Confessions of a Hostie Read online

  ‘No. Peanuts,’ I repeat myself. I’m convinced that he is the subject of some sort of experiment for Artificial Stupidity.

  ‘Cashews? Do you have cashews?’ he persists.

  ‘No. Peanuts!’

  ‘Are they roasted?’

  At this point I could do one of two things. I could attack this man with a verbal machete, and risk losing my job, or I could do the smart thing and get even with him.

  ‘Of course, we have roasted peanuts. I’ll roast you a fresh batch now. It might take a while though.’

  He nods, smiling. I go back to the galley, fill a foil tray with peanuts and then place them in the oven: I roast the nuts on high. Only when I am sure that they have been burnt to a crisp do I take them out of the oven.

  When I serve the piping hot peanuts to the man, he immediately attempts to grab a few nuts eagerly, only to immediately drop them back, his fingers burnt. I walk away with a satisfied grin on my face.

  I hide myself in the galley again, but only moments later find the same passenger standing before me; he has opened the curtains to the galley and is looking inside, at me. ‘Oh God, what does he want now,’ I groan to myself.

  However, he takes my hand in his own and shakes it, repeatedly.

  ‘Those are the nicest peanuts I have ever had.’

  I feel terrible. All the poor man had wanted was a little attention, and all I had done was screw with him.

  I sit down in the galley with the curtains closed and have an attack of hormone-induced cry.

  curry in a hurry

  It is now called Mumbai, but most locals still call it Bombay. I must say that I love India. It is a fascinating place; however, as crew, we don’t really have enough time or the energy to leave the confines of the city areas. On my first five or six trips to Mumbai, I was the definitive tourist there and did everything a tourist would most surely do, from seeing where Gandhi had lived to treating myself to high tea at Taj Mahal Hotel. Later, in 2009, that same magnificent hotel would become a shooting gallery for radical extremists. Luckily none of our crew was there at the time, although the terrorist attack did open our eyes to some of the dangers that lay out there. Most of the countries I fly to are caught in some sort of political or social turmoil: some of them have the usual security issues that can be negotiated with a little common sense, while some countries are just downright dangerous. Such incidents made me realise that we do not live in a perfect world.

  Such incidents also made me realise that I had a knack for escaping trouble.

  In 2002, I was in Bali only a week before the bombings there. I was in Jakarta in 2004, only a day before a bomb had ripped through the foyer of the nearby Marriott hotel. In 2005, while I had been on my way to London, the tube bombings had occurred in the city. During another one of my trips to Mumbai, in 2006, a series of bombs had gone off on local trains, killing hundreds. This had happened only hours before we had arrived there, and our crew had been instructed by our company’s security to not leave the hotel. I had left Narita only an hour or so before the catastrophic earthquake of 2011. I’ve just narrowly missed riots in Bangkok on two occasions and became stuck there during major flooding. I have also been in other cities badly affected by monsoons, typhoons, cyclones, hurricanes and tornadoes. I saw massive destruction caused by a series of twisters in and around the Dallas area, Texas. Our hotel in Brisbane, Australia, was once inundated by flood waters while I was there, as were hotels in Manila, Bangkok, as well as Mumbai. And I was in New York only days before 9-11; I had then flown back into the city on one of the first flights that had been allowed in.

  I rarely leave the hotel room these days when I travel to cities like Mumbai. Apart from the safety issues, there’s another reason for this: I have had horrible gastro-experiences in India.

  Before taking this job I could never have imagined the amount of strain my poor bowels would have to endure. Flight attendants talk to each other about things that I am sure no one else would ever discuss with their work colleagues. We freely discuss our toilet habits and about the ill-effects of a hostile vindaloo. I’ve suffered food-related bugs that I didn’t even know existed. The worst of these was giardia – it basically stripped out my insides and made me feel like I wanted to die.

  I now carry around my own pharmaceutical dispensary. I have tablets for diarrhoea, and I also have tablets for constipation – I have never needed the latter in India. I’ve made sure that I will never eat food off a Bombay street vendor’s cart ever again, but rather stick to the dining room of my hotel. My decision to stay in the confines of five-star luxury really doesn’t need justifying after all: the hotel has clean kitchens, outstanding food, comfortable beds, a magnificent pool and drinkable coffee. What more do I need?

  Ironically, poor countries like India have the grandest hotels. In fact, I have found that the poorer the country, the better its hotels. In Mumbai, the magnificent hotel I usually stay in is surrounded by slums. Every time I order a gin and tonic there, I know the drink costs as much as what it would take to feed a whole family in the slum. For a month.

  Well, I can’t cure all the world’s problems, can I? I am just being saucy, of course. Flight attendants are some of the most generous people I know. The involvement by some crew in fund-raising and charity work is outstanding.

