Welcome, however, one can tell you're new around these parts, as a veteran Flyertalker looks for more opportunities to fly, not fewer.

Retired Continental Air employee, ex-Travel agency / restaurant owner,reside in Red Bank, NJ

my name is elharith sirelkhatim ihave just come back from along trip using your fantastic planes to kualalambour me and my son ienjoyed the flight and now iwouold like to add this trip to my miles &points thanks to all of you and also please convey special greetings to cap. habeeb alansari for his nice take off and good landing at BAHRAIN AIRPORT SALAM TO ALL

Hi, I'm Ben, living in Boston, MA. I've been reading the FlyerTalk forums quite a lot before making decisions about FT programs (I'm *G on BM, *S on LH, and GLD on AA), booking rewards, the AA challenge etc. Today I've decided to write my first post. I'm flying mainly on the East coast and towards Europe. Best, Ben

I split my time between graduate school--pursuing a Ph.D. in organizational communication--and working for a large lobbying association based here in Chicago (for the moment, although my passion is academia, and that's where I'd like to land, from a career perspective). I began taking Chinese languge courses in college thinking that it would be an interesting way to fulfill a requirement, but fast-forward a number of years, and I now hold a master's degree in China studies, speak Mandarin at about a 10th-grade level, and have lived, worked, and conducted research in a number of Chinese cities.

Travel has been my passion since my first trip out of North America (to Paris and Amsterdam, as a 5-year-old), and I visit a minimum of one new country per year. By the time the second week in January rolls around, I'll have ventured to Costa Rica, Denmark (a return visit), Hungary, and the Czech Republic since mid-2008...not terribly impressive for FlyerTalk, but I like to think that I get around quite a bit for someone who isn't wealthy or powerful and doesn't travel for work. My ultimate travel goal is to join the Century Club (100 countries visited), and I'm just over 25% of the way there.

My favorite destinations thus far are Jerusalem, Venice, Beijing, Paris, Barcelona, and Cambodia. I'll be taking a 6-week leave of absence from work and school responsibilities next summer to backpack around India and Nepal--a trip that I've wanted to take for years and to which I am finally treating myself.

I've been reading various travel blogs for quite some time, but believe it or not, I just stumbled upon FlyerTalk about four months ago, and I've been posting ever since.

I look forward to continuing to get to know other FT'ers, and thanks for welcoming us newbies into your great community!

Jumping in the pool after years of lurking

Welcome to all the new members and those who have delurked

Dear Members,

My name is Alejandro Alcaraz I am 24yo and I live in Barcelona, SPAIN. I am currently enrolled in a Law & Master degree in ESADE Business School in Barcelona. I am a Platinum Charge Card member for almost two years. I have been reading this post for a very long time and I find it very useful.

Cheers,

Alejandro Alcaraz

Hello everyone,

I've been lurking here for a while and decided it's time to introduce myself.

I am an American now living in the UK. I'm an academic, and currently in the second year of my PhD. I'm a qualitative sociolinguist/linguistic anthropologist/discourse analyst, interested in cabin/flight crew communication onboard a commercial (as opposed to private) aircraft, and cabin crew identity construction. My interest stems from my background as an anthropologist and about a decade working in the commercial airline industry in the US. I'm always interested in talking about my research; feel free to PM me for further information

When not working on my research, I love being outdoors, doing pretty much anything: running, walking, horse riding. I'd say biking but I don't have a bike at the moment! I also enjoy playing World of Warcrack -- oops, I mean Warcraft ; discovering delicious red wines, particularly Malbecs; travelling to new destinations; learning; watching far too much TV for my own good; and snooker.

Looking forward to discovering the FT community!

My name is Patrick and I am in Market Conduct Compliance for a major Canadian life insurance company. I am based out of Toronto, but live in Hamilton about 60 km west of Toronto. I just started with the company earlier this year and my job involves extensive travel to the far east where we have insurance oeprations (five trips this year, usually CX to HKG and then onto whichever operation I am visiting).

I am married, no kids, a 21/2 year old dog named Rex who is a pound puppy that we got from the local animal shelter when he was six months old.

I enjoy boating and have a 34 ft express cruiser, which we have just moved to Lake Erie for next year's boating season.

Wife and I are retired. I traveled alot on business and still have United miles. United was very good to us for years when I was a frequent flier. nice upgrades and super personal service. of course that is all gone now, but i am still loyal to United and used to use a Visa card to rackup United mileage. Now i am using a Marriott rewards card as hotel stays are more important. we charge everything we can on Visa cards and always pay it off monthly. Seems to be a good way to get miles or hotels. Look forward to an exchange of information to make travel more rewarding. CHEERS!

Greetings,

I have been a member for some time, and have never posted. Time to fix that.

I'm an Australian who has been living in San Jose, CA for 10 years or so. I'm a consultant for Hewlett Packard, working out of the Cupertino site in Silicon Valley. I'm a solution architect for the design and installation of VoIP Contact Centres based around the Cisco product set, so I'm often engaged on long projects at customer sites, typically flying out of San Jose for points east on Sunday, coming home on Friday night. I certainly rack up the miles, almost all on United Airlines.

I've been 1K on United for the last 6 years, though San Jose is very competitive for upgrades - we have a lot of 1Ks here, as you can imagine. I almost always stay at Marriott hotels, so am Platinum with them. I fly to Brisbane each year to spend Christmas with my mum and brothers and sisters, and travel to Europe on business a couple of times a year on average. I have made the long haul to Bangalore out of SFO on two occasions. Most of my flights are out of San Jose, with the international flights out of SFO. Strangely enough for a Bay Area resident, I have never flown out of, or into, Oakland airport.

I'm not much interested in participating in Mileage Runs, as I don't seem to have much trouble getting 100,000 miles under my belt each year. Although I don't need MRs, I find some fascination in reading posts on that topic. My main area of interest here is probably in the United Mileage Plus forum.

Outside of work, my main interests are in high-end stereo systems (a.k.a hifi) and am a steady correspondent at Audio Asylum www.audioasylum.com and Steve Hoffman's Forum http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums. I often get to CES in Las Vegas each year and spend way too much money on CDs and goodies for the home system. Don't ask me about home theatre, though.

Apologies to any flyers who come after me early in the month - I've always finished the crossword in the Mileage Plus magazine, and I leave it there just to annoy you.

I hope I can contribute something of interest to my fellow travellers. It's going to be tough though - FlyerTalk has way too many members.

Regards,
Geoff

My name is Becky. I've lived in Portland, OR for 10 yrs and Wichita, KS before that. I work in the technology field maintaining several computer labs in an educational setting. I love to travel and enjoy finding travel deals on the internet. I belong to several ff programs but have enough points in only one for any trips. With the economy the way it is, I plan on using information from this site to utilize ff programs better so I can afford to travel in the future.

NAME: JEBA ANANDHAN A
Residence: UK
Nationality: Indian
Frequent flyer club: Skywards

Hello! I'm Belle. I was just browsing through some topics and thought it would be
nice to be a member so I registered. I hope I'll have a great time here.