Skip to main content

to Fly or not to Fly

Ever since the Wrights spoiled the party on the ground by taking to the skies the humans have kept wanting to improve the experience. After over 100 years let me announce this... We really have NOT! We flew Singapore Air - the staff at least does not yell back at you (certain stateside airlines will also give you free attitude and no peanuts) but its still hopeless. One good thing going for the brothers Orville and Wilbur was that they tried to experiment on a beach in the Carolinas... clean fresh air and a short flight. Bathroom breaks at will etc. Modern flights - this one going from San Fran to some point in Asia - 14 plus hours depending on the point. In something they call COACH. Not the fancy accouterment the ladies carry - although now that I think about it the trip sure felt like I was sitting in one. Cramped - barely able to sleep. Some have counseled that the way to do these long haul pressurized, smelly, sort of compressed and almost tasteless food journeys is to adopt a Zen posture. Tune it all out and dream of what awaits on the other end. Sometimes that can work - again depending on what the other end might be or why you are trying to get there. Regardless, add few infants (that are beginning to lose it) and invalids to the mix coupled with the pressures on the airline to keep feeding the dolts in all those seats lest they revolt, the passageways are barely free to wander and stretch any part of the anatomy. If you do stretch, careful what you wish for since the bowels may want to take a break from this monotony and if luck would have it the lavatories would be out of commission - someone really went wild minutes before you and they had to shut a few down. Now you have an aromatic pressurized cabin with wild infants and meal carts and semi comatose world citizenry, some waking up in an unfamiliar time zone and wondering why they got boiled chicken instead of the Korean grilled beef. That's my beef!
Labels:

Comments

  1. RajendraAugust 2, 2012 at 7:19 PM

    at least you are not asking where's the beef, like some great people. The less said about long flights, the better.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Of Jims and Johns

Here is another essay on the subject of first names. As in birth names. Or names provided to an offspring at birth. While the developed world tends to shy away from the exotic like Refrigerator or Coca Cola for their new production there is a plethora of Jims and Johns and Bobs or Robs. Speaking of which I do not think there is a categoric decision point at the time of birth if a child will be hereafter called as Bob. I mean have not yet met a toddler called Bob or Rob for that matter. At some point though the parental instinct to mouth out multiple syllables runs out and they switch from calling the crawler Robert to simply Robbie to Rob. Now speaking of - it is strange that the name sounds like something you would not want Rob to do - i.e. Rob anyone. Then why call someone that? After all Rob Peter to Pay Paul is not exactly a maxim to live a young life? Is it? Perhaps Peter or Paul might want to have a say in it? Then there is this matter of going to the John. Why degrad...
2 comments
Read more

Presumptive Society

Today's world is hyper connected.  I am not so sure what it means but you hear it a lot.  It is probably hyper but not sure how connected it is.  Sugar (fermented or not) is available in many ways than before and so getting hyper is easy.  It is probably more a threat than cocaine since it is sold legally. And what is this connected stuff?  Most people I encounter seem disconnected from reality.  So going back to this assumption that we are connected there are subtle and no so subtle instances of how brands and companies and middle men try to portray someone - A linkedin profile for somebody working for X years at a place advertises to the connected network that so and so is CELEBRATING X years @ Such and Such Inc. Do we know if (s)he is celebrating or cringing?  Perhaps a better way to portray will be - So and So LASTED X years @ such & such inc. Then it exhorts the readership to go ahead and congratulate them for this lasting effe...
2 comments
Read more

But What If We're Wrong?

I attempted to read this book by author Chuck Klosterman backward to forward but it started hurting my brain so I decided to stop and do it like any other publication in the English language.  Start from page 1 and move to the right. Witty, caustic and thought provoking this is a book you want to read if you believe that the status quo might, just might be wrong. At times bordering on being contrarian about most things around us it tries to zero in on the notion of what makes anything believable and certain in our minds.  The fact that there is a fact itself is ironic.  Something analogous to the idea that you can never predict the future because there is no future. Many books and movies have tried to play on this concept - best that I recollect (I think I am) was 'The Truman Show'.  This book by Klosterman attempts to provoke the reader to at least contemplate that what they think they know may be wrong. He uses examples like concept of gravity, and how it ...
2 comments
Read more