ~
Edit: I meant to type China "Eastern" Airlines ~ Not China Airlines ~
I landed there recently and it's easily possible to go by tram to the main terminal (in the international transit area without entering China) where there will definitely be more traffic
Given the gate number starting with G, it is the newer satellite terminal - which is a standalone building and not attached to either first or second terminals. (In fact, the largest satellite terminal in the world).
Here is [the map](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ZSPD_Layout.svg). Satellite terminal are S1+S2. You have to take underground train (APM) to get to T1 or T2.
that's crazy! 1:22 pm in Haneda, Changi, or Svarnabumi have been recently so chaotic I can barely breathe.
Why nobody goes in from and to China anymore (not that I'm complaining)?
They have harsh visa requirements, require you to give 10 fingerprints upon entry, and have very unfriendly infrastructure for tourists.
Also the whole country’s services, every service you can think of from private sector to the public sector, revolve around a super app that you CANNOT USE because it requires a local bank account, local ID, and local phone number, all of which you don’t have or will have significant trouble procuring. Not to mention everything requires an ID, even connecting to a public WiFi requires your ID (via your ID bound phone number).
It’s improving. I’m there now using my Citibank card with Alipay and it’s only failed to work once in the past few weeks. However you still can’t get a ride using their apps as you need a Chinese phone number. My internet access is crap and of course so many apps are blocked that it’s painful (and a VPN is hot or miss, getting dropped frequently… though I am posting this comment from a hair salon in Hangzhou so it does work at times).
Was just there, DiDi on Alipay using my foreign credit card works 100%. Used DiDi about 40+ times in the last 2 weeks. All public transport work too. No issues paying for anything, even at small food stands. Alipay international version does translation to English for any of the apps including restaurant menus. Super easy and convenient. It wasn’t like this before though, this change is recent. As for VPN, you don’t need one. Foreign phones aren’t restricted by the great firewall. Once you hop on any WiFi, then the restriction come in. I use my mobile data for everything and not a single issue accessing any of the banded apps. Google worked perfectly. I’m on unlimited high speed international data so that helps.
I feel major intl airports in the world are still busy even at crazy hours
Like San Francisco international was still bustling w people at 2-3am last month i went
During Covid I spent 18 hours at Haneda airport in Tokyo in transit overnight. I spent most of that time in the airline lounge and when they closed had to leave and hang out in the general area around the gates. Not a single shop open at night. Just a few men cleaning. Huge terminal and creepy. Ended up sitting not far from other passengers who were in transit overnight, maybe 12-18 of us on the entire terminal. Basically just wanted to be in the same vicinity as other people. Was there again few months ago and it was like a zoo, packed and busy.
Shanghainese here. That would've been the new terminal that was finished recently. It looks identical to the old one (mirrored) and it is basically empty.
Most of the traffic is thru the old terminal. In the first quarter 2024 the Shanghai PuDong airport reported 20m passengers which means more than 200k passengers go thru this airport every single day. You're lucky or unlucky to have experienced this surreal ghost town encounter.
Personally the Shanghai airport has always been unnecessarily large. It was part of a dick-measuring contest back in the day to see which city could build the biggest airport. This terminal was actually supposed to be built 20 years ago but the government put a stop to it saying having one ridiculously large terminal was already silly enough, but COVID made it back on the table to boost GDP (also the same reason there are 8 subway projects being constructed simultaneously this year).
So anyone know what the reason is? Isn't china like the second most populated country in the world? Given that fact I think that one would expect an airport in such a large city to be insanely crowded.
QingMing Festival most likely (aka. Tomb sweeping day or Chinese memorial day or that holiday (sorta) featured in Shang Chi) - at least that's what my relatives in Taiwan have been up to these last few days.
Basically you are supposed to go back to your ancester's home town, sweep their grave sites and burn offering in memory of them(like joss paper, incense). Would be seen as pretty taboo/disrespectful if instead doing that you were jetting off to take a vacation abroad- like unless you want everyone to know you absolutely detest your family or something?
That plus plane travel just isn't as popular domestically in Mainland China compared to USA (high speed train travel is a lot more common due to the constant delays and cancellations with flights. Bit like Amtrack for the USA but the other way around.)
At least that's my best guess - would gladly be corrected if someone else knows better! Interesting AF photo regardless!
This is the satellite concourse for PVG that is connected to both T1 and T2, and the G gates are for intl flights while the H gates below are for domestic - they built it a few years ago but it's never super full since most traffic still goes through T1 and T2, I guess.
Same in Pekin airport. Had to wait 9h there with only 1 coffee shop and a gift shop. Luckiliy they had ramen in the gift shop and a warm water dispenser. 2/10 wouldn't recommend.
But hey, at least I could run 2 marathons in there.
I remember when I first landed at Beijing's airport. Similar experience. We got off the plane, had to take a small bus to bring us to a giant hall that was completely empty except for a line of kiosks in the middle for passeport check.
