On the Road in China: Friendly skies 

Source: ONE Sport

Seeing the life insurance counter beside the check-in desk was a little disconcerting.

I was about to take my first domestic flight in China and while I knew I had nothing to worry about there was some curiosity to see just what 'air insurance' entailed.

To be fair, they did also cover loss of baggage and flight

cancellation but their main business was in financial protection against the unthinkable.

A premium of 20 RMB (NZ$4) bought me up to

600,000 RMB (NZ$120,000) worth of cover in case of all kinds of air accidents as well as plane disappearance (think Bermuda Triangle).

Internal tourism is booming is China as the burgeoning middle classes have disposable income and want to see their country.

One study estimated that close to 90% of all tourism in China in 2008 was undertaken by locals.

Booking the flight had been hassle free, and Shanghai Pudding airport is as vast as you would expect.

It has capacity for 60 million passengers annually (Auckland processes 13 million per annum) and is the 3rd busiest airport for freight on the planet.

Getting to the airport had been a lot of fun, on the German-built Maglev train, which covered the 30km from the city centre in less than eight minutes.

The only complaint as a tourist was that with a top speed of 450km/h and a cruising speed of 'just' 300km/h it was hard not to take blurred photos and it was all over very fast!

My last train journey had been on the quaint Overlander from National Park to Auckland which made for quite a contrast.

The flight on China Eastern Airlines was full, but quite fine and surprisingly more legroom than on most New Zealand domestic flights.

A group of charming Israeli's certainly added something to the two and a half hour trip.

The dozen or so tourists insisted on sitting together, which caused quite a kerfuffle as the already full plane was rearranged and Chinese businessmen had to be scattered like confetti.

Our friends from the Middle East then demanded drinks, slippers to wear and food - all in their own inimitable way while one member of the party, who bore a striking resemblance to a very overweight Danny De Vito insisted on waddling down the aisle every ten minutes.

This pleasant individual would bump into every single person on his journey down the plane, although to be fair there was no danger of his billowing stomach doing any actual damage.

The Chinese are charming hosts and generally do not show anger in public, partly to avoid losing face.

But Israeli Danny had raised the ire of a few of the passengers, and even tested the endless patience of the air hostesses.

I wondered if he had purchased 'air insurance'.

tvnz.co.nz's Michael Burgess is in China courtesy of the Asia New Zealand foundation and travelled there with Air New Zealand. He is aiming to investigate the impact and legacy of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and will be writing about the sights and sounds of China along the way.

Michael is in China for three weeks. Check out his archive of articles here