I have flown almost exclusively on American Airlines for over the past 9 years. I went to Barcelona on Virgin and was so impressed with the flight attendants. They were so professional and friendly. Yes, friendly!! What a concept!!! The seats are tighter than American Airlines but the service and friendliness of the flight attendants cannot be compared with the indifference and and at times rudeness of American Airlines. I don't want to start a debate on that but it was so refreshing. The food was of much better quality and the portions were quite generous. They also provided each passenger in coach with a great little accesory bag. They don't even do this in first class on Amercian anymore.

I so agree with you. I tried American once,this past June, because of the added legroom. Never again!!! I'd say it was horrible start to finish but it went way beyond that...it lasted for two days after I got to London thanks to a dreadful case of food poisoning. Don't ask what gave it to me. I couldn't recognize what I was eating. I've flown Virgin many times in all three classes and can't wait to go back.

Well, you're wrong about the amenity bag. AA does give them out to business and first class. I'm in Bangkok now, flew AA to Tokyo in business and JAL to Bangkok in coach. Had a wonderful crew on AA. It was a 13 hour flight from Chicago to Tokyo. Thank God I'm able to upgrade to business. The food was wonderful, plenty, even a snack table set-up for late nighters. So please don't talk about something you don't know about. We all know you don't like AA and that's fine, but don't make up stuff.
The JAL flight was 6 hours. I have never, ever sat in such tight seats in my life. The crew was great, but that's expected, as it has a lot to do with their corporate culture and just the culture itself. Very young, very good looking, willing to bend over backwards. Which flight am I looking forward to??? Well, actually I would love to stay here in Bangkok, but all good things must come to an end, and it is the AA flight from Tokyo to Chicago, not the JAL flight. Sure the FA's are better to look at, but after 1/2 hour, what do you have??? a seat that gives you about 30" of space. Sorry, if I want to look at pretty girls, let me choose when and where, but when I fly, I like my space. The AA coach is about 5" more, and on any long flight I would prefer that, anytime.

Frequent Flier, I flew from the East Coast to Honolulu round trip and was given no such amenity bag and the food was really of poor quality. But thank you for pointing out for which you wrongly thought were my errors. I am so happy for you. Not only were you given an amenity bag, able to gorge on AA's wonderful cuisine, you were also able to gawk at their lovely young flight attendants. I am sure they were charmed by you! You sound like such a charming passenger. However, they might wise to take some caution while bending over in any direction near you!!!

"able to gawk at their lovely young flight attendants".....cabicou....As I read AA's post, I am certain he was referring to the flight attendants on the JAL flight, not the AA flight...in your retort,you make reference only to AA.So Ican only assume that you misread AA's post...BTW, Hawaii is "domestic"...No airline gives amenity kits on domestic flights.....Have a nice day and a great LaborDay weekend!

AAFrequent Flyer, I am curious...which seats on AA in economy give you 5 extra inches of legroom (compared to the 31 on most other airlines)--excluding exit row and bulkhead?

American instituted a "More Room Throughout Coach" program in its entire fleet a couple of years ago, removing rows from Coach (with PR cameras rolling) to give the poor unwashed masses in Steerage a little more room. It DOES make a difference, especially on the MD80s and 737s.

American recently partially reversed the program, putting rows BACK into Economy on their A300 and B757 fleet servicing "vacation" destinations. I haven't noticed that legroom is back to the Bad Old Days on their 757s serving business destinations....

Thanks BeachBoi,
No point of debating, as 'Cabicou' already made up hers/his mind about AA. As I stated in my first reply, we all know AA is not the choice for 'Cabicou' and that's fine, I just don't like when people make up stories to make their point.
Anywya, I highly recommend this part of the world to anybody that hasn't been. It's worth the loooonnnnggggg flight. TRUST ME!!!!!

If I knew you were comming we could have had a beer!

jamesA(BKK)

JamesA,
I'm still here, and will be till Wednesday. We all went to the Bed Supper Club last night and had a great time at the restaurant. Afterwards I came back to my hotel, the Conrad Hilton and had few at the Club 87. That is one hot spot.
I will be staying at the Conrad, but tomorrow(Sunday) I'm getting upgraded to a suite, so if you're still interested, let me know and I will post the room number tomorrow so you could call. I'm part of a big group from FlyerTalk.com. Everybody is staying in different places. We're suppose to get together again tonight right here at the Conrad. Don't know what the plans are, but judging from last night, the group falls apart into smaller groups later in the evening as everybody has different agendas. You're more than welcome to join us. Today only I'm in 2321. If you're interested, call and leave a message. I will call back and let you know where and when.
See Ya!