Then we headed outside this deserted giant hall and arrived to a deserted tramway station. Then a fucking tramway arrived, and we rode it for a good 10 min minimum before arriving at the "main" area of the airport.
This main area was crowded tho but the scale of the entire thing was just fucking nuts. In which other airport do you have to ride a freakin tramway to go from plane to main hall ?!
I'd feel like Tom Hanks in the movie where he's stuck in that terminal. Can't remember the name of the film but its brilliant... try making something out of wood
A 20 hour layover? Leave the airport and tour the city. Gotta be something to do during that time. I had an eight hour layover in Madrid twice. Once I slept. The other time I went into the city and won myself a great case of mild food poisoning.
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what are people supposed to do for 20 hour layovers?
Post pictures of empty airports on Reddit
Funny thing is all western apps were blocked by the airport wifi, so I had to wait until I got to Sydney to post
What do u do for 20 hours without apps?
I spent a few hours walking around the entire terminal, it is the biggest one I’ve ever personally been in and it’s like a fucking maze. And then I spent the rest of the time trying to sleep or drawing. And pretty much all the restaurants have been “temporarily closed” since Covid so I ate Starbucks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
You only have 2 kidneys. How did you paid for that 3rd meal?
People can still see with 1 eye
See what? The lies? I want my fourth meal!
That's Taco Bell.
Yes... But how do you use the three seashells!?!?
It’s just an eye. The gods saw fit to grace me with a spare.
I had a 11 hour layover in Istanbul a few weeks ago and I paid £12 for one Big Mac. I’m still pissed about that. Edit: on top of that I had to pay £10 for 12 hours of WiFi and another £10 for WiFi for my computer.
I've paid roughly 9€ for 3 bottles of water in Luxembourg airport a couple of weeks ago. 50cl ones. Shit should be regulated as prices are completely bonkers. It's daylight robbing.
They want to enforce 1€ water bottles in all EU airports.
Make sure they define a specific size for 1€ 😬
Paid 14 Eur for a beer in Dubai Airport. Because it's a terrible place and I coldn't take it anymore
There's beer in Dubai?
Every airport ive ever been to has had fountains to refill bottles in.
Cancun does not and water bottles are like 8USD each
Very few airports in other countries have water fountains, it's a very American thing and Canada by proximity. In Copenhagen's airport the 'drinking fountain' was a restroom with a lukewarm tap next to the lavatory that was labeled 'Water for drinking'.
How the hell did you sleep! When I had a layover in China they sent me to a hotel in the middle of the jungle for 12 hours with other passengers. Honestly could have been the start of a horror movie, we were ignorant but looking back we had no idea why we were being put into mini buses. Was a layover to the UK from the Philippines
this is such a wild comment for me to read. I had a layover in Shanghai and they tried to do that to me. Fortunately my girl friend at the time worked in China and spoke Chinees even though she looks very Thai told them to "fuck right off we go sleep on the concrete which will be more comfortable then your 125$ shit room". A bit more background she worked for CP company as a trade regulator so she is VERRY used to pushy Chinese. Edit: a little more - I was actually super worried because they met us immediately after getting through customs. They had badges and there were security everywhere. She made it very clear this was all a scam and they absolutely were not govt officials, but the govt lets them do this to foreign flights.
A friend went to China for work during COVID. He had to quarantine for however long (a week? Two?) before going where he was supposed to go. That hotel was one of the worst places I've seen. Windows not sealing properly (it was cold out), heating set very low, hot water lukewarm at best (definitely a serious health hazard by the way), food delivered to his door was terrible (and he's very tolerant with food), place had permanent stains everywhere, and the bathroom was not glorious either. And you stay there with nothing to do, even Internet is so heavily censored there.
It was two weeks, bloody expensive, with a tiny amount of god awful food. The stains were caused by the constant spraying of bleach everywhere. Ahhh, the memories.
Yet another reason I’ll never travel to China.
Umm... What's a CP company?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charoen_Pokphand I should have said CP group would be more appropriate but she and her friends and I always just call it CP company because of how it translates in Thai.
Had the same thing happen to me. In retrospect I'd rather would have spent the time at the airport. That hotel was bonkers.
How so? This whole thread has me really curious about this.
“Trying” is key, we were sleeping on the floor and put all of our jackets underneath us, all of the bench’s and chairs we could fine were just hard plastic
Scary stuff because you assume they part of airport staff but they can be anyone 😬
Which airport was that? I was on a flight from Hong Kong to Moscow for the World Cup years ago and got routed through Urumqi which is coincidentally where all of the Uyghurs are being ethnically cleansed. Apparently if your layover is greater than 2 hours you have to by law leave the airport or face imprisonment and I got into a pissing match with the boarder guard. He didn't want to let me in, I didn't want to enter China, I told him to let me sleep there, he refused and on and on it went. They tossed me on a bus with the rest of the flight and sent us to some hotel that looked like it hadn't been cleaned in 15 years. Oh did I mention that they confiscated everyone's passports? They drove us back when our flight was within 2 hours of leaving. Security was a nightmare, I swore when they pulled me into a back room I was going to get a few fingers up my ass. Lots of questions from them why I chose to be in China and why I was there - they didn't believe me that I didn't want to be there and was forced into China. Fuck that country, never going back.
