30000ft Where the Magic Happens...!!

There is already so much written about cabin crew to empathizes with them, but often it either remains  totally not noticed or passengers are still unaware of the cabin crew life.

A tiny person who only used to dream about the metal tube flying and making a horrendous sound while flying up above at 30000ft, trying to look in the sky the very moment when there ears catch the slightest noise, just to figure out that the plane has already passed over a little further, closing the eyes and emotionally thinking that “one day I will be there”, practically realizing the principle of “light travels faster then sound”.

Emotions as always are stronger than our practical world as we tend to dream our emotional side and then put all efforts to achieve them, make them the reality. 

Yeah! Some of us will say that the quench can be attained by flying as passengers, but a glass of water is not enough when you dream of fresh water river.

Hence giving birth to the ever energetic, enthusiastic, agile, smiling, aspiring, loveable, dreamable Cabin Crew. The job that promises that you can get in that metal tube over and over again till the time you feel it has satisfied your hunger of traveling. And the best part is that you don’t pay rather one get paid to travel.

Obviously with the greater job comes the greater responsibility, and our cabin crew life is not different.

The selection process

Itself is horrifying, as not only that the charm of the job is unexplainable also the money is tremendous. Not everyone who appears is selected, the most heart breaking is that the ones who are not selected are not even given any feedback for self development. In some of the airlines even it is said that “go home and think what mistakes you made”. Leaving a person in the middle of the ocean with no magnetic compass, so one does not have any idea which way to swim (if you know swimming). Nevertheless the ones who got through the interviews are asked to do there medicals and pack their bags and get in habit of doing it.

First day of training

All smiling faces are around trying to get acquainted with each other (Keep in mind that most of the candidates are around 21-25 year), who is from where and what are their names, it’s imperative because of two reasons first that you will have to spend another 2 months of training with others and second and important because your mere survival in the aviation industry depends on if you are a Social person.

After that starts the induction program, telling in depth about the company and paperwork. This usually takes a week almost. As the service training gets over starts the important stuff safety training with the famous line “if u goof up in the service we can correct it but safety has no second chances”, which apparently is correct to some extent. After an extensive and grilling 2 months and exams, a fresh product is ready to deliver in the sky.

At work

The dream of many, actually came to life and took more then 2 months to realize, there goes our fresh cabin crew with tantalizing eyes to grab the world with both the arms. Having the impression that just has to serve the passengers and see the world. It merely takes a few weeks for her/him to realize that this is a different ball game. “It’s more like that I am an onboard magician” once a crew said to me.

YOU DON’T HAVE CHICKEN?

Usually the first encounter happens when you finish with chicken on board and some passenger is so angry that there is no chicken any more, as if it was the crew mistake and she is supposed to open the door or a  tandoor and bring some more kids of our dear HEN. Or simply do some magic and get it.

I AM SMARTER THAN YOU…!!!

Some of the passengers are psychologically advanced I guess because the moment they come they would try to make some ruckus so that they will get better attention all through the flight.

GIVE ME MORE… YOU BITCH!!!

After the food mystery comes the Alcohol  needs, doesn't matter if you don’t have it or if the bar cart Is closed, or if one is unduly intoxicated and not even smelling of alcohol but the passenger next to him complains about his beer farts as well.

But he needs more and he needs now!! That’s not a request it a fucking order now!” Who are these 20-25 year old smart looking tiny ladies to tell me that I am drunk, I need more”,

 And after a few drinks I don’t know why that it always becomes impossible for the passenger  to understand that anything whether food or drinks just can be finished. Doesn’t matter if the flight is 16 hours or less but nothing should or could finish on a plane.

When surprisingly almost 80% travelers these days are at least partially literate, who get to face these people? Yes the one who is not allowed to drink on board “cabin crew”. I bet you allow cabin crew to drink two tequila shots they will straighten these mother F*%#ks.

One won’t believe that cabin crew is the one, who people shout at, curse, abuse, harassed, sexually harassed, pressurized, pushed, manipulated, and look down upon.  And the worse of it is that cabin crew is just like another office job when comes to team work, your zone, your mistake, your passenger, you serve him, you clean him, you you you you you you you!!!!!!!

KNEEL DOWN IN FRONT OF ME!

