One down, five to go. Auckland

There's probably not a better way to see a city than under moonlight, twinkling in the predawn light, sea flat and milky.

I felt no panic, despite the dream.. unless you count the horror I felt when I realised I hadn't got my passport. Last minute packing does that, and getting my passport is not something I do too often.

Watching the passengers I saw a man with half an ear bump his head into the overhead storage and mused that it was exactly that sort of carelessness which led him to his present state of earlessness.

We waited while a cop jumped on board, late, and took off over the picture-postcard scene.

After an uneventful flight we touched down and I banged my head on the overhead storage. Karma: that'll teach me for being such a smug git.

My bag was almost first off the plane and after a stroll to the international terminal I found I had stumbled across the first of the check-ins for the Royal Brunei flight. Straight to the head of the queue where a rather pretty check-in girl made me guess her country of origin - after remarking on my unusual place of birth. I failed miserably despite her taking my metaphorical hand and trying to help. She was 21 and had been in NZ for 18 years, so I felt none too upset that I couldn't nail down her light accented English to her birth place, the Punjab in India. Having been there five times we chatted a while before the sniggering of the other check-in staff became unbearable. The phrase 'you've made an old man very happy' popped into my mind, along with 'you sad old fool' and 'don't tell the Moldovan one' and I wandered off only to find free internet access.

Such a serendipitous start. Will it keep up? Should I have locked my checked-in luggage?