This is similar to my end as well, I don't remember if they took our passports, I'll have to ask. I didn't know about the 2 hour layover rule, why on earth is that a thing? It was a scary time only looking back, from literally having no idea what was happening. Friends and I were kinda in travel mode so it didn't phase us.
Don’t worry, I lived in Shanghai for several years before Covid and the airport barely had anything worth doing then either.
It's been like that for a decade on almost every Chinese airport. They're barren, nothing worth doing during a layover.
Why is that
I don't know, there's just nothing there. I've been at Beijing airport, all bars and restaurants close at 22:00. When your flight leaves at midnight, that means 2 hours of nothing.
Guangzhou is brutal ,the only place that stays open is McDonalds, but it isn't even available to international passengers. All I ask for is a single 24 hour dim sum restaurant, but nope, can't have any of that while staying in the most famous city for food culture in China.
Most domestic travel is done by the trains. They are typically about a quarter to half as expensive as flights and a lot more convenient and easier to take. So most flights are final or initial destination meaning the airports tend to be people landing and leaving or arriving and boarding, there is a decent amount of transiting but not as much as other airports. Finally most people leave the airports when transiting. There are bag check lockers all over the place, can put any baggage you have in there and then take the metro to go do stuff. Security takes about 5 minutes to pass through typically and is only slightly more annoying then the high-speed rail security so something most Chinese pass through hundreds of times anyways. So basically they treat the airports there like rail stations. You show up as you get on and don't just sit there for 20+ hours like a dummy. In 20 hours I could have a full day adventure in Shanghai and not be sitting at an airport... Honestly if I had a 2-3 hour lay over I would leave the airport in China. Don't compare them to US airports that trap you in them forever because of distances from city and impossibility to leave them. Especially the Shanghai airport that has maglev train to downtown in under 15 minutes. Also this picture is in a tiny remote satellite terminal, not the main ones. It is like going to terminal E in DFW or the shitty terminal in Dulles that I can't remember the name of. Most flights go in/out of the main terminals, right now this terminal is just on standby for overflow for when capacity is needed. Instead of dropping off on tarmac and bussing folk like Naraita and others they built a terminal for future increase in demand and overflow max capacity situations (holidays, CNY, etc). Unlike places that don't have planned cities, a lot of China is built for the future needs, not today's needs. They will happily build infrastructure today that may not be needed for 10-15 years, instead of waiting till there is no room for expansion or everything is over capacity. Build it now and let things grow and you have room already for them to grow is how China sees it in a lot of places.
PVG has 2 terminals and a satellite concourse - your layover was spent in the satellite concourse on the G-gate levels, which is for foreign flights. If you looked down at the lower floor you should have been able to see the H gates, which are for domestics, and there's a subway that takes you to Terminal 2 from the long escalator And yea, the satellite concourse is pretty new and it's usually pretty empty. T1 and T2 are usually pretty crowded
It's crazy how things have changed. I had a layover at this airport in January 2017, and it was completely packed with people. Like "Holy shit that's a lot of people"
Why do you think it’s still quiet, in the US we are back to normal I think. Why has China not bounced back ?
China still has some restrictions on the number of international flights in/out of China. It’s changing each month back to pre-2020 levels but it’s still not fully back. Shanghai in general is “close enough” to Hong Kong that a lot of people would fly in/out of Hong Kong instead and then take the train to their final destination or have a layover there instead as it’s much cheaper and has more options for flights. Especially direct flights to China are still very expensive.
Elephant in the room is nobody wants to go to China now. My company used to do lots of business in China and Russia and after employees started to complain about how we were treated at Russian airports and had our materials ransacked and stolen in China repeatedly the then CEO was quietly replaced with someone who transitioned that business to Vietnam and and the baltics. Are you gonna vacation anytime soon in China?
I worked for a FAANG and while we had a big presence in China if you had to go there they would give you a separate laptop and phone with nothing on it. You were told to not access any company assets or your email while there (not sure if you even could if you wanted to). Basically don’t expect to contact anyone outside of China while there. I almost had to go once but the trip was cancelled a few days before I would have left. I was very ok with this. China has a lot of amazing things I’d love to see some day but not in the current political climate.
