The Joy of Flying

I remember Shashi Tharoor each time I board a plane. Not because I love the way he flicks his hair but travelling 'cattle class' stirs exasperating farrago of emotions. 

Once in the plane, you grab your 36B and impatiently wait for ground clearance. I’m talking about the seat number, you pervert. There are ten planes ahead of you and the airline does its best to save fuel by not switching on the air conditioner before takeoff. You can suffocate to death in the fart and sweat soaked seats for all they care. Mind you, this is not some low cost airline but supposedly premium, all service Jet Airways – The Joy of Flying. That’s their tagline. 

If you are on a short flight, anxiety begins to play havoc with your bladder muscles. They go into an involuntary twist. The first thought that comes to mind is to rush to the nearest toilet before it gets drenched in dew drops and begins to smell of roses. As it happens, one bladder inspires other 149 bladders. Unfortunately, there is short window of release between take off and descent. As a result people queue up outside the toilet before the cabin crew distributes juice to ensure a mass bladder burst. 

For some reason, the smiling stewardess who welcomed you with a chirpy ‘good morning’ gets all snappy. I don’t get it. Minutes ago she was pumping sunshine up our bottoms and now she is clouding it with ‘why the hell are you here’ expression. What happened?

One elderly man pisses her off by occupying the toilet for eternity and then brushing past her cart. When he returns to his seat, she is reeling from the after effects of reading Half Girlfriend, “Sir, we have only one non-veg meal left, lena hai to le warna kat le.” 

Almost.

“Sir, we’ve run out of non-veg trays. You can take veg if you want.” 

The old coot gets into an argument over the meal and after much doo-doo, it turns out that the quibble was over 15 grains of black gram accompanied with three cookie sized kulchas. If I offer this to my house-help she will screw her nose, ‘Didi aap kha lo’. 

Meanwhile others who are debating whether to pee or not to pee guzzle enough juice and beer to feel the force. Just when there is a queue of dozen loaded passengers, the seat belt sign is on. 

Crew on their seats, we are about to descend. 

Difficult to say if the stewardess has ‘why can’t you do it at home’ expression or ‘Piss off’ face. She decides to unload her annoyance over all the silent ogling she's faced in her career. ‘No Sir, please return to your seat. Can’t you see the seat belt sign is on?’ 

You can almost feel the joy in her heart. Revenge. Is. Sweet.

Never seen such imploring faces – Pee-lease…uff! 

I’m enjoying all the turbulence, making notes to write a blog post, when one lady decides to break the queue and take the feminist route to the toilet, “I’m menstruating, you can’t stop me.”

Silence.

The lady gets lucky. A dozen livid men return to their seats twisting their legs in awkward ways. Sitting on my window seat, I want to ask the lady, girl to girl, why should a menstruating lady get priority over someone about to wet his pants? Or soil his shorts? 

Eventually you land, hopefully at your destination (unless the pilot takes you to Jaipur or Lucknow due to air congestion over Delhi). You decide to be patient and sit tight before the groundstaff takes ages to fix the aerobridge. Turns out, sitting is a bad idea. Because everyone is standing and 149 booties are at your nose level. Direct transfer. 

We are the last to leave, but I now know why pee-ople itch to get out. Once at the airport, I find a sparkling clean toilet and I’m so happy, I could cry. Happiness, after all, is finding a place to go when you really gotta go. 

That’s the real joy. Not the joy of flying.

Apologies for messing your morning with this un-pee-leasant post.