Flight tales II

In continuation about my experiences on airplanes..

After I came to Singapore, there were quite a few trips to India back and forth. I cant remember anything significant about them of course. But once I started with my graduate studies of course,my horizons widened. I was soon flying to many countries for conferences and vacations.

On my flight to Milan, there was a middle-aged Indian lady who was seated on my seat when I boarded. She insisted it was hers even after I showed her my ticket and only after intervention from the air hostess, she agreed that she had the middle seat. I can see why she was not keen to be sandwiched between two strangers for a long haul flight but hey, neither was I! I guess if she had requested me, I might have obliged but lying so blatantly was not helpful at all. After so much hue and cry, she then sat next to me and continued to sulk all the way. I remember that she couldn’t figure out her remote controls and would secretly watch my screen ( I was watching a Hindi movie) and turn away when I looked. I thought it was silly but she was too proud to ask for help. Considering our bumpy introduction, I didn’t offer either. But later during the flight, things changed. Somewhere along the way, there was some really bad turbulence. Needless to say, I was scared but I had flown enough to know it was routine. But this lady was terrified. She screamed and grabbed my hand. She closed her eyes and continued to hold my hand tightly for the next few minutes until the turbulence subsided. I felt sorry for her and I let her hold my hand and told her it was a common occurrence and that we’d be ok.  Once we were back on track, she looked at me sheepishly and said thank you. That broke the ice and we were quite cordial for the rest of  the trip.

The next flight instance I remember was my onward and return flight from the US. The onward flight was memorable because of this incident. But the return flight was a different experience. Being my first trip to the US, I was quite pleased when I went there that I wasn’t too jet lagged. But the return journey shot all that false pride down. I remember boarding the flight happily but half way through sleep encompassed me and I slept for the entire journey. Even if I was robbed, I think I wouldn’t have known. The plane staff had to come and wake me up when it was time to alight. I had slept through out without having a single meal. When I landed in HongKong where I was transiting, I just sat in a chair and went to sleep. Somebody could have taken away all my luggage and I wouldn’t have cared less. Thankfully I boarded the flight and landed in Singapore. Even after I got here, I just told the taxidriver where I needed to go and then fell asleep in the taxi. He woke me up when we got to the address. I figured if I was elsewhere, I could have probably ended up elsewhere easily. Thanks to it being Singapore and thanks to the taxidriver, I ended up home safely.

I have more tales but this post is quite long already. So, do you have any flight tales to share ?