The mystery of the destination was finally revealed to us. It turns out that Gulf Air is like a town bus. It stops in many destinations and picks up truck loads of people. Gulf Air fools people into thinking that it is a world class airline. It is in fact just like traveling in a local bus; only it flies. And ofcourse they do not print all the destinations on the ticket and fool people into thinking that it goes only to one destination.
The four of us boarded the same flight. I was mystified when I entered the plane; it was one of the oldest and dirtiest planes I had ever seen. All seats had a peculiar blue colour. The seats seemed to be more than 1000 years old. Suchi and I got the worst seats ; in the four seats that are usually in the center; very crammed. There was an elderly Indian couple next to us. When we sat down, the seats seemed to be fixed. There was no concept of push-back seats ! Both of us were so shocked. Anyway, we settled in ( or atleast tried to).
There was a big TV hanging in front of us ( 2 seats away). When I say big, I don't mean a big screen, it was one of those relic picture tube TV's which was just big and bulky. We hoped that they would play some good movie. Suddenly someone started taking in some strange language using the microphone. It us a few minutes to realize that it was something in Arabic. It was the usual welcome note. It was followed by a welcome in English ( sounded like Arabic though). Then the pilot told us that we would be flying to Bahrain. The flight would then continue to Muscat. Mystery solved. The Air-hostess were dressed in a strange dress. They had a hood and some weird clothes. Most of them had a middle-eastern look; they looked like models. They gave me a you are fat and ugly complex (sigh).
Then there seemed to be an earthquake ! The whole plane began to shake and wobble. We got terrified ! The lights went out and there was a deafening noise ! It took us a few minutes to realize that it was the plane taking-off ! The loud noise was the engines ! On the brighter side, atleast there was an engine ! After what seemed an eternity, the wobbling finally reduced. I guess we had reached cruising altitude. I stopped clutching the seat and quickly confirmed to see if there was a life-jacket below the seat. That was a very difficult task to do, considering the fact that there was hardly any space.
Then the giant TV was on; something in Arabic/Urdu was displayed. Then some ad started. We quickly fished out the headphones from the pouch in front. The headphones had the same blue colour of the seats( hence forth I will call it GulfAir Blue). It us 10 minutes to find the socket for the headphones on the seat. I had never seen anything like it. There were so many buttons on both the arm-rests. It was like some space ship. Finally, we found the socket. The audio was in Arabic. Only one of Suchi's headphones was working. Then they started playing some Hindi movie (Naye Padosan). We found a Hindi audio channel and started to watch the movie. That's when I realized something was wrong with the TV. It seemed to be shaking too much. In fact, I thought it was going to break-off and fall down on the passengers' head. I felt very sorry for the person sitting under the giant TV.
Then came dinner time. The food was unexpectedly good. Or maybe by then I was mentally prepared to eat horrible stale food. We got a lot of nice things to eat. The service was pretty good compared to the plane's standard.
I was very scared to close my eyes and sleep. What if the wobbling plane crashed ? How would I escape ? Plus the fact the seats were uncomfortable and there was no leg space added to my misery. We got matching GulfAir Blue blankets and socks (which were actually soft and wrm). I finally had a disturbed sleep.
My prayers' were answered and we reached Bahrain without any mishaps. Only when I came down the steps, I noticed the colourful plane. Its tail was splashed with all the rainbow colours. Looked like modern art. Or maybe they had some discount from the paint company.
Adventures in Bahrain and the flight to Bombay will be the next post.
The four of us boarded the same flight. I was mystified when I entered the plane; it was one of the oldest and dirtiest planes I had ever seen. All seats had a peculiar blue colour. The seats seemed to be more than 1000 years old. Suchi and I got the worst seats ; in the four seats that are usually in the center; very crammed. There was an elderly Indian couple next to us. When we sat down, the seats seemed to be fixed. There was no concept of push-back seats ! Both of us were so shocked. Anyway, we settled in ( or atleast tried to).
There was a big TV hanging in front of us ( 2 seats away). When I say big, I don't mean a big screen, it was one of those relic picture tube TV's which was just big and bulky. We hoped that they would play some good movie. Suddenly someone started taking in some strange language using the microphone. It us a few minutes to realize that it was something in Arabic. It was the usual welcome note. It was followed by a welcome in English ( sounded like Arabic though). Then the pilot told us that we would be flying to Bahrain. The flight would then continue to Muscat. Mystery solved. The Air-hostess were dressed in a strange dress. They had a hood and some weird clothes. Most of them had a middle-eastern look; they looked like models. They gave me a you are fat and ugly complex (sigh).
Then there seemed to be an earthquake ! The whole plane began to shake and wobble. We got terrified ! The lights went out and there was a deafening noise ! It took us a few minutes to realize that it was the plane taking-off ! The loud noise was the engines ! On the brighter side, atleast there was an engine ! After what seemed an eternity, the wobbling finally reduced. I guess we had reached cruising altitude. I stopped clutching the seat and quickly confirmed to see if there was a life-jacket below the seat. That was a very difficult task to do, considering the fact that there was hardly any space.
Then the giant TV was on; something in Arabic/Urdu was displayed. Then some ad started. We quickly fished out the headphones from the pouch in front. The headphones had the same blue colour of the seats( hence forth I will call it GulfAir Blue). It us 10 minutes to find the socket for the headphones on the seat. I had never seen anything like it. There were so many buttons on both the arm-rests. It was like some space ship. Finally, we found the socket. The audio was in Arabic. Only one of Suchi's headphones was working. Then they started playing some Hindi movie (Naye Padosan). We found a Hindi audio channel and started to watch the movie. That's when I realized something was wrong with the TV. It seemed to be shaking too much. In fact, I thought it was going to break-off and fall down on the passengers' head. I felt very sorry for the person sitting under the giant TV.
Then came dinner time. The food was unexpectedly good. Or maybe by then I was mentally prepared to eat horrible stale food. We got a lot of nice things to eat. The service was pretty good compared to the plane's standard.
I was very scared to close my eyes and sleep. What if the wobbling plane crashed ? How would I escape ? Plus the fact the seats were uncomfortable and there was no leg space added to my misery. We got matching GulfAir Blue blankets and socks (which were actually soft and wrm). I finally had a disturbed sleep.
My prayers' were answered and we reached Bahrain without any mishaps. Only when I came down the steps, I noticed the colourful plane. Its tail was splashed with all the rainbow colours. Looked like modern art. Or maybe they had some discount from the paint company.
Adventures in Bahrain and the flight to Bombay will be the next post.
3 comments:
hilarious ones ..waiting for the next one ... :-)
Boy, you seemed to have had some adventure!! Maybe they shd have a Lonely Planet book based on our travels ;-)!
He He He ... it was a 51 hour trip after all :-)
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