Flight 9W 118 - Mumbai London Heathrow

I have been meaning to write this post for a while now, almost since I landed to UK last Sunday (12th Nov 2006). Nevertheless, better late than never..!

First things first...If you are traveling to UK for long term, particularly during winter, get your baggage ready..

If you are from Bangalore following places can be useful:

Woolen:
Eastern Stores, Brown Stores - Commercial Street
Padmasree Traders - Gandhinagar

I purchased an overcoat, 3 pairs of inners, 2 sweaters, 4 pairs of woolen socks among other items. I already had a couple of jackets and sweatshirts with me.

Luggage:Shops around Gandhinagar - I purchased a huge 32-34 sized bag and an expandable trolley from here..

Once shopping and packing is done, you head to airport.

At airport, there are 3-4 sets of formalities.

1. Luggage screening through X-ray...not mandatory for hand luggage, but useful if you plan to check in your handluggage as well.
2. Check in at the counter...Ask the lady at the counter if you wish to check in your hand luggage as well.
3. Immigration check - Embarkation form submission and routine Q&A with GoI official
4. Security check and hand-luggage screening
5. Board the aircraft

The luggage allowance that Jet gave was 30 kg for check in luggage and 8 kg for hand luggage. However, I had 34 kg check in and 12 kg hand luggage. Since my check in baggage was heavy, lady at the check-in counter correctly smelled foul (!) and insisted on weighing my hand baggage as well ! She tried to act tough initially and asked me to reduce check in weight..When I told her that I can't handover anything to anyone, since noone is waiting outside, she relented.. Finally I checked in 32.5 kg weight and carried around 14 kg of hand baggage in my trolley...Once check in counter was crossed, rest was easy.. The flight was good, though they had less water bottles available with them ! During the flight, they gave us a landing card which was to be filled up and later submitted to immigration officials in London.

Once landed, we came out through aerobridge..then went towards immigration...presented the landing card, work permit and passport etc...after a few questions etc, I was asked to go to health control since I was on work permit.. health control is close to immigration (left side of immigration to be precise)...I presented my X-ray there...once cleared, I again went to Passport Control desk (or some similar name) right outside health control...after clearing all of these, I went for baggage claim...I collected trolley from a corner where all trolleys were kept..Since it took me nearly 30-40 mins in these formalities and queues, luggage was already lying next to conveyer belt..I picked up luggage and came out through the green channel (nothing to declare)..near the information counter, my cabbie, mehfooz was waiting with a placard that had my misspelt name with Infosys mentioned there... I went alongwith him to the parking and stood there...he got his cab there in a min or so.. Once in a cab, I started for Kingsbury..On the way, Mehfooz and I had some intersting chat about Islam, jainism, India, Pakistan, US, Kashmir, Bangladesh etc. Cost of cab from heathrow to Kingsbury - GBP 65, Parking charges (not paid) - GBP 4

..more into edition 2 of London Diary

Adios..
Ashish