Hong Kong airport
Actually, the real name is Chek Lap Kok Airport. Basically, this is one massive structure. I mean, really massive. And yep, this entry pretty much sums up the fact that I am back in the ‘land of the rising sun’.
This new airport opened for commercial operations in 1998, replacing Kai Tak airport. Gone are the days when you would see low flying aircrafts in Kowloon. I was actually here back in 1998 within the first month of opening. It was rather chaotic back then cuz things were not running smoothly, mainly, waiting hours for the luggage to show up, luggage getting lost, etc. Like said, that was the old days when it first opened. In terms of looks and such, not much has changed since (I was here again in 2002). The customs and immigration officers are still as f*ing rude as ever. Anyway…
The airport at 6:30am. My flight was at 8:45am. Sucks!
Upon arriving in Tokyo, I got finger-printed and mugshot-ed, a new law which started last month. All foreigners entering Japan will need to go through this procedure for so called ’safety measures’ against terrorism and other crimes. This was rather controversial before it went into effect because the authorities get to keep the collected data indefinitely. As usual, people were bitching about privacy issues and such. Oh well, personally, I don’t care all that much since I’m not here to cause any problems nor get up to any illegal activities.
The whole fingerprinting and photographing procedure adds up to less than 20 seconds more time when compared with before. Theres a box on the immigration counter, it has two small index finger scanners on it, and a screen and camera above it. The immigration officer will first ask you (after checking your entry documents) to put your two index fingers onto the scanner for scanning. This procedure takes like 5 seconds. Then you are required to look into the camera for the mugshot. This too takes 5 seconds or so. If you’re clean (like me ^o^), you go through. That’s all.
Anyway, I’ll leave it here. Enjoy the rest of the pics:
Shops, restaurants and cafes
There are tons of boarding areas. Very spacious.
My flight, North West Airlines
