Hey there it's been a while! Please enjoy the latest installment of the Flight Fiascos series....I truly am cursed.
Look I love airports. Like I really love airports. Probably more than I should. Despite all my bad luck in airports I’d probably rather be in one than almost anywhere else. But...oh boy...the airport gods are REALLY testing me tonight. Is it too much to ask for ONE smooth trip? IS IT???
I’m sitting on the plane as I write this, waiting to taxi. This is probably the safest plane in the WORLD as I had to go through no less than FIVE different “security” points to board this exceptional aircraft. That’s right. Five. Apparently I just...idk...have that kind of face (???). So sit back, relax, and hopefully experience some amusement from my transit misery. Someone should.
So I get dropped off at the airport, I say my goodbyes, and enter the building. Fine. So far so good. I get to the check in line, I’ve already checked in ahead of time so all I have to do is drop my bags and get my boarding pass. No biggie. As a ~frequent flyer~ I have acquired silver status (bad n bougie I know I know) so I thought I could go into the sky priority line. Alas the sign said only gold status and up. Now, if you know me, you know I’m not one to break the rules. And I’m not really one to gripe or be super impatient in these situations. But like....there was literally no one in the sky priority line....and like a million people in the regular line....and my trolley had a bum wheel so I was pushing it with all of the little muscle I had and my arms were already shaking a lil (jeez I should really start going to the gym again). Honestly though if silver status doesn’t give you sky priority check in or priority boarding then what does it actually give you? Bragging rights? A sense of self worth? Extra bags of peanuts? Long story short, I went to the sky priority line.
And no one stopped me! I just thought, “YES! FINALLY THE AIRPORT GODS HAVE FORGIVEN ME! THE ODDS ARE FINALLY WORKING IN MY FAVOR.”
Me to me: Oh. You naive little fool.
So I get to the check in desk....
Ok wait. First, some background.
I packed one (1) suitcase. Not a big suitcase. At least ten pounds under the weight limit. But today I was checking in two bags. The second bag was full of 60 meters of white fabric. Why, you ask? Because my mother decided that that is something she needs.
That’s a whole other story. No need to get into it here.
So anyway I’m checking in these two bags. Bag one. My clothes, etc. Done ✅. Great. Super. Rolling along. Boarding pass. Acquired. Nice. Seat 37G. Cool. Gate 48. Ok. Got it. Bag two. Fabric bag......the lady behind the counter and the bag boy exchange some words. I think nothing of it. The bag is way under weight. Everything should be fine. Cue the narrator: everything was not fine.
The lady turns to me and asks. “Miss, what is in this bag?” I answer, “fabric, like for curtains.” The fabric is not for curtains but I wasn’t really in the mood to tell this woman why my mother actually needs 60 meters of fabric. Anyway, the lady tells the bag boy that the bag has fabric in it and then says to me, “ok this bag will have to be screened.”
Huh. That’s weird. It’s just fabric. But ok.
I follow the bag boy who is now pushing my bum wheel trolley with just the fabric bag on it. As we walk I try to talk to him and be friendly so he knew I wasn’t ~suspicious~. I don’t know what I was trying to prove. He didn’t laugh at my jokes.
He leads me to the very back corner of the room where there was a conspicuous looking luggage X-ray machine. I would say I was approximately 23% creeped out. Not enough to cause alarm yet. The man sitting by the X-ray machine asked me again, “miss, what is in this bag” I answer. “Fabric, like for curtains and things.” The man tells the bag boy that the bag contains fabric, a piece of information of which this bag boy is now an expert.
So the X-ray man and the bag boy exchange some more words and then they tell me they will not be screening my bag.
Huh. Ok. Cool I guess.
The bag boy and I walk off. I think we are going back to the check in desk, but instead the bag boy tells me that he will drop my bag off and I can go to the security line. Wait. I’m confused. You’re taking my bag? Yes miss. And I’m going to security? Yes miss. We’re not going back to check in line D? No miss I’m taking this back to another belt. Ok can i come see where you’re dropping my bag? It’s alright miss security is here. I know that but can I just see where you’re taking my bag. Miss please calm down security line is here.
