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Now's my chance to let fly
Sitting strapped to a seat 30,000 feet up in the air and forced to watch a tiny screen while bored stewardesses feed you junk food at all odd hours is not my idea of fun.
- By Mahmood Saberi, Senior Reporter
- Published: 23:33 October 25, 2008
Sitting strapped to a seat 30,000 feet up in the air and forced to watch a tiny screen while bored stewardesses feed you junk food at all odd hours is not my idea of fun.
The last trip I took involved a mind-numbing 14-hour flight and every time I tried to doze off the stewardess would wake me up like she was a nurse in an emergency ward handing out life-saving drugs, dump a sandwich on my tray which I wouldn't dare give even a starving Klingon, and ask me what I would like to drink.
It is said that travel broadens the mind and raises the spirits. I am not so sure about my mind but my belly sure spreads its horizons whenever I go on a trip and my spirits are raised almost to the point of dehydration.
As the hours pass my neighbour in the next seat becomes extra familiar and starts nudging and winking at me every time his favourite person arrives with the grape drink.
After a couple of hours of mindless eating and watching mindless junk on the screen, nothing, not even the usual turbulence as we approach North America, fazes me. But let me tell you, the turbulence is real bad, especially during the hurricane season, and the whole cabin goes kacha-kacha from time to time, between your fervent prayers and false promises of giving up smoking, if God would only let you live this time.
You can really feel nature's annoyance if you are sitting in economy class at the back, as the cabin sways from side to side. Meanwhile, my knuckles are white from holding on to the seat for dear life while a young lady in her early 10s across the aisle watches me with amusement in her eyes.
Henry J. Tillman (I really have no idea who he is), once said: "The saying, 'Getting there is half the fun', became obsolete with the advent of commercial airlines."
I think I know what he means. It is no longer an adventure when you buy a ticket and print it out off the Web and set out with a backpack containing three pairs of jeans, a toothbrush and miles and miles of wires for your laptop, camera, digital recorder and back massager and packs of double-A batteries.
One airport looks like any other and waiting for a delayed flight in either La Guardia or Kish International Airport is the same as you wait with your head thrown back on to the seat, with your mouth open and drooling, while the tinny announcements on the public address speakers drone on and on: "Passengers for Kazakhstan please go to gate 4 as the captain says you better board now or he is leaving. Thank you."
Now with so many planes flying to destinations you didn't even know existed, airlines are fighting for your seat, literally. The one thing they think will tempt you to fly with them is extra leg space. "Our airline offers you 5.3 inches more leg space between the seats."
Or, "Our seats turn into luxurious beds." Suddenly, as the movie ends, 300 passengers extend their seats, go to sleep, snoring loudly at high altitude as a worried captain wonders whether something's wrong with the engine.
Bed or no bed, I have never slept on a flight and always arrive at my destination looking like the professor from the movie, Back to the Future, with wide open eyes and frizzy hair standing on end. The reason is the one passenger who continuously rings the call bell, which goes "dong" throughout the night.
The other reason is that whenever I travel, the plane is usually full of screaming kids, with harried fathers running up and down the aisles like pet dogs. The mothers pretend the kids don't belong to them as they are now officially on a holiday.
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