I have seen supervisors asking the junior cabin crew to apologies to the drunk passengers as she refused him a drink and now he is upset. I have seen cabin crew catching hold of some VIPs’ legs as they are upset and threaten to complain about the crew and get them fired. I have seen cabin crew crying as the passenger has thoroughly sexually harassed her by just his words. On complaining the mistake comes on to the crew itself as it is perceived that she is the one who is friendlier.

WHAT WERE YOU THINKING SO FAR?

A crew who has more meaningful job she/he thought, while administering oxygen to asthmatic passenger, CPR to heart attack, Heimlich maneuver, and trained to help the mother giving birth to a child in mid air. Life savers on board, who can save everyone life in 90 seconds by using 50% of total exits, Who fight the fire, comply with the hijackers, know how to use the PBE, asbestos gloves, crash axe, and procedures to survive in jungle (if crashed in one), usage of Radio locater beacon, Fire extinguisher, know how to make a tent, camp, which water to use which not….. Etc. etc. The one who board the plane first and leave the last even in case of emergency, even if there own life is in danger.

Still taking shit from everyone, from passenger and colleagues, everyday they come to work in hope of a good day, smiling and greeting  walking through the aisle they are the ones spreading the magic to miles……

Respect the crew, who are truly the heroes of the airline, what would a plane do made of diamonds if there is no crew.

This is my effort to say I salute the life of a cabin crew.

Fly High Burn the Sky

What does dream girl dream about & what is the reality?

Someone great once said “ travel the world and you won't repent spending a penny”, The dream of many would be to travel the world. Indeed travelling the world has no limits and to see the unseen has no price. The idea of travelling the world is itself very lucrative.

The one who said the above saying forgot to envision the 21^st century  world. Where every thing has a cost to incur. Nothing comes for free and no travel is cheap, yes one might not care about the cost while you are travelling because the world is actually mesmerizing, the more you see the more you wanna see. Technology has made it even more easier to know about different places.

Hence our beautiful green and blue earth has been divided within categories of “ Must see places” & “not so cool places”.

Must see places are the parts of the green blue ball where one should go before the short term life vanishes. Whereas Not so cool places are the ones where if you don't go, society will not make you feel jealous.

I think In this ever evolving world, there is one thing that  middle class people always wanna do is to travel and see the world. I say middle class people because the poor won’t imagine and the Rich don’t care as they always go from one place to the other. Yes, the middle class is the one who wants to travel, collects money for it, longs for it, work even harder and harder so to enjoy later. A study shows that more than 45% of middle class people take double jobs so as they can travel abroad to have a nice little vacation.It will be really imperative to talk about the first person who ever traveled the world Ferdinand Magellan, who started his voyage when he was 25 years old, from the west of the known world to the east of it.

Hence creating the everlasting and zillion dollar travel business. Ever since right from the Mayan civilization the traveling between the worlds or lets say rather traveling to moon and other planets have been thought of, processed and trialed. There by making the journey across any two points important and necessary.

So after all this debate of traveling and how and why is it a dream of many?

What would be the perfect way to travel and how not to spend a penny and see the world across. Like any other query google can answer this even faster and easier.

Let’s join the travel business which offers to take you from one continent to an other and from one country to another. Shipping business sounds good to the same but ships do take a longer span of time and it's a very meticulous job to be in the water from approx 45 days before landing up on the docks of any country. Railways make it even narrower as it's practically impossible to cross seven seas.

Here come an option which is safer (nowadays), advanced, way too faster than ships, and offers to show you across the green and blue floating ball in the universe, you guessed it right Aviation. Apparently, not everyone associated with the aviation business can see the world at a pace of that compared to the Flight attendants.

Flight attendants commonly called as cabin crew & flight crew do travel the world at a tremendous pace and sometimes are able to cover all the continents within 2 years of the career. Of cause they are paid to travel, and most obviously their stay is taken care by the company they work for.

Thus making it the most perfect career option, often I have seen people who want to join as a cabin crew talking that how much they wanna see the world, the glamour of the job pulls everyone. The timid little girl who only used to put make up on her face (that to some local one)occasionally, will now have to apply most luxurious branded make up on her face every day. Advertisers have made the mere walk in the airport so important that every gal longs to wear that uniform and put that affectionate make up with the smile up her face showing the content and feeling of gratification and walking through various airports across the world.

