Some more work for Scott Morrison and the Liberal party to do ...

(Above: Singapore from the hotel room).

So here's the mysterious thing, as suggested in Fairfax's So, why are some flying and others not?

Last night Malaysia Airlines sent a lumbering, fully loaded 747 into the ether, heading from Sydney to Kuala Lumpur. It snuck across New South Wales at eighteen thousand feet, doing a humble 400 miles or so an hour, but as soon as we crossed the border and hit the far north east of South Australia, the pedal hit the medal, the speed and the height cranked up, and ultimately we were at forty thousand feet doing 565 or so miles an hour.

Ash cloud? What ash cloud?

A couple of hours later, right on the chimes of midnight, a friend caught a Singapore Airlines flight from Melbourne, direct to Singapore. According to her, it took off like a bat from hell, climbed high and hard, and then kept going all the way, with the A-380 making sounds of significant effort to keep to schedule via the stratosphere ...

Ash cloud? What ash cloud?

Well it's all very mysterious, but we look forward to Scott Morrison explaining how a couple of Asian airlines (and a lot of others) seemed to handle the ash peril with nonchalance.

And while he's at it, seeing how he'll be joining the pond in Malaysia (though not in any intimate personal way) perhaps Morrison could ask for a tour of Kuala Lumpur airport, just to see what a relatively poor country can manage by way of an entrance for international travellers.

Lordy, it even has robotic trains, along with the ersatz marble and the mindless duplication of meaningless brands to be seen at every international airport around the world.

That said, it's a reminder that Sydney airport still looks like a pig's ear rather than a miracle non-iron rayon purse, and will always be cramped and confined, and increasingly under pressure. The Liberal government under Howard had a decade to get things moving, the various do nothing Labor governments wasted opportunities in even more spectacular fashion.

Perhaps it was all designed as a way to keep Australia carbon pure and battling climate change, in a direct action, take no action way.

Still, it would be interesting to hear of Liberal party policies in relation to aviation in Australia, instead of grand standing stunts in a policy free zone ...

And now, since the pond abhors blogs with happy shots of views from hotel rooms - get a life blogger people - it's time for the pond to do the south east Asian circuit and go about the business of grandstanding in the judgemental way beloved of Australian politicians ...