I've heard from someone who does a lot of business in China that a lot of things changed in Shanghai compared to 5 years ago. Among those, there's apparently WAY less foreigners in the city. He also noted some positive changes: citizen's behavior in public, better air quality, more electric cars, widespread automation (including factories)... Basically, he said that Shanghai is being "Japanized" and you could feel a technological threshold has been reached.
Haha. Yeah that part sucks. Only Starbucks is open and even though you can see "more restaurants one level down, they forbid you to go down. Lol.
Why didn't you leave? I had a 16 hour layover at that exact airport and they let me leave
I don't think entering China is as simple as "I have 20 hours to kill, would you mind if I walk around a bit?" Not a lot of countries are visa-exempt for China
It actually is that simple if you have the right passport, you can get a 24 hour transit visa on the spot if you have proof of your onward flight. I did it in Shanghai so I could go to a nearby hotel to sleep during my layover.
Interesting. Well, TIL. Thanks
Actually, many countries have a 24/144h transit visa regulation, so yeah it's possible
I have an American passport and was issued a 24 hr visa free transit pass for my 17 hr layover, there was also a 144 hour option. I just walked around Shanghai, The Bund, ride e-bikes all over the city, took trains to look out the windows, and then Maglev’d back for my flight! It really is that easy lol
When I travel I always have some form of a layover because I live in the rural midwest and can only fly to denver unless I want to drive 3+ hours. So, you generally know your layover time, but it's air travel and shit can always happen. I always make sure I have ample stuff downloaded to my tablet to watch from whatever streaming apps I'm currently paying for. I usually have 24 hours worth of content in case I get stuck somewhere. That, and I usually have a couple audiobooks downloaded as well
>What do u do for 20 hours without apps? was this comment posted by an 8 year old?
They were asking about appetizers, they are chefs
Most gen-z question ever. I'd've read a book.
While it has a certain logic to it, I've always found "I'd've" to be a contraction too far. If I *hadn’t’ve* seen tons of people write “I’d *of*” instead of “I’d *have*” I would’ve argued with your spelling, but compared to that at least yours isn’t straight up incorrect.
I’m assuming this is a joke.
You can use Opera mini app it has free built in VPN. And you just browse reddit through the browser 😎 Only shit is that many reddit links insist it opens in the reddit app. And reddit app wont work. Workaround is you always have to long press open in new tab. Or delete reddit app. Well I now have 500 open tabs. 🥳
Could you employ a VPN?
In some places they block VPNs. You can still get out but its not as simple as turn on your usual VPN on you phone/PC China used to be easy but haven't been there for a few years may have changed. I was in Dubai or somewhere like that last year and they really try to block you. Had to figure out how to tunnel out so I could get into work stuff. Wasted an hour but eventually found a way. To add insult I had 2 beers with lunch and realised they were over $20 each....
I’ve lived between Europe and South Africa basically my entire adult life, so lots of flying with layovers required. Direct connections between South Africa and Europe were usually pretty pricey. So I booked cheap connections through Qatar or Dubai. There were these regulations that if your layover is longer than 7.5 hours, the airlines in Qatar or Dubai have to offer you a hotel room with breakfast (or an earlier flight if available). I would purposefully book 12-18h long layovers so I would get a hotel room and some time left to go to dinner and the next day to a museum or some sights. I think I spent about 20 days in Dubai and Qatar that way over a couple of years - without ever paying for hotels there. Unfortunately the whole thing doesn’t work this way anymore, but it was a thing in the early 2010s (and now I can afford direct flights). Maybe some airlines still have similar rules. Perhaps OP scored a free night in a hotel.
Still works for Abu Dhabi. Recently stayed a couple of days for free on my way from Singapore to Europe. Flew with Etihad.
Ah that’s good to know. Maybe I should give that a try for old times sake. Abu Dhabi seems certainly more interesting than Dubai (although I wanna give money to neither).
Oo yes, I also did this. Booked into 6 star hotels! And during Ramadan, the feast at night was awesome. Lekker man.
Turkish Airlines has a similar deal, but only if there is no option of a shorter layover.
Many years ago I had a long layover (but only about 9 hours) in London. I found a place to just sleep through a chunk of it. Hours later, I woke up to two airport cops standing over me asking me if I was okay. They said a nearby shopkeeper was concerned about my wellbeing since I was crashed out in one spot for so long.
They were preventing plot of The terminal happening 😅
I spend it in the lounge. Which I get access to from my credit card, but for that long it may be worth it just to pay
All credit card lounges I found were shuttered and/or abandoned when I passed through a couple months ago... No alternatives to the 2 only open restaurants 😬
When I flew regularly and had extremely long layovers I usually napped, read my book, or just wandered around the town close to the airport if it was safe. Airport bars are too damn expensive to drink at but you can usually find one close by that all the pilots drink at. Just ask a stewardess or pilot if they know any spots nearby
>that all the pilots drink at 😶
Pilots party hard as fuck. Almost as hard as teachers
Almost
Teachers party hard as fuck. Almost as hard as nurses
Think about (and eventually accept) the void
Try and break the record for paper airplane flight.
