Review: Marhaba Lounge Singapore (SIN – T3)

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I appreciate that the Marhaba Lounge makes an effort to provide a more tranquil place to wait for your flight as well as food, drink, restrooms, and showers. But I just would not bother with this crowded lounge in an airport like Singapore Changi…

Marhaba Lounge Singapore Terminal 3 Review (SIN)

SkyTeam is the ugly step-sister at Singapore Changi Airport. While oneworld has many excellent lounges and Star Alliance has several nice Singapore Airlines lounges, SkyTeam has no nice lounge…just contract lounges. Garuda Indonesia uses the Marhaba Lounge in Termianl 3.

Marhaba is run by Dnata, short for Dubai National Air Travel Agency, which provides ground handling at airports around the world. The lounge is open 24/7 and also part of the Priority Pass network.

What I found, though, was a very crowded lounge:

I appreciated the universal power outlets located throughout the lounge.

The food did not look fresh…this curry in particular looked like it came with a guaranteed trip to the restroom…

The limited drink selection included water, orange juice, beer, wine, coffee, tea, and limited spirits (lower-shelf vodka, rum, gin, and whisky).

The lounge does have restrooms as well as two shower suites. The shower suites are available on a first-come, first-served basis and there is no waiting list or attendant. You grab your own towels and have to wait for an opening. I did not see anyone cleaning the shower suites between uses.

CONCLUSION

Singapore Changi is such a cool airport that I just would not bother to spend much time in this lounge and probably skip it altogether. I enjoyed a nice cup of coffee while Augustine played and we also enjoyed the Butterfly Garden. Both were far better than this lounge. Maybe I’m being too hard on it, but when I also compare it to lounges like the Qantas, Qatar, and Singapore lounges…well, there just is no comparison. They are far better.

I’m live-blogging my SAS EuroBonus SkyTeam Milion Mile challenge this week. Click here for background and route information.