Pop Quiz: which Asian-based carrier operates 77W aircraft on North American routes with a growing route network, 6 seats in First with no overhead bins, and reverse herringbone seats in business class with a private mini-cabin? If you answered Cathay Pacific you'd be spot on. And if you answered China Eastern, you'd be right as well! Other than some finishes and colors, you might confuse the two aircraft these two carriers fly. Hard product aside, though, there's really not much to compare between these companies.

Reverse herringbone seat:



Mini cabin:


Note: on both outbound and inbound sectors, the mini-cabin was blocked and could only be assigned at check-in. It was therefore also empty, which was great for privacy. It was also nice because I could ask the FAs to keep the temperature at a cool temperature, since I'm really afraid of hot cabins on Asian carriers except CX and SQ. I'm not sure why MU blocks passengers from requesting these seats. From what I could tell First class was basically not operational on either flight.

My flights on MU's business class were between YYZ and PVG, a long 14+ hour flight in both directions. A note about check-in at YYZ: They were selling upgrades to business class for CAD$800 and there appeared to be frew takers. And they were being really strict about carry-on, insisting that all bags be weighed and anything over the ridiculous 10kg weight limit had to be checked.

Here's are the highlights of the trip:

Amenity kit contents include socks, eyeshade, and earplugs. Nothing to write home about or keep, but adequate. Toothbrush/toothpaste also provided, and extras available in the bathroom.





The headphones provided are absolutely worthless. In addition to being of the lowest quality possible, they are not the right connection to the seat so the only way to get both channels of audio is to slowly pull the plug just right outside of the fully seated position and hope that it doesn't get jostled. A big fail on this.



Menus were distributed. It was odd for two reasons. One, the menu appears to be used for multiple months, and you have to select the right tab to find the right menu. Second, menus were taken away immediately after orders were taken, so there was no way to remember what dish was being served. It seems awfully stingy to try to save a few RMB on printing menus.



Seasoned duck on Paris toast canape. Pretty yummy:


Grilled shrimp and raisin salad. This only tasted OK:



Seabass with lemon caper sauce. This was awful. It was drowning in butter and I felt like throwing up after half of it.



Fruit plate:



Rock hard ice cream:



And here's a picture of my entree on the return flight. This was pretty awful too:



Service was robotic but fast. One thing I noticed was that FAs were fastidious about cleaning a bathroom after it was used. Those of you who have been to China know that mainland Chinese bathroom customs leave much to be desired, so I appreciated that the bathrooms were always clean.

The IFE was half-baked. There was a limited selection of movies, and quality was good if you could get the headphones working. Other parts of the IFE were strange, such as the inflight menu selection that seemed to suggest a la carte food ordering but was clearly not operational. There was a kindle-like reading function too, but it only contained samples of books, not full-length versions.

The worst part about the outbound flight, though, was being woken up by cigarette smoke. MU flight crews are notorious for smoking in flight and it's pretty obnoxious. Thankfully the return trip was smoke-free.

Bottom line: business class is all about the seat. In that regard, China Eastern has a fine, world-class product on the 77W. Bring your own headphones, bring your own inflight entertainment, bring your own food and drink, and avoid the mini cabin unless you want to take a chance of smelling cigarette smoke during the flight.