Pan American World Airways teacher, Vol. X, No. 4, March 1954

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Pa/v America# World Airways Teacher
Mar., 1954
Published by Pan American World Airways
VOL. X No. 4
EDUCATIONAL TRAVEL ROUND THE WORLD
By George Gardner
Since the coming thing in educational travel is the Round the World Tour, I decided to start the New Year right by taking a swing around the world myself. And my New Year’s Resolution was that I’d keep a log and report as fully as possible to those who organize or participate in educational travel.
1 left New York at noon on New Year’s Day, made a week end stop in the Mid-West and remained in San Francisco for three days so that I had fresh impressions of three different U.S. areas in mind as I started this Odyssey. Then:
HAWAII
PA 801 (t)
Lv. San Francisco. . PST 23:59 Th (S) Arr. Honolulu...... HST 7:45 Fr (S)
(t) “Strato” Clipper (B-377)
(S) Sleeperette Service
Flight 801 is called a “local” schedule because it operates to Honolulu only and is not part of a round the world schedule like Flights 1, 3, 5 and others. How about that? A 2400 mile over ocean flight of 10J4 hours in the air (8 hours eastbound with the prevailing wind) is a local schedule!
I later used portions of practically all the westbound RTW flights, as will appear in the time table excerpts scattered through this account. That is a procedure which is normal for RTW travel. A schedule whips around the world in five days, but passengers make stopovers and take as long as they like to complete the circuit, and the schedule is flown by relays of both equipment and crews.
Departure time for Flight 801 is listed at 23 :59 to by-pass the question as to whether midnight is the end or the beginning of the day—a proposition which is confusing to many time table readers. But 23:59 has to be the end of the day.
It was a routine, on time departure, and I was asleep fifteen minutes after the takeoff. Missed the post-midnight snack completely, but I must have been a living, sleeping proof of Sleeperette comfort. These reclining chairs tip all the way back and a leg rest slides out from under the seat, giving you the effect of a chaise lounge. Next to a real bed or berth, I can’t think of anything that would do the job better. Some of the passengers did sleep in berths, having paid the extra charge for this accommodation.
| I slept soundly and woke up just in time to take my breakfast tray. Breakfast over, I looked out the window, and there was Diamond Head. We were on the approach to the airport, and in another few minutes we were on the ground.
Anna Kahanamoku, educational travel representative in the Honolulu PAA office,
was there to greet me. Anna draped a beautiful flower lei over my shoulders and I gladly responded, Hawaiian style. Then we departed Detroit style, by automobile, for the Moana Hotel on Waikiki Beach.
I wondered if the banyan tree in the courtyard of the Moana had grown since my last visit. I think it has, all right, but it was 100 feet across in 1940, counting the area of the spreading branches with their limbs descending to the ground to form supplemental roots and trunks, and 14 years growth doesn’t make a very decided difference.
The Moana is representative of Hawaii’s fine hotels, including the Royal Hawaiian, the new Surfrider and many others. New hotels are going up too. For educational groups requiring less expensive accommodations, there are other beach hotels and apartments and groups which go to Honolulu in the summer time for the University of Hawaii summer session may arrange for dormitory accommodations.
University of Hawaii
The summer session runs six weeks and attracts many students from the U. S. Most arrive in organized groups, like those arranged by Howard Tours, Phinney McGinnis and S.T.O.P., and most of them arrive in Honolulu by air. This year the University will have a short three weeks course in August, following the regular summer session—offered in response to urgent requests for it, on an experimental basis for this year, and with the prospect that it may be made a permanent feature.
Attendance at the University of Hawaii summer schools combines with a vacation in an island group which is justly called the Paradise of the Pacific.
JAPAN
PA 823 (t)
Lv. Honolulu.......HST 22:30 Su (S)
(International Date Line)
Lv. Wake Island.. .E 180°	7:15 Tu (S)
Arr. Tokyo.........E 135° 12:45 Tu (S)
(t) “Strato” Clipper (B-377)
(S) Sleeperette Service
Departing Honolulu, I left U.S. territory and entered into the realm of international travel. I had to show my passport, also the yellow book which certifies that I am vaccinated and have received immunization for various diseases which could easily create serious problems around the world if travelers were not required to take these precautions. The diseases against which I am fortified include; — smallpox, yellow fever, cholera, typhoid, plague and typhus.
Enroute this time the Sleeperette was just as comfortable, but my subconscious was
not up to the task of keeping track of time zones so I was awake every early and had the men’s wash room all to myself to shave with the ship’s electric razor.
The landing at Wake Island was before dawn. I hadn’t much opportunity to visit this little community with military, Weather Bureau, CAA and air line offices and shops. We remained on Wake Island just long-enough for breakfast and then, at sunrise, we took off for Tokyo.
* * *
Tokyo International Airport is the terminal for all the International carriers, for Japan Air Lines domestic service and for the Military Air Transport services, so it is one of the world’s big busy airports.
Greetings were extended this time by PAA’s Assistant Traffic and Sales Manager Warren Elsener, in charge of the Tokyo Traffic Office for the time being while his boss was in the United States on home leave. Warren took me to the Nikkatsu Hotel, one of several fine American-European style hotels in Tokyo. Better known in the U.S. is the Imperial Hotel — earthquake proof hostelry designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
Warren also arranged appointments for me at the Embassy and with Japanese educators, took me to lunch at a Japanese tempura (fish fried in deep fat) restaurant, to his home in the PAA compound where most of our air line employees live, sent me with one of his men to a large Japanese cocktail party at the Imperial Hotel (about the same as an American cocktail party but with handshaking either replaced or accompanied by much deep bowing in the Japanese style).
Part of my time in Japan was devoted to making calls on University people in Kyoto.
The Situation for Educational Tours
Japan has 72 national and private universities, and although I visited only a few, I was assured that any and all of them would welcome visitors from America. They have them already in the regular terms mostly. Fullbright and other exchange students, teachers and professors. They do not have special summer courses for foreigners as schools in some countries do and their regular summer courses are not adaptable because of the language difficulty. But given an idea of what might be wanted and how it could be financed, they would be happy to set up arrangements.
I’d like to describe the setting of one of my interviews, which was with Dr. Yukitoki Takikawa, President of Kyoto University.
Tsuyoshi Matsuzoe, our Japanese sales representative in Osaka (neighboring city to Kyoto) had made this appointment and con-