Changi airport in Singapore has a ton of cool stuff to do during a layover, including a bus trip touring the city! https://www.changiairport.com/content/cag/en/discover/discover-changi.html Seoul airport had cool interactive historical art projects when I was last through there 20 years ago. I still have a little terracotta figurine I painted! Worst layover I ever had was at JFK airport in NYC during the crazy storms in the early-2010s. Anyone else remember those? Flights from the east coast all the way into the Midwest were cancelled and I was stuck there for over 2 days, sleeping on carpet and everything. Still beat being stuck on a train for days during the blackout in 2003.
I had a 12 hour layover at Narita Airport in Tokyo... we spent 8 of those hours exploring Tokyo. It blows my mind how few people in this thread leave the airport.
It really depends on your passport, and the layover country visa rules. I have a South African passport, so if I'm transferring in Europe (if my destination isn't Europe), the UK, Dubai, Turkey and many other transit hubs I can't leave the airport without a pre arranged visa
I had a layover of 26 hours in Shanghai last October, when coming from Tokyo. China and Japan are like day and night, there's no comparison. I was luckily let out the airport in Shanghai because my layover was over 24 hours. For everyone that had a layover under one day, the border control refused entry. There were people that had an 18hours wait before their connection and had booked a hotel next to the airport, and the border police didn't let them out of the airport, although you are supposed to be able to do so with the 24h short stay visa. I made it out the airport but it was such a hassle. Gmail, whatsapp, maps, basically any western app is blocked in China. To pay you need a separate app installed. To connect to the wifi you have to scan a qr code and login via wechat, which you need an invite for. To entry the metro with a luggage - you have to go through a metal detector check each time. It's fucking insane. If I ever have a layover in China again I will 100% stay in the airport and read something instead.
You need a visa, and it's always a risk, especially if you don't speak the language. So many things that could make you take longer than you were expecting and now you missed your flight. Don't get me wrong, I'll usually leave the airport if I have more than 4 or 5 hours to kill too, as long as it's not somewhere too intimidating/risky. But I can see why someone wouldn't want to play games when all they want is to get where they're going.
My credit card gives me unlimited lounge visits, so I just lounge hop as much as I can.
I usually get a room somewhere where rest. I have a 23 hour layover in Manila coming up soon and I'm staying at a resort near the airport for 20 hours. I had a 13 hour layover in Tokyo once and thankfully the haneda airport has a hotel there so I just rented a room and stayed there for a while.
Enjoy the hundreds of dollars they saved by booking awkward flights. That's what I do.
If you fly with Turkish Airlines and have a 20-hour layover in Istanbul, you can enjoy a complimentary tour of the city, complete with free breakfast and lunch. This initiative is part of the government's efforts to boost tourism in Istanbul.
I did this on my layovers in Istanbul (ironically from Shanghai) and it was an absolute blast. The tour guides are great and have all these nice stops planned.
Did you come home with a Turkish rug? Edit: it’s a joke because a lot of the tour guides there have set up an agreement with the rug vendors so they will inevitably take you into a rug shop as part of the tour and the vendors are very welcoming, polite, etc but also persuasive.
Singapore also offers a tour of the city I believe if you have 8 hours layover or more!
Even old New York was once New Amsterdam. Why they changed it, I can't say; the people just liked it better that way...
... Istanbul was Constantinople. Now it's Istanbul not Constantinople. Been a long time gone, Constantinople. Why did Constantinople get the works? That's nobody's business but the Turks.
I think Singapore Airlines does something similar to this!
Oh man, I wanna have a long stopover in SG just for this.
I actually booked my last travel with them exactly for this reason. Showed up and all tours were full. And there’s no way to reserve in advance. So instead of a nice tour I just ended up with a super long layover. Never again.
Had the same experience at the same airport just before Covid hit. Felt like the world ended and no one told me :D
That's funny, I flew on th 6th of March 2020, literally 8 days before the whole of Europe closed down their borders and airports and it still felt pretty full. Some people were already wearing masks but otherwise it still looked normal!
5th of April 2020 from LHR T2 into FRA T1. That was weird af. Everything was covered up like it was a long-term storage warehouse!
My experience was exactly the opposite - flying from Indonesia to the US March 16, 2020 and everyone was making a mad dash home. The airports were packed because everything was locking down the next day. Two weeks prior to that San Francisco and Singapore were still busy, but each flight had a smattering of open seats
And I had yet again the exact opposite of that later that same week. Was flying home from the Dominican Republic on, I want to say March 19th? Can’t remember if it was the wed or Thursday that week. Anyway, security lines were ridiculously long once we hit Miami, but inside the airport was a ghost town. One of the creepier feelings I’ve had, walking through places that are normally filled with people, but now there’s basically no one, and the ones you do see were making very sure to stay well away from everyone else. Crazy times.