Way before even she (talking in specific gender as 90% of crew members are girls, but It could also apply to boys in various occasions) is selected to be a crew, she already have dreams to move out her native country, all of a sudden her own country either becomes dirty and crowded or becomes very static and boring, if nothing then the people of their own country become so narrow and lifestyle is like a sheep walk. They start dreaming about the destinations they wanna visit, things they wanna buy, world to see and yes of cause a boyfriend who may be from different country and which might make her settle in abroad and the exit plan is also ready by now.

 Expecting to explore various cultures and people their languages and accents. Here she keeps her few first steps in the webbed world of Cabin crew.

On the first few months and years everything seems to fall in place and first few months are just perfect and as per the plan, new crew members start to believe in the illusion of controlling their life and running the show, the very way they wanted it to be. They say “to get comfortable in any place is your first mistake”, and that what happens. First clicker goes off when the body starts to hurt and your back hurts more than your heart. Time flies right beneath your foot steps and you don’t even realize that your exit plan has passed and over due by 2 years now. Money never seems enough, the standard of life becomes like such. You find less real friends but more Gucci ,Prada, LV bags in your closet. Suddenly all other nationalities become faded and your flag and food becomes priced possessions, your vocabulary increases so much that you keep mixing your native language with the others. 

Parties, clubs , lounges and pubs give you so much of your favorite music that you don’t wanna talk anymore. People everywhere seem to be unhappy which start to make you negative about life and you tend to move backward from them. Passengers shout at you, supervisors blame you for their mistakes, fellow crew member is not there for you, all of a sudden you might find yourself on a 12 hour flight with others talking in their native language and no one to talk, It’s like standing in times square for the 5th time and you are all alone, the loneliness kills you inside. You long for your leaves, you wanna go  to your stupid looking country which now soothes you, where you feel belonged, you wanna make a new exit plan.One day you feel that it's enough - I had enough of world traveling I wanna settle, relax, I have seen it all and the next split second you realize that this is  addiction. Outside this world your experience is not counted, what will you do? Where will you work? Visiting home is fine but can you go back there in that dirt and filth?

The world of cabin crew has now webbed you, the illusion now is showing its magic trick, it has made you a woman of Prada and Gucci bag, a woman who hadn't even heard about sushi before but now you love it, what if u don't find it again? There starts a flight between the heart and the mind, and believe me not mind always wins. You have already expanded your world, bought a new house, a new car, loaned some money, invested in shares, bought the best insurance. You have come too far to turn back.

Hence leaving a Cabin crew to adapt a plastic smile from the smile of that genuine little timid, naive, simple and enthusiastic girl who once jumped from her bed to see the world. And today she is dragging her feet as she has realized that she is trapped in this vicious circle. She can’t live it but she can't leave it.

There is no exit plan.

Fly High Burn The Sky

30,000 ft & above: An Extraordinary league of unhappy people

30,000 ft & above: An Extraordinary league of unhappy people: If i were to ask you to think about a place where you will find the most happy bunch of professionals what would you think of?  A reasona...

An Extraordinary league of unhappy people

If i were to ask you to think about a place where you will find the most happy bunch of professionals what would you think of? 

A reasonable amount of people will think about a industry based on the basis of paying you if you are or lets say look happy. What is it ? Ah!! common its an Aircraft, yes cabin crew. Yeah! the only bunch of professionals who are expected thoroughly to be smiling and agile always. Well they get paid for the same isn't it?

Now before we go any further lets try and understand what is this all about smiling business?
There are two factors her 

1. Post 9/11

Yeah after that drastic event which was a heinous act of destroying humanity shook the world of flying and changed it for better i must say. As now it more safer and pleasant to travel by air. 
Nevertheless there was a time after the incident that huge amount of people were afraid of travel by air, thus it became even more imperative to attract them with something which looks more assured right? 
Now our planes are safer, safety is up to mark, contingencies are to minimum, but still a common passenger will not know and will understand about all these technical stuff. And god knows if you are telling the truth or not, So here comes the human touch, Lady on the plane are looking confident, well trained, and are so happy to see you as if she has seen her grandmother gifting her holocaust ring. Now that gives some credibility to the passengers to see that correct? No one would board a plane knowing that its gonna go down, and to support the fact here are our friendly, supportive, smiling ever happy Cabin crew.

