Monday, August 3, 2009

Mid-Air Mis-Adventures

Well... its probably common knowledge by now that i'm leaving for India in a couple of days. Needless to say, there's a lot of stuff happening here at EL... but they mostly involve three things.

1. Cleaning my room : Removing assorted things from my room like dead supervillains, discarded cartoon crap and batman masks.. not to mention the dust thats turned into a thick sheet of lead.

2. Packing: Ok.. now lets see... There's 15 pairs of socks that i simply must carry... add to it a small collection of Shriya Saran scrapbooks. Packing is difficult business.. even for the packaging engineer.

3. Reminding myself that I need a plane to fly out of EL: Yes... I've designated five people to remind me on thursday that I shouldn't go to DECS...I should actually go to the airport.....which one ? i'm not too sure.... yet...

This post was supposed to be about my plane journeys and my mid-air mis-adventures. Here's a couple of them.



Too Many Moos - Pretty European air hostess is serving us drinks... And me being the caffeinator, I ask her for coffee.... And me also being the brahmin kid who grew up in Chennai had never seen black coffee before.... I ask her for Milk and she gives me one of those mini moos (tiny tubs of milk that are taken with black coffee).

.....My ten thousand watt brain begins to calculate the number of mini moos i'd need to have indian-style coffee... I take a deep breath and ask for 7 more......Needless to say... the air hostess was annoyed... and the passengers next to me were amused. :-)

Raghav's law of in-flight kiddos ---- Irrespective of the number of people in a flight (most passenger planes average in the early 200's) and irrespective of where i'm sitting..The NOISIEST KID in the flight gets a seat next to me.


Raghav's laws of in-flight seating assignments ---- If I get an AISLE seat the person at the window is someone who needs to use the loo once every twenty minutes and if I get a window seat, the flight is at night and/or over the ocean.


KollyWood vs HollyWood - Well.. there was this one time when an american man in his mid thirties was sitting next to me during a long distance flight. Small talk led to big talk and eventually careened towards a discussion on indian films. I spoke at length.. extolling the virtues of indian film makers... i told him about songs and dances and all the other things that make indian movies worth watching.... as luck would have it... the in flight movies were in Tamil....and they were ....

Madhavan in and as...THAMBI !... an epic tale of a man's struggle against anti social elements...

which was followed by Vijay in KURUVI.. an epic tale of a man's struggle against anti social elements..

which was followed by Ajith in Aegan....an epic tale of a man's struggle against anti social elements...

My american friend asked me if this was some kind of special feature where the same story is told in three different ways....for once..i didnt have anything to say.

Sleeping Beauty ----- We've all been there.. before every flight we wish secretly that the person next to us would be from the cover of the Cosmopolitan that we glanced at, a while back at the news stand....It so happened that during the boarding call for one domestic flight, I spotted one such stunner..She was a total package - high heels, tank top, leather jeans, streaked blonde hair (THE WORKS!).. and i made one of those silly odd ball promises i make to myself when i want something to happen.. "If she sits next to me in the plane.. no Panda Express for a month !..."

Wonder of wonder of wonders ! I sit in 15 A and "ms.oh my god i wish u sat next to me" was in 15 B...............but she came......... she sat..... and she SNORED ! and believe me.. she would've given my dad a run for his money in the snoring department...:|

The Grinch who stole my In-flight happiness ---- this was one time i was on an air india flight with a really really badly behaved kid next to me... The air hostess was pushing late forties, early fifties and she reminded me of a teacher i used to be terrified of when i was in third grade... I put on my best Bambi eyed smile and told her that my in-seat monitor wasnt working and that i was getting very bored... she says in the best "third grade terrifying teacher" voice ever... "WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO ABOUT IT ??"...I sat on that seat like a kitten that was stuck on a tree for the rest of the flight..

(Well thats it for now.. will tell you about who sat next to me soon !.. comment away!)