  One of the better things about travelling and seeing so much is that it gives you perspective, a chance to see the bigger picture. Not everyone who travels opens their eyes wide enough to see that bigger picture, but the opportunities are certainly there. As I lie by the hotel’s pool, contemplating the world, contemplating my life, I can’t help but realise that my period cramps, jetlag and lack of sleep are all inconsequential in the larger order of things.

  However, along with the bigger perspective, travelling can also give you a bigger sense of denial.

  So, I deny all the trouble and chaos I see around me. And I simply order another gin and tonic.

  sometimes the greatest experiences are giving something back

  ‘I bet you have had some great experiences on your job,’ people usually tell me. And then they ask about the greatest and most memorable experience I’ve had.

  They probably expect me to talk about the great places I’ve travelled to – perhaps the Great Wall of China, or the Great Lakes of Northern America, or the Great Barrier Reef of Australia.

  However, the greatest impression left on me during my flying career was my trip to New York, only six days after 9-11. As we travelled on the crew bus toward Manhattan, the sun was setting behind the island. There was not a cloud to be seen in the sky. It should have been a beautiful sight, but it was not. The familiar shapes of the World Trade towers were missing from the city’s skyline. There was only smoke where the twin towers had stood. When we had arrived at our hotel, just around the corner from Times Square, you could tell that things were different. Gone were the friendly smiles of the hotel staff. Gone were the big city noises usually associated with New York. I couldn’t even hear the impatient horns of taxis. People had come out to the still-blackened streets, but the atmosphere was still quiet, somber.

  When we arrived at our hotel, we really didn’t know what to do. It was inappropriate to party, but some of us felt we should do something. But what? I suggested we go to a little bar called ‘Don’t Tell Mama’, only a short walk away from the hotel we stayed in. According to the concierge, all of the city’s theatres and bars had been closed for days, but some bars were reopening that night.

  ‘Don’t Tell Mama’ is a bit like a karaoke bar, but with live music. The inhouse pianist knows every Broadway tune ever written, and most of the bar staff are performers, some even understudies for the local Broadway shows, and they sing show tunes on stage between serving drinks. The bar is also a meeting place for producers, actors and a few Broadway stars, who sometimes drop in for a drink after a show. On any given night, you are likely to hear some exceptionally talented performers there.

  On the night several of our
crew went there, many of those performers paid their respects to family and friends that had passed away in the blasts only days ago, and singers belted out Frank Sinatra tunes with a passion I have never seen before. They let their tears flow freely, and we sat there for hours, watching them, awestruck by their strength. By the time we left the bar, the sun was long up.

  We then walked down to the World Trade site. Security was surprisingly lax, and one of the crew members flashed a fake press pass (from Bangkok). We continued walking inside the cordoned-off areas. And we stood there, silent, amongst the smouldering rubble that was once such a symbol of power. No one took photos. No one spoke. Everyone was moved.

  From this experience, I learnt how fragile the human life can be, and how senseless these acts of violence are.

  In all fairness, I am not as completely self-absorbed as I seem. Nor am I completely oblivious to the difficulties of those less fortunate than myself. I am involved in charity work in a number of poverty-stricken nations. A number of crew work on these projects, and we donate our time and experience, not just goods or money (although we do that too). We have hammered in many, many nails for others – we have funded and helped build houses for orphanages in Asia and Africa.

  On the home front I have my own little project going on: I save all the hotel amenities that I have collected from trips, like shampoos, soaps, slippers and lots more, throughout the year and make little gift hampers. I even buy a few extra odds and ends in my travels to add to these hampers. I then deliver them to several nursing homes in my area at Christmas time. I usually take them in a few days prior to Christmas, as I am typically away on Christmas day, going away on one of my trips. Not this year though, I make a note to myself. For once, I have not been rostered to work on Christmas. This year, I get to don my little Santa hat and hand out the hampers on Christmas morning.

  I have celebrated Christmas only once at home so far, ever since I began my flying career. That day, I still remember, I took my sack of hampers to the first of the nursing homes. There was a lovely old lady sitting near the home’s front door, and we had a little chat. She told me she was so excited about meeting her family – they were on their way now, to meet her and spend Christmas morning with her at the home. When I met the nurse in charge, I explained that I did not have enough hampers for every patient at the home, and that they be handed out to only those that did not have families; people like the lovely lady I had just talked to had family arriving to see her, and they would obviously bring her gifts, I reasoned. The nurse told me that the lovely lady I had just spoken to had been staying at the home for over three years, and every year she waited outside for her family to come. But, every year, no one came for her.

  I wept for her. After I had regained some semblance of composure, I offered a hamper to the lovely old lady, then sat with her and chatted for most of the morning.