2. Open Market

In the recent era air travel has become cheaper and easier, open borders and lack of time advertised air travel as the best means of travelling. Hence creating the huge market for competition, have you seen the adds off lately for different airlines. I remember this one a girl walking around a city in Europe(what i guess), and smiling and helping everyone around, for sure she was not complying with the company rule to change her uniform before going out. But anyways the message was that "we just don't hire people who are happy in uniform but happy and uniform every where they go" . Choose us..!!
By now m sure you must be confused reading the title and the story which doesn't match, so without further ado lets dissect this topic.
Are you stretching your lips or smiling?
I happen to be a cabin crew my self for many years, i think i can take this levy of sharing some truth with the world.
Cabin crew and happiness my folks have a very very distanced relationship. Yeah ! i am telling you, practically speaking how can some one be happy doing the same job every day. But yeah when you are paid to do so it becomes a lot easier. 
A profession which gave a idiom "real smile or plastic smile". Cabin crew are the most unhappy league of people. And not only at one place, the most i have seen around the globe. 
It always just starts right at the observer flights(for those who doesn't know after the completion of so called training of the cabin crew they get these familiarization flights called observer flights), most of the crew are not happy for these flights as they are not paid for it.

And there after starts the process of complains,

Hotels

 Cabin crew often stay in 5 star branded hotels around the globe on a layover. Some of them who haven even stepped into one will always complaint about the color of the curtains, floor is not carpeted, food is bad, staff is impolite, wine served me in the hotel was not chilled, check in is soooooooooooo slow!! My view from the room is so bad.

In flight

"Its a full load!! oh my god", passengers are demanding, my cart doesn't move properly, ah!! no one helped me on my cart(meaning help is required and expected from the other crew who had finished his/her job), "this passenger is on my nerves he wants a chilled wine", food is not good, Supervisor doesn't know anything, i don't like this flight.

Personal Life

"why i am here?", I don't have a bf/gf, my bf/gf cheated on me, ah!! i cant find anyone perfect with this job!, this job sucks my personal life away, I will soon leave this job and lifestyle(and believe me no one leaves ).

Roster

The one thing that every one is desperately waiting every month just to crib a little more, here there are two types of people 10% who got exactly what flights they wanted (Happy crew), 90% who either didn't got what they wanted or didn't got in the order they requested it(very upset crew).

My Roster SUCKS!!!," There is something wrong with these rostering people, i didn't got any of  my request, it's always like this with me, i f***ing hate them"," all turn around, they didn't give my leaves, very less days off, too many days off"," too many layover i wanted to be in the base my bf/gf lives here"," Very less hours of flying only 60 hrs what money i gonna make"," Oh! too much flying hours 135 what i will do with this money if i wont have my health", "they don't gave me my training's"," alas! my whole roster is only training" ... ENDLESS....!!

Pay Day

No no no !! not only cabin crew everyone is happy on the payday. But our fellow crew might find that there is some mistake in the paycheck as there last months  10$ is not there.But over all the best day of the month , until and unless rostering doesn't pull you out from a standby for a double sector flight.

Over all no one can beat our beloved happy looking, smiling, prim and proper, helpful, smart and beautiful/handsome Cabin crew(i guess), in the matter of complaining. 

Folks i am not mocking anyone i was the same when i was working, i got to learn one thing that i wanna share, i.e. Its very comfortable when paychecks are following us, going to different countries, living in 5 star hotels, eating multi cuisine food, tasting best wine around the globe and after all that sitting on the couch and say " you know my like sucks".

Give it up !! Start cherishing small details and live life as u promise to yourself as to be genuinely happy people.

Fly High Burn The Sky

30,000 ft & above: The so called Glamorous job of a cabin crew.See...

30,000 ft & above: The so called Glamorous job of a cabin crew.


See...: The so called Glamorous job of a cabin crew. Seems like and more so they portray it as a glamours life, all one can see from the outsi...

The so called Glamorous job of a cabin crew.

Seems like and more so they portray it as a glamours life, all one can see from the outside is beautiful girls and handsome boys indulging themselves in serving tea&coffee and food as per customers choice or no choice in some cases. Ever smiling and makeup up to the mark, red nail paints and lipstick, stocking of the skin color, smokey eyes and best fragrance of channel and nina ricci (so and so forth) amazingly shiny shoes as if a beautiful lady is required to serve the food in case for the food to digest, men having no beard as it might be the only cause of hair fall in the food. 

Okay lets agree that certain personal hygiene is required, but if talking about the most of the airlines and most of the passenger traffic travelling in Economy class (cattle class), we will all find something in common that most of the passengers would complain about bad airline food. So, i guess the person who serves the bad food if looks good it works, isn't it? That is the reason correct, companies spend hundreds of dollars on so called Grooming classes. 

