Of air travel and the all-deserving Indian auntsOn my flight back to India from Paris last weekend, I had the good fortune of sharing my neighborhood in the "spacious" economy class with two oh-so-comforting Indian aunts.
It all started like it usually does. Let me tell you that I prefer to have a window seat on short (<2 hours) flights and an aisle seat on the longer ones. The reasons are simple. Reason number one is the following. I get a view from the window seat and have my own moments of glory and empowerment looking down on the tiny planet and the unsuspecting strands of civilization below. This compulsion to feel like God is so strong that I can't resist but have my head turned toward the widow side for ninety percent of the flight time; so at the end of a long flight, I invariably have a sore neck and have to spend the next day keeping my neck at an opposite angle to the amusement of all and sundry. And like most of us, I do not like being an object of fun, esp on tired days.
Most of you would have read the good ideas and not-so-good-ideas about what to do during an international flight. In the later part of my academic life, I was only interested in scoring the minimum marks required to pass a course and that habit has kind of ridden along and is now a reflection of my general attitude towards most things in life. I can't drink less in an international flight though one is advised to. Since I score a zero on this one, in order to "pass", I must do the advisable walks and stretches getting up from my seat every 2 hours (or sooner, depending on the tensile strength of the bladders of the hot chicks in row number 25, 32, and 35). Now we all know that the economy class cabin was designed by some sadist pervert who was into bondage and stuff. So I think the customary "excuse me + smile expressing helplessness" on getting up and "Thank you + smile conveying relief and genuine admiration for the adjusting nature of your co-passenger" on your return are grossly inadequate gestures to make the sleeping co-sufferer feel any bit better esp If you plan to do the routine every other hour. This is the reason number two I take the aisle seat.
So I took the excruciating pain of requesting the lady at the Lufthansa check-in counter to assign me an aisle seat and she readily obliged by allotting me an aisle seat in the middle bay that comprises of four seats. And topped it up with a plastic smile which, I knew, had always been there waiting to come at its destined time irrespective of the availability of an aisle seat and in the other case would have accompanied the sincere apologies due to unavailability of one. That's the thing about plastic smiles...they are "one size fits all". After the usual rounds of cursing the security staff for making me do almost a strip, I boarded the aircraft, with the usual hopes of finding a Preity Zinta sitting next to me. The usual disappointment followed when I saw two elderly Indian aunts, one of them sitting "temporarily" on my coveted aisle seat. At least that's what I initially thought. I proceeded to my seat and despite "I understand Hindi better than I understand English" written all over the faces of the salwar-kameez clad aunts, I politely "informed" them in English which seat was mine, giving them a customary confused look. The younger(??) of the two old ladies told me in an authoritative and deserving tone, "To kya hua bete, tum idhar baith jao" (So what son, you can sit here). Effectively, she was asking...er ordering me to be sandwiched between an old lady on one side and an old guy on the other side which, no man my age would fancy. But my middle-class upbringing is so deep rooted that the elderly-respecting me took no time in obliging them by saying "no problem" and believing that they deserved the aisle seat more than I did. I knew I was forcing myself to believe this just to try to feel less frustrated about the situation. Did I mention that my expectations of receiving a warm "thank you very much" were also shattered because enough seconds had elapsed after my "no problem" and the thankless ladies didn't show any intentions of admiring my chivalry. Well, I couldn't care less...or did I. The flight was full, so there was no chance of getting another aisle seat (which I nevertheless tried later). Now shock number two. Scene: I am gesturing to indicate that I want to slide in to my "new" seat and so it would perhaps help if the oldies moved their well-settled butts and gave me way. Instead, the younger oldie, the leader of the two who would eventually become my new neighbor, suggested I enter from the other side because it would only bother one passenger instead of bothering two. So she wanted me to take a full round of the bay and come from the other side. Smart, I thought but didn't oblige. So they had to step out of their comfort zones. If you don't know how to curse someone with your expressions without uttering a single word, you should have been there to see how this can be done in the most effective manner. If there were justice, inconsiderate people like me would have been stoned to death. Well, I finally settled not only into my new seat but also into the worst kind of perfume that I had "experienced" in many years. "Which animal pissed on you?" I wanted to ask but then I decided keeping mum was optimum. Now how do I plan to spend the next 9 hours? I picked up the in-flight magazine from the front pocket and started flipping the pages. Here comes shock number 3. The aunt started coughing uncontrollably and at the first opportunity to gather her breath, told me that she is allergic to paper so I shouldn't read. I put the magazine back, asked the flight attendant for two bottles of wine, finished them faster than Devdas would have done and slept my way to glory.
Alcohol may be injurious to health but there are some definite advantages.
