Kenya Airways after four years through the hard years: the London and the Africa network from Nairobi, the crew who stayed
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#1 Kenya Airways, Nairobi, four years, and Melissa wrote the Kenyan applicant thread and the Kenya Airways threads on here are about the hiring state. The airline from inside after four years of the hard years, for the Nairobi applicants who apply to the Gulf and overlook the home carrier.
The airline
Kenya's national carrier, Nairobi as the hub, the 787s and 737s and Embraers, the London (Heathrow), Paris, Amsterdam, the Gulf (Dubai, Doha, Jeddah), India (Mumbai), China (Guangzhou), and the Africa network that is the airline's identity: Johannesburg, Cape Town, Lagos, Accra, Addis, Entebbe, Kigali, Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar, Lusaka, Harare, Kinshasa, Luanda and more. The Africa network from Nairobi is the East African gateway and the crew know the continent.
The hard years
The financial difficulties that the hiring threads mention: the restructuring, the fleet reductions, the government support, the crew numbers reduced, the strikes, the uncertainty that the crisis thread describes for the national carriers. The crew who stayed through them are the airline's core now and the pride Leila's MEA thread describes is ours in a Kenyan form: the airline kept flying and the crew kept it flying.
The shilling and the hard currency allowances
The basic in shillings, modest and eroded, and the layover allowances in pounds, euros, dollars and dirhams on the London, Paris, Amsterdam, Gulf and Johannesburg routes, which are the real income for the international crew. A month with a London and a Paris and a Dubai is a good month; a month of the regional Africa in shillings is not. The crew who hold the Europe routes by seniority are the ones who stay, and the juniors on the regional routes are the ones who go to the Gulf events.
The crew who stayed
The senior crew with the Europe routes and the Nairobi families and the national carrier identity, and the younger crew who did two years and used the KQ experience at the Gulf events in Nairobi, where it is respected, as Melissa and Kwame said. The KQ crew at the Gulf carriers are a large group and the ones who stayed at KQ are the ones for whom Nairobi is not negotiable.
The national carrier the Gulf applicants overlook
The Nairobi applicant groups apply to Emirates and Qatar and skip KQ because the hiring is irregular and the shilling is the shilling. The honest case for KQ: the Africa network that the Gulf carriers cannot give from inside the continent, the London and Paris with the hard currency allowances, the home base with the family, and the KQ experience as the Gulf door later. The case against: the hard years, the irregular rounds, the shilling on the regional routes.
For the Nairobi applicants
Apply to KQ when the round opens and to the Gulf events, as Melissa advised. If KQ comes, the Africa network and the London are a real two years and the Gulf event is friendlier after. If the Gulf comes first, the Nairobi route from Dubai and Doha is daily and the community is waiting. The home carrier is a door, not a consolation.
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#2 Nairobi, applying to both, and Aisha has written the KQ case the applicant groups do not make: the Africa network from inside, the London allowances, the Gulf door after. The hard years are the hard years. The home carrier is a door, as she says. KQ application in when the round opens.
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#3 Emirates purser, from Nairobi, and the KQ crew at Emirates are a large group and the KQ experience was respected at my event a decade ago and is now. Aisha's KQ is the airline I overlooked at 22 and the one the Nairobi applicants should not. The Africa network is the thing the Gulf cannot give from Nairobi.
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#4 Ghana, and the KQ Accra flights are the East African carrier's West African reach and the KQ crews know Accra the way the Ethiopian crews do. The Africa network as the identity is the East African carriers' shared thing. Aisha has the KQ version.
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#5 Qatar, Sudanese, and the Nairobi route from Doha with the KQ crews at the Nairobi airport is the thing I see monthly: the home carrier's crew and the Gulf carrier's Kenyan crew at the same gate. Both chose. Aisha's case for the home one is fair.
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#6 FlySafair Johannesburg, and the KQ Johannesburg flights are the East African crews on the South African apron and they know the continent. The national carrier that kept flying through the hard years is the African aviation story at every capital. Aisha's thread is the Nairobi chapter.
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#7 MEA Beirut, and the national carrier through the hard years with the hard currency allowances as the income and the pride as the glue is the MEA story in Nairobi. Aisha and I have the same airline on different continents. The family of national carriers has a Kenyan member.