Did this little shit just tell me to calm down?
Let me just confirm with you that I was completely pleasant that entire time. Not once did I sound angry or even frustrated. I’m not confrontational so I didn’t push any further. I got in the security line and little shit bag boy walked off with my bag. I’m choosing to be an optimist when I say that I’m sure that bag will be waiting for me on the conveyor belt in New York.
So I get in the worlds longest security line. Finally I get to the front. Laptop out. Shoes off. Etc etc. I walk up to the metal detector, I’m about to walk through, but then the attendant on the other side makes a face at me and waves me to the side. I turn around to see what he’s referring to. Ah right. The women’s line.
For those of you that don’t know, at the Bombay airport there are two gendered lines to go through the metal detectors. The men go through one and they are scanned by a male attendant with the hand metal scanner out in the open. But the women go through and are directed towards a curtained stall to be scanned by a woman attendant. Please know that having to go through that and then again writing about it makes me want to bang my head against a wall.
Anywayyyyyy. The woman’s line always takes longer for some reason. I guess female passengers look more suspicious. Must be the lululemon leggings. Very dangerous. So I’m waiting in the security line from the 19th century and I keep an eye on my bag, shoes, and laptop as they go through the X-ray machine. They go through quickly, and I wait...and wait...and wait. I was SO sure my laptop was about to be swiped. I RAN into that sexist lil booth. Got scanned, ran out. Phew. Laptops still there. A get my things together and rather huffily walk to my next obstacle, the immigration line.
Ok so I don’t know what it is, but something about airports makes people function at like a fifth grade level. The immigration line is always really long. No matter how you slice it, you’re gonna wait there for a good 30 minutes AT LEAST. (if you’re cursed like me, minimum 50 if you’re lucky) I don’t have time to go through ALL the childishness I saw while waiting in that line so I’ll just say I have never seen so many attempts at cuts-ies in my life. Like...grown men elbowing each other to get in the front of the line....I just....
So I get to the front of this line (ahem - by waiting my TURN) and I’m like, cool just two more people in front of me, sweet!
I really gotta learn to stop being hopeful in the airport.
As soon as I get into my specific counter line, the attendant gets up, he smiles at us, waves at us....and walks off. Never to be seen by the likes of us again. Suddenly I find myself being pushed - yes, pushed - by people as they try and cut into other counter’s lines. It was like the worlds grumpiest mosh pit. I am placed against my will in the slowest counter line. Once I get to the counter I see why. This immigration attendant was, by my approximation, twelve years old. I had a feeling he only kind of knew what he was doing and my LORD did he take his SWEET time to figure it out. Eventually our young friend found his way and I was through.
I speed walked to my gate. And I mean SPEED walked. Like housewives on a Wednesday morning I SCOOTED myself to the gate, tucked away in the most eerily quiet part of the airport. Of course I was the last person in line to board, which meant that there would be approximately 0.002% chance of me getting space in the overhead bin but whatever I’m not salty or anything.
Before I boarded I went up to the gate desk to ask if it would be possible to confirm if my bag had gotten on the flight using my baggage tags. Before I could get a word out the lady behind the desk looked at me, eyes wide and shouted “GET IN LINE IF YOU WANT TO GET ON THIS PLANE WE ARE ABOUT TO CLOSE BOARDING!”
Like...damn...ok...sorry?
I asked a nicer looking attendant by the gate if checking for my bag would be possible and she basically was like nope, sucks 4 u kid ✌️ peace out boo.
Cool. Nice. Sweet. Awesome.
I got in line to board. They scanned my ticket and I thought I was home free...OH BUT WAIT! THERES MORE. Another round of security. Shoes off, laptop out, sexist metal detectors, the whole nine yards.
I FINALLY get on the plane.