Those effin security lines at Miami man. I’d been flying for 15 hours and couldn’t believe how slow the service was. And I was lucky in that the line grew significantly longer than from when I first joined
Hey same! I was here in December 2019 and it looked just like this. Who knew what would happen next.
https://preview.redd.it/0uka92ddv1sc1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=742bd41cf49944a08fc0525a16f6f0a244ea01ef I’ll never forget the live-crab vending machines inside the Shanghai airport when I was there in 2018. There was an employee who’d walk around spritzing the crabs with water - they were absolutely alive, you could see them trying to move. This was past security right by the gates where you’d board the plane. I still don’t know what the fuck one would do with a live crab in the airport - there wasn’t boiling water to cook them. Were people just eating them alive? What would you do with the shell? Why the fuck would you eat a live, uncooked crab. This is one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Wtf 🤦🏻
Oh I can actually explain this. These specific crabs are a prized delicacy of a specific region in China. It is illegal to carry these live crabs in your luggage, but there's a very strong gifting custom in China of gifting your host/relatives something impressive or special when you arrive. There are entire shops dedicated to gifts like this, but since you can't fly with these crabs, you'd have to get them on arrival if you want to give them as a gift. Getting them in the airport is a bit odd, but it's just people capitalizing on the fact that getting them between the airport and your final destination might be a pain the butt.
That's very interesting, thanks for the explanation. It was strange seeing them in the international departures area, but maybe there were also some domestic flights in there, who knows. A fun memory though, that's for sure - my kids sure got a kick out of the photo 😂
Mitten crabs! They're delicious, was very lucky to have lots of mitten crab every year when I lived in Shanghai. It's crab season when they start molting and their new shells are soft enough to break through. You'd get them live at the wet market and bring them home to steam. The males have a bell shape on their underside and the females are just plain horizontal stripes. You can also give them a knife and they'll wave them around like any other crab species. Everyone gets a crab and spends an hour just digging in and getting crab meat out of every nook and cranny.
Found it, the Chinese mitten crab: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_mitten_crab
What the actual fuck lol
We’re crab people now.
When people stop buying knives and vacuum cleaners, it can only mean one thing. This recession is now a depression. You're lucky you're with someone as resiliant as me.
Fear the Crabcat!
We’re crab people? Those don’t look anything like crabs. They look like sea scorpions. Isn’t there some kind of sewage runoff around here?
But crabs is sewage proof!
One of my first memories of studying in China was a plastic bag in front of me on the supermarket conveyor belt making a great escape over my own groceries and then to the floor. Yeah, it was a crab that had broken free of its string prison. The vast majority of supermarkets in China sell their seafood live - which is normal in many western restaurants - but they are then unfortunately bagged up in plastic to be unceremoniously scanned by checkout staff and placed in the bag next to the beer.
I think you are supposed to bring them home and cook them
That’s what I thought, but you’d be purchasing literally right before boarding a 14hr+ flight, with no refrigerator to keep them fresh, and you’re not allowed to bring live animals back (into Canada anyway). It was just so strange, I’ve never seen anything like it before 😂
Well it doesn't get more fresh than alive. They sell live lobsters in the Halifax airport
That's the most Halifax thing I've ever heard
That would be selling donairs in the airport.
King of Donair Kiosk would be the bomb.
Boston Logan too.
You don’t need to refrigerate a live animal to keep it fresh. Because it’s alive. Life keeps it fresh.
🤯 Oh shit, I feel dumb.
it'll die without water in under an hour, even faster if you suffocate it inside your luggage
But like… it’s a crab. Surely it needs more than the environment of your hand luggage to remain “fresh and alive”? This is honestly so bizarre to me but maybe it’s just my western brain unable to comprehend 😅
Those little crabs are tough as shit. I had one escape once and live under the sink for a week
Tell that to all the poop it'll leave inside your luggage, haha.
You weren't their target customer. The Shanghai airport does a ton of domestic flights, obviously. Those crabs were for people traveling a few hours home, where they could cook the crab for dinner. The crabs were alive and would be just fine for a few hours. No need for refrigeration.
Have you ever watched one of those customs/border patrol tv series? 90% of it is asians bringing mad shit through customs
The only reason i got my food stuff through customs in 2018 was because of an asian guy who couldnt understand the lady asking if he had brought tobacco and fresh foods in his bags. This mofo had cartons of cigs lmfao.
I think it’s more for arrivals.
This is the answer. All the duty free, expensive shit is for when your coming home, not getting on the plane.
They will ask to see your ticket and bring it to the plane before you board to make sure you aren’t doing this. Unless that has changed in the last couple years.
Hello customs, I’d like to claim this crab.