Leaving behind the grooming classes one more thing.

There is nothing bad in keeping personal hygiene intact and obviously to be prim and proper for the cabin crew as these are the people who serve food, but do we know here that these beautiful ladies/gentlemen wearing Prada watches and channel perfumes, actually clean the very toilet where some fat f**k has just went to throw his dump and haven press the magic blue button which creates a huge noise and magically suck all your dumping inside an invisible septic tank, and for those of you who didn't knew this so far ya your shit doesn't fly in the sky it is inside the same airplane and comes down with you upon a safe landing. Ya all over the place if it crashes and creating the cause of death for the whales if in case of ditching(plane crashing into the ocean), So coming back to the topic so all crew members for sure wearing the plastic gloves before cleaning the toilet in with passengers do there pee pee (often can't aim at the right place), and dump.So the moral of the story is that still you looking slim, attractive, happy, smiling, smell amazing, polite, will make that bad food sound good.

LIFE SAVERS

Cabin crew are trained well for handling the first aid situations from simple headache to a child birth. When i say child birth i mean exactly taking the baby out (who couldn't wait for another few hours inside), from the mother in mid air. Our proficient cabin crew around the globe have delivered so many kids on board (just like the old times when hospitals were not required to deliver a baby), i guess all these babies should be sent to 100 meter relay races in Olympics, ya they will run faster right as they were born on the same fundamental, running fast. 
There is a universal saying that blonds are bimbos. But if the same blonde becomes a cabin crew one should see her capabilities. The job is like that, I have been a crew to different airlines and i have noticed that one becomes so street smart after becoming crew. 
Cabin crew lifestyle defies one saying and makes it the most positive in all sense, " Jack of all trades, Master of none". 
So, in all sense i think that grooming is just a part of cabin crew job, the packing of the package doesn't make the gift look good. And i would suggest all the airline to provide ample amount of GOOD food so that these lovely, energetic, smiling crew doesn't have to lie to the passengers that they are still looking for the choice of food. 
Last but not the least that being a cabin crew (Fair amount of cabin crew should agree) is a simplest of job, made complicated by the people in it. It's no rocket science to switch that oven ON and heat the cold food, but if your lipstick is not replenished then there could be a big problem.
I wanna say something to these people... " Go get a life".
Fly High Burn the Sky

When sky used to blue and not so high

When borders were beyond saying bye bye
Dollars used to be just a paper art...
When airports were required for a new start.
I think now was it for real or a dream?

When a bottle of whiskey was not enough..
Gaining weight on the couch was like being tough.
When Australia was not far away from USA..
When Bora Bora island was not far away from marina bay..
I think now was it for real or a dream?

When struggle started only after 330 am…
Fighting with friends over a cricket game.
When everything was fine and Kerala was in India's west...
Felt like those days were the best...
Religion politics and sex were time killing theories.
Will we wake up by the wake up call was the only worry?
I think now was it for real or a dream?

Going to the gym was a fantasy..
The one who goes regularly will earn the supremacy.
When driving a dodge, bmw and hummer was like a piece of cake.
No nothing was at stake.
When gossip would take over the real action. 
When arguments use to take over real interaction.
When love was with no strings attached...
People were together but were emotionally detached.
I think now was it for real or a dream?

When one cup of tea was followed by six other,
When all birds of the same feather use to flock together.
When whiskey with coke was replaced with soda and then with water,
When days were longer and nights were shorter.
When sleeping at midnight was a curse...
When clubs and pubs use to give us a perfect turf.
I think now was it real or a dream?

When the most romantic walk was on the cornish.
All languages looked as if ours from Serbian to Russian or Spanish.
When cooking at home was a delicacy, 
All other cuisine were ok but nothing like desi.
When security guard use to bring food and have a drink.
When sometimes we use to dance and if in mood someone use to sing.
When a new relation was suppose to be celebrated. 
And an old break use to devastate.

Covered a long journey from a 19 inch tv to a 55 inches Led.
From a swift to coupe and then to dodge. 
From few thousand rupees to few hundred thousand.
From blenders pride to chivas and from jameson to single malts.
I think that was a glorified dream. 
I woke up without any sense and scream.
But definitely i have earned people more then money.
For sure i don’t have flings but i have u honey.
Here the real world awaits me.
(Cheers! Ladies and gentlemen  who made this ordinary journey an extraordinary one).