I get to my seat, I by some miracle manage to fit my bag in the overhead compartment. I sit, I start writing this thing that you’re reading now. I assume the worst has passed.
Me to me: Oh ho ho ho you absolute idiot baby.
I’m sitting in my seat writing as people futz around me trying to move bags here and there, flight attendants zip up and down the isles, people start scrolling through the in-flight movie menus. While all of this is happening, another security measure is put in place - air hosts are walking through the cabin randomly selecting people and asking to see their boarding passes. I’m just sitting there thinking - excuse me miss, but isn’t the security stuff and the racial profiling etc supposed to happen BEFORE we board? No? Ok.
Things start to settle. Captain makes the announcement, “cabin crew please prepare for takeoff.” We sit quietly.
5 minutes pass, 10 minutes, 20. Why aren’t we moving yet?
Suddenly, an announcement from the captain. “Ladies and gentleman I don’t want to embarrass anyone, but we just wanted to let you know that a passenger has informed us that they are not comfortable flying as they have not flown in many years and has requested to get off of the flight. This will require us to reattach the bridge and this is a security concern but we must be respectful of this passenger’s wishes. Thank you for your patience.”
Ok...so like...sure...be respectful...but COME ON. This mans went through ALL of that security bullshit and immigration bullshit, GOT on the plane, waited for EVERYONE to get ON the plane and NOW YOU WANT TO GET OFF?? NOW???? WHAT KIND OF RACHEL GREEN ROSS GELLAR BULLSH-
I’m fine.
So we wait another 30 minutes or so for the plane to reattach and cabin doors to open etc etc. The passenger gets off presumably, and then a team of what I’m calling “Bombay Airport FBI” get on the plane. Another announcement from the cockpit - “Ladies and gentlemen, as a security measure the ground team will be going through and checking every overhead bin for unclaimed luggage. As they make their way through the cabin please identify your luggage as it is presented to you”. Sigh. Here we go.
The team, clad in neon green vests start opening all of the overheads. Bags come out, people start shouting, “that’s my bag!” “Yep that’s mine”. Because, as we established earlier, airports make people dumb, many people neglected to identify their bags at which time announcements over the com had to be made until they had to threaten to take the bags off the plane, and ultimately the bag was claimed. This happened about seven times. Considering there are 300 people on this plane I count that as a win.
Finally, Bombay Airports Finest deplane and it looks like we are ready to go. Ah but wait, the little cart thingy that’s supposed to taxi us to the runway got tired of waiting and went to get another plane. Just to give some perspective - the guy sitting next to me watched the entirety of 127 Hours before we left the gate. I’m trying REALLY hard not to feel a kind of kinship with James Franco right now but....I’m *this* close to eating my contact lenses. (At least in my last airplane horror story I got snacks)
So we waited for the next airplane Uber and FINALLY we started heading towards the runway.
As we took off I...honestly...I had to laugh. I did. I started cackling. As we took off, half of the overhead bins started opening by themselves because they hadn’t been shut properly by our little investigative team. One after the other- click, click, click, they came down. It was like a game of whack-a-mole but with ~danger~.
I’m honestly skeptical about finishing this story because I’m sure some other unforeseen delay or inconvenience is waiting for me in the near future. But I guess for now I’m just gonna - oops as I wrote this another thing happened. The air hostess came around with these complimentary bellini drinks. I was REALLY looking forward to it cuz I had gotten one on my last flight and it’s really yummy. So of course what happens? She reaches over me to give one to my neighbor, I reach for one, but before I can get it she just KEEPS RIGHT ON WALKIN. So I guess no Bellini for me :(. Anyway where was I? Oh yea - I was gonna say I’m just gonna get a drink and watch a movie and enjoy the next 16 hours of the flight but I think it would be better if I just go to sleep. I’ve had enough.
Update: I GOT MY BELLINI!
If you got to the end of this chaos, leave me a comment! Tell me about your worst travel experience!
i loved it!