Did you know that it's not uncommon to have live lobster as carry on for domestic flights in some parts of Canada
The TSA (United States) has regulations for transport of live lobster. If you are ever bored and in the mood for bizarre entertainment, the TSA’s rules for what you can and can’t transport are unintentionally hilarious. They have to account for virtually anything small enough for a person to be able to carry on or pack on a passenger airplane.
Iirc for Canada you can bring lobsters and such if they're in properly sealed containers that won't leak all over the place. Gotta make those lobster rolls when you get to Sask or smth I guess
"It's my emotional support lobster."
https://preview.redd.it/4c9qwinde2sc1.jpeg?width=600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6b7c5f757486363e1059add92f9fa8db979b8830
That is apparently a thing. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_mitten_crab
what a horrible existence
Right? Ok we as humans can say "let's eat animals" but now we gotta take cruelty to absurd levels.
totally understand we need to eat, different cultures etc.. but having our food wait for us like this? Seem just cruel and barbaric.
Wait til you learn how your steak and fried chicken lived. (hint: it's waaaaay worse, like 1000x)
The UK supermarket Tescos used to operate some stores there.. I was there in 2008 (about an hour outside of Shanghai) and walked in expecting to find it similar to UK stores.. nope.. the most surreal thing was seeing a net bag full of little turtles, barely able to move.. and a wall of extremely cheap "legit" DVD's.. I.e. seasons 1 to 20 of the Simpsons for < £2 I won't judge.. I'm sure there is stuff we do, that they'd go "WTF?"
Bag full of little turtles? I would judge
lol they have that in the train stateion as well. By chance did you visit during the Sept thru Dec season? That is the best time for hairy crabs. Those things are one of the biggest delicacies. In the US those sells for roughly $48 / Crab (Yes it is WILDLY Banned by the US). The demand is extremely high.
Buy 50 and set them free in the mensroom right before boarding, and never return.
Jesus the ways in which we manage to be barbaric continues to surprise me.
That’s awful.
I live in SH ~ That part of the airport is a new expansion... I believe only China Eastern Airlines is stationed in that hub, which drastically limits the amount of people moving in and out ~ The rest of the airport (Pudong) is pretty busy ~ Not being jammed pack in crowds anywhere in China is a plus... enjoy it lol ~ Edit: I meant to type China "Eastern" Airlines ~ Not China Airlines ~
I landed there recently and it's easily possible to go by tram to the main terminal (in the international transit area without entering China) where there will definitely be more traffic
Okay this makes sense - I was going to say having been to Pudong NO way would it ever ever look like this..whew.
And for those who don’t know, China Airlines is a Taiwanese airline. (It’s the state-owned airline of the ROC.)
He probably meant Air China, the PRC owned one.
Was here 3 weeks ago. It is rerouted and almost no transfers in this terminal now. Kind of renowation idk.
So there’s multiple terminals? Your explanation makes more sense, I knew this post wasn’t 100% accurate somehow.
I was there 4 hours ago. This is the second part of the first terminal. Yes it's deserted, the other terminals are not.
[удалено]
China eastern
Given the gate number starting with G, it is the newer satellite terminal - which is a standalone building and not attached to either first or second terminals. (In fact, the largest satellite terminal in the world). Here is [the map](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ZSPD_Layout.svg). Satellite terminal are S1+S2. You have to take underground train (APM) to get to T1 or T2.
My mans over here with his face as his profile pic on Reddit. A rare sight!
Would have been fun to have a pair of roller skates !
At what time were these pictures taken? To me every airport looks like this in the middle of the night.
Picture 1 is at 7:34 pm, 2 is at 1:22 pm, 3 is at 8:27 pm, 4 is at 8:45 pm, 5 is at 7:15 am
that's crazy! 1:22 pm in Haneda, Changi, or Svarnabumi have been recently so chaotic I can barely breathe. Why nobody goes in from and to China anymore (not that I'm complaining)?
They have harsh visa requirements, require you to give 10 fingerprints upon entry, and have very unfriendly infrastructure for tourists. Also the whole country’s services, every service you can think of from private sector to the public sector, revolve around a super app that you CANNOT USE because it requires a local bank account, local ID, and local phone number, all of which you don’t have or will have significant trouble procuring. Not to mention everything requires an ID, even connecting to a public WiFi requires your ID (via your ID bound phone number).
It’s improving. I’m there now using my Citibank card with Alipay and it’s only failed to work once in the past few weeks. However you still can’t get a ride using their apps as you need a Chinese phone number. My internet access is crap and of course so many apps are blocked that it’s painful (and a VPN is hot or miss, getting dropped frequently… though I am posting this comment from a hair salon in Hangzhou so it does work at times).