Just some more info for cabicou,

I did not take the amenity bag with me this time, as I have about 10 of them at home, but talking to others here in Bangkok, here is a list of what's in the bag:

Eye shades
Ear plugs
Socks
Tootpaste and toothbrush
The following are from Origins:
lip balm
Hand moisturizer
Face moisturizer
There is another tube of something that nobody can remember.
and also a coupon for Origins products at Saks 5th Ave.
All first class and business pax on an international 777 AA flight get Bose Noise reduction Headphones to use in flight. These are great, if for no other reason, but to filter out any baby noises.
So there you have it cabicou.

Dearest AA frequent Flier,
I have have been a frequent flier with AA for 8 years and I am a Saphire member, I'll have you know. The quality of AA has gone down over the years and that is refelected in the attitude of the flight attendants and ground crew. You have absolutely no basis for claiming that I am "making stuff up". I fly AA most of the time because I have little or no other choice and I also want those ff miles as I assume you do to. However, I will state again that the it was such a pleasure to be greated and served by such friendly and professional people aboard my flight to Barcelona. Maybe you should be a bit more open minded instead of taking such an unhealthy pleasure of attacking others. Perhaps you suffer from low self esteem.

I will correct my spelling error. ...a pleasure to be greeted...not greated and I will omit the word"the" from one of my sentences as well. I am sure the kind AA frequent flier would point that out to me given the chance.

Cabicou........Emeralds are great!!

AAFF, just ignore cabicou (which is a kind of cheese, I believe), who gets her hackles, goes on the attack, and is thereafter relentless. Your posts are almost without exception helpful and valid, and thank you for them.

Oh please Soccrmom, I believe that you and AAF are partners or close friends and are in cahoots!!!! You can't stand that anyone else has an opinion. I am not the one who goes after people. I just don't suffer fools gladly!

Which was the connecting carrier into Barcelona? How did that flight compare?

Cabicou,
Possibly, if your reading skills were little better and/or you took time to read replies, you would have known that I did NOT have a problem with you knocking AA or praising Virgin. In your original post you stated that AA does not provide amenity bags to first class pax. My first reply to you was in regards to that fact, which was wrong. This is my 6th international flight on AA this year and I got them every time.

What's great about the capitalist system, is that we all have choices. You decided that AA wasn't/isn't doing it for you and you moved over to a different provider. That's your right and believe it or not I will fight to support that right. My problem was with the fact that you made the off-hand remark about the amenity bags. It was and still is FALSE.

We all could argue about which airline is the best, but personally I do believe that is an impossible debate. Some offer better prices, some offer better food, some offer better service, some offer more room, many offer a combination of the above, but none offer all of the above, and it becomes a personal choice of what one is looking for. I do have a problem with people comparing apples and oranges. You compared AA domestic to Virgin International. Also without starting a new debate my point always was and still is that AA and all US airlines are somewhat of a different breed. They do have to deal with providing a living wage to their employees(this may be a suprise to you), powerful unions, a very competitive market while many of the foreign based airlines do not. I always laugh when I see comparisons of AA to some of the far east airlines. I LOVE CATHAY PACIFIC, but I would never compare the two. The young FA's are working for meager wages and they are treated as corporate slaves. They are told when and how to jump and they do it gladly. For many of them it's a way out. They are told how long they could fly and when they have to retire. They are told how to look and if they don't meet the standard they are gone. Would you want your fellow American worker to be treated the same way? I hope not.

So please refrain from making false statements, and just stick to reviewing your experiences.

Just for the record: I'm not an AA employee, I'm not in any way associated with AA other then being a loyal customer. AA does everything I want. AA is great for me personally, but I don't expect the whole world to follow me. I'm a capitalist at heart and I believe in choices and I will defend anybodies right to have a choice. I also believe in truth when making a point. Sorry Cabicou if that offends you.

Where is Cahoots? Does it have an Admirals Club? We could certainly meet there, AAFF, but I think you live about 750 miles south of me.

How do you know where I live SOCCR? We must be the same person and at the very least in CAHOOTS (and no, there is no AC in Cahoots, but I believe AA is looking into it as we speak)