A flying start to the Fifa magic

It's never boring. Travelling to India, especially by Air Eye, always manages to be an entertaining, if not frustrating, experience. On the eve of my return flight to Mumbai, I foolishly thought that the Air Eye office in town would give me accurate information on luggage allowance. Confident of their response, I packed keeping in mind the 40kg limit.

Strangely, I voiced a premonition of awkward check-in situations the day of departure. Someone said, "What could possibly go wrong on a straight flight to Mumbai?" As it happens, plenty.

The first omen was a counter board flashing Bangalore as well as Mumbai under my flight's number. Of course, I figured Air Eye would fly to Mumbai and onwards to Bangalore. I figured wrong. Counter staff gleefully informed me that I had an extra three and a half hours of flying time ahead of me in addition to a one hour wait inside the aircraft at Bangalore before reaching Mumbai. Lovely.

Excess baggage

The ever cheerful staff member then politely noted that I had 10kg of excess baggage. Assuming the lad was not referring to a wide expanse of stomach and torso area, I mentioned the conversation with Air Eye staff the night before. Still beaming, his exact words were, "Oh, they've obviously given you the wrong information. You're only allowed 30kg. But don't worry ma'am, we're not charging you anything this time. Next time, though, it'll be different."

Feeling a bit like a naughty schoolgirl who got rapped on the knuckles rather than being sent to the principal's office, I slunk away in a dazed stupor. The travel agent produced a flood of apologies and the added nugget that Hussain, who had made the bookings, was no longer working with the company. Well, thank you Hussain for not being around so that I could vent.

Air Eye endeavoured a habitually half hour delay in take-off (they always wait patiently for that single errant passenger who strolls in late). In keeping with my run of good fortune, my immediate neighbour was a kind, but well rounded lady whose fleshy excess baggage climbed on board with her and rolled over the arm rests and settled on my forearms.

My other neighbour was a decidedly seedy looking middle-aged man who was desperately trying to make eye contact. Still optimistic, I slept soundly and woke to the sound of my own snore. Meals were served and neighbour lady's elbow caught my eye only once. Neighbour man was happily sloshing down beverages and repulsed sufficiently by my no doubt gentle snoring to ignore me. Things were definitely looking up.

Then we landed both physically and into the realms of reality. Notoriously infamous prepaid taxis were monopolising airport transfers. Determined to put an end to a series of raw deals, I slid into an autorickshaw and trundled home to catch the Fifa World Cup action live.

After watching the Germans stomp Aryan-like over gritty Costa Rica, I lustily cheered on the opportunistic Ecuadorean team to shock-and-awe the Poles.

Fiesta

Football fiesta served up such delicacies as a barely-there victory for giants, England, and the unbelievably heroic defiance of a 10-man Trinidad and Tobago team against the mighty Swedes. The gutsy Trinidadian main course was followed by the soothing dessert of Argentina's triumph, flavoured with a strong punch of Ivory Coast spirit. And I got to watch it all, free of cost.

Back home, neither the newspaperman nor the milkman nor the cable guy has been around for several months. Either they are extremely well off, think I'm dead or are scared of me even in a live state. I get two newspapers, one litre of milk and the magic of world cup football as a gift. Sometimes, you get to a series of good deals, too.

Shalini John is a journalist based in Mumbai.