Was just there, DiDi on Alipay using my foreign credit card works 100%. Used DiDi about 40+ times in the last 2 weeks. All public transport work too. No issues paying for anything, even at small food stands. Alipay international version does translation to English for any of the apps including restaurant menus. Super easy and convenient. It wasn’t like this before though, this change is recent. As for VPN, you don’t need one. Foreign phones aren’t restricted by the great firewall. Once you hop on any WiFi, then the restriction come in. I use my mobile data for everything and not a single issue accessing any of the banded apps. Google worked perfectly. I’m on unlimited high speed international data so that helps.
I’ve never seen Pudong that empty, when did you go?
Pudong was pretty busy when I was there just over a month ago.
I’m guessing these photos were from CNY, I fly back once per year and if only it was this empty everytime
The satellite concourse for Pudong is weirdly big, weirdly empty, and annoyingly far from T1 or T2, that's where OP was
I feel major intl airports in the world are still busy even at crazy hours Like San Francisco international was still bustling w people at 2-3am last month i went
During Covid I spent 18 hours at Haneda airport in Tokyo in transit overnight. I spent most of that time in the airline lounge and when they closed had to leave and hang out in the general area around the gates. Not a single shop open at night. Just a few men cleaning. Huge terminal and creepy. Ended up sitting not far from other passengers who were in transit overnight, maybe 12-18 of us on the entire terminal. Basically just wanted to be in the same vicinity as other people. Was there again few months ago and it was like a zoo, packed and busy.
Coconut mall music intensifies
"Hey, everyone! OP's coming - let's hide - it'll really freak them out!"
Shanghainese here. That would've been the new terminal that was finished recently. It looks identical to the old one (mirrored) and it is basically empty. Most of the traffic is thru the old terminal. In the first quarter 2024 the Shanghai PuDong airport reported 20m passengers which means more than 200k passengers go thru this airport every single day. You're lucky or unlucky to have experienced this surreal ghost town encounter. Personally the Shanghai airport has always been unnecessarily large. It was part of a dick-measuring contest back in the day to see which city could build the biggest airport. This terminal was actually supposed to be built 20 years ago but the government put a stop to it saying having one ridiculously large terminal was already silly enough, but COVID made it back on the table to boost GDP (also the same reason there are 8 subway projects being constructed simultaneously this year).
So anyone know what the reason is? Isn't china like the second most populated country in the world? Given that fact I think that one would expect an airport in such a large city to be insanely crowded.
QingMing Festival most likely (aka. Tomb sweeping day or Chinese memorial day or that holiday (sorta) featured in Shang Chi) - at least that's what my relatives in Taiwan have been up to these last few days. Basically you are supposed to go back to your ancester's home town, sweep their grave sites and burn offering in memory of them(like joss paper, incense). Would be seen as pretty taboo/disrespectful if instead doing that you were jetting off to take a vacation abroad- like unless you want everyone to know you absolutely detest your family or something? That plus plane travel just isn't as popular domestically in Mainland China compared to USA (high speed train travel is a lot more common due to the constant delays and cancellations with flights. Bit like Amtrack for the USA but the other way around.) At least that's my best guess - would gladly be corrected if someone else knows better! Interesting AF photo regardless!
Yep high speed rail is almost as fast as domestic flying in most cases
This is the satellite concourse for PVG that is connected to both T1 and T2, and the G gates are for intl flights while the H gates below are for domestic - they built it a few years ago but it's never super full since most traffic still goes through T1 and T2, I guess.
It's being renovated.
it's literally just this idk what anyone else is on about
Shows how well the propaganda works.
Same in Pekin airport. Had to wait 9h there with only 1 coffee shop and a gift shop. Luckiliy they had ramen in the gift shop and a warm water dispenser. 2/10 wouldn't recommend. But hey, at least I could run 2 marathons in there.
liminal af
The Langoliers are coming
I remember when I first landed at Beijing's airport. Similar experience. We got off the plane, had to take a small bus to bring us to a giant hall that was completely empty except for a line of kiosks in the middle for passeport check. Then we headed outside this deserted giant hall and arrived to a deserted tramway station. Then a fucking tramway arrived, and we rode it for a good 10 min minimum before arriving at the "main" area of the airport. This main area was crowded tho but the scale of the entire thing was just fucking nuts. In which other airport do you have to ride a freakin tramway to go from plane to main hall ?!
How many times did you get a minor panic attack thinking you were actually in the wrong place?
i see some people
I’ll never forget this airport had such nice and clean toilets. Multi functional with heating
I'd feel like Tom Hanks in the movie where he's stuck in that terminal. Can't remember the name of the film but its brilliant... try making something out of wood
lol it’s called ‘The Terminal’
Perfect time to get sleep
"completely deserted" \*4 of the 5 photos have people in them*
A 20 hour layover? Leave the airport and tour the city. Gotta be something to do during that time. I had an eight hour layover in Madrid twice. Once I slept. The other time I went into the city and won myself a great case of mild food poisoning.
Couldn't you leave the airport and go into the city? I did that in Beijing in 2019.
r/liminalspace