Airline Reviews

After spending a night at the Sheraton Bali, I was headed to my next destination of Kuala Lumpur. I was very excited for several reasons. 1, this would be my first time visiting Malaysia and 2, I was finally going to be able to try Malaysia Airlines A330 business class which I’ve been meaning to for the past year or so, happy to tick it off finally.

The flight today was being operated by the carriers A330-300 aircraft which features a total of 27 business class suites. Not all of the seats are designed the same, so I would definitely recommend checking the seat map properly when selecting your seat and if there are any throne seats, take one of them as they give you direct aisle access and it’s a heck more private.

The flight boarded about 10 minutes behind schedule. However, we sat on the tarmac at Denpasar for about an hour as passengers required medical assistance.

I was quite intrigued to see what the loads for the service would be like and to my surprise,  the cabin ended up being less than half full.  There were probably ten passengers at most seated in the business cabin.

As a reference when choosing your seats, the odd number rows are all 1-2-1 while the even rows are 1-2-2.

When you first get to your seat, you’ll find a small blanket as well as pillow:

And here was my seat for the flight, 4K.

This was also my first time flying on one of these seat designs, and I can confidently say that I’m quite a fan of it.

 

 

The IFE monitor seemed a little small to me, but the variety of content was quite sufficient with the standard movies, tv and music.

One drawback to the seat though is the footwell. If you’re a tall traveller, this may be quite a tight space, especially if you don’t bend your knees when sleeping.

The seat also has a fantastic amount of storage. In the seat itself, you’ll find two compartments while you’ll find the third located next to your feet on the right-hand side.

To the left is where you’ll find your reading light, IFE controller and your seating function buttons. I had read a few reviews of the product beforehand, and a lot of people mentioned that the buttons are very sensitive, I agree 100% as my elbow often knocked it, and the seat would move slightly.

Below the main control panel is where you’ll find a smaller one which you use when the bed is reclined fully (my apologies on the blurry image).

Once I was seated, the cabin crew operating the flight introduced themselves to all of the guests and provided them with a pre-departure beverage which consisted of either water, champagne, orange or guava juice. I went with the Guava juice and was also given a cold town.

The view of departing out of Denpasar was pretty lovely!

You’ll also find a pair of noise-cancelling headphones at your seat, which could be described as average at best; I noticed there was quite a bit of static noise.

Stupidly I had forgotten to take a photo of the menu, but there was a selection of 3 main meals to choose from. Unfortunately, there was no satay, kind of half the reason I wanted to fly Malaysian 😉

Just before the meal service commenced, the captain ordered the crew to take their seats for 10 minutes as we’d be flying directly through a storm.

After we had passed, the crew hoped up and started getting the meal service underway.

Onboard Catering & Beverages

When the person looking after me asked if I would like a beverage, I was thinking of having a cocktail or something along those lines and asked him to surprise me. He came back a few minutes later with what would have been the strongest vodka sunrise like drink I’ve ever tasted, wow it packed a punch.

The food on the flight was ok but definitely could be better. I also think the plastic covers make the whole setting look cheap and I still don’t understand why they do it in business, Aircalin did the same thing. While the beef fillet was quite tasty, it was a struggle to cut and resulted in a little spillage of the accompanying sauce.

As you can see below, these are the other seats which are preferable for people travelling together.

 

But if you’re a solo traveller, you can’t go past the throne chair.

And here’s an overview of the cabin taken:

Overall

I had quite a positive experience travelling on Malaysia Airlines, but I wouldn’t say it was a flawless flight. While I understand the need for a delay with medical, we were sitting on the ground for almost an hour and a half without any communication whatsoever. The food was also ok, but as I said, that could be improved for the better.

I would like to at some stage try this product on a longer service and also finally get to try the famous satay that I’ve heard only good things about.

Have you flown Malaysia Airlines A330 Business?