  As for India, all my charity attempts there have only ended in an overwhelming feeling of helplessness. Each time crew have taken either clothing or food into a slum, the slum lords have taken away the goods, and although they promise to distribute them to those who need it, we know that they will sell the things we gave them. The only ones that eventually benefitted from our generosity are those at the top, not the ones who need help. Sometimes life is unfair.

  the glamour of being an international flight attendant

  It is already time for me to fly out of Mumbai. I am heading back to Singapore, and we have almost finished boarding the passengers. I am refreshed after the well-deserved rest I got in Mumbai. I have even decided to reassess my attitude onboard the aircraft: I will try to show patience; I will try to be courteous; I will try to be understanding. I can only hope that my renewed sense of human respect lasts for the duration of the flight.

  No one has grabbed at me or pulled at my uniform yet.

  ‘So far so good,’ I sigh. But then again we have yet to take off.

  I have been called so many things in my flying life. Air hostess. Stewardess. A trolley dolly. Hostie.

  The new, and more politically correct term, for what I do is ‘flight attendant.’ My duties, however, are not as easy to define. Most passengers think all I do is pour tea and coffee for them. They have no idea about some of the situations we flight attendants may be required to deal with. We are first and foremost a safety professional – and there is a lot more we do. We are a security officer, a fire-fighter, a psychologist, a travel agent, a cleaner, a law enforcer, a bartender, an aged-care worker, an announcer, a cook, a diplomat, a promotional spokesperson, a problem solver, a salesperson, a nurse and a child-minder, all rolled into one.

  When a passenger addresses me as ‘waitress’, I jokingly tell them about some of these other skills, before smiling to say, ‘So, would you like the chicken or the beef?’

  Most people think being a flight attendant is an extremely glamorous job. They couldn’t be more wrong. Try spending fourteen or fifteen hours getting harassed in a narrow aluminium tube with nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.

  I get pushed, grabbed, prodded, tugged at, coughed on, spat on and vomited on too often to recall. I’ve even been handed a soiled diaper. Moreover, some of the things I’ve found in the aircraft’s toilets are too graphic to describe here. In fact, some of the things I’ve seen in the cabin are too graphic to describe here. If someone vomits or a toilet has been treated like a toxic dump there are no commercial cleaners on call at 35,000 feet. We can, at times, lock off a toilet that has been badly violated. However, there are generally only enough toilets onboard to service the first six rows of passengers. Even if there aren’t enough serviceable toilets, the passengers will still need to go – and they do go. This next story I am about to tell is almost too incredulous to believe, so I will leave out the explicit details. I will say that on one flight someone used the back galley as a toilet. Not number ones either. Because of hygiene reasons the galley was blocked off, and passengers did not receive any food for the rest of the flight – all because someone (or something) should have been locked up in a cage and not been on an aircraft. We were out in the cabin working, as we do, and no one saw who the culprit was. Based on the evidence, we could tell this was an adult, or at least someone with adult-size toilet habits. Had we, or the passengers for that matter, known who had done it, the intensity of the reprisal would have been proportionate to that of the disgusting act.

  Oh the glamour of it all.

  Travelling around the world was once seen as quite glamorous, by both the passengers as well as the hosties. I remember my first ever time on a plane. I was eleven then, and a wide-eyed and awe-struck passenger. Everyone on my flight was dressed immaculately. The men looked distinguished in their Cary Grant suits while all the ladies wore Coco Channel and other designer apparel. I remember looking at the stewardesses and thinking about how beautiful they looked. They were the epitome of style and elegance, and I was mesmerised. It was then that eleven-year-old me decided to become a flight attendant.

  Oh, how times have changed now. These days we are lucky if the passengers are wearing shoes. Airline travel was once an experience to be savoured, but it is now purely a mode of transportation. And more than often, a passenger’s common courtesy is checked in along with the luggage. Crew normally don’t put up with passengers that are disrespectful or uncouth. We get really livid at rude passengers, or we get even. One passenger I had the misfortune of serving was extremely rude to all the crew as well as to passengers around him. On landing he mocked the crew by putting a cigarette in his mouth and pretending to smoke it. He knew what he was doing and as the cigarette was not lit he taunted ‘There is nothing you can do. I am not breaking any laws.’

  ‘Maybe so, sir.’

  Unbeknown to him, when we landed, we forwarded his details to customs officials along with the message that he was acting suspiciously during the flight and had refused to eat or drink. Also, we casually hinted that we thought he might be carrying drugs.

  As the crew walked away, most
of us laughing like an evil Bond villain, we hoped that the rude man would enjoy being body-searched with a rubber glove.

  I’ve heard similar revenge stories from the other crew members. When I first started flying I had never heard of the term ‘air rage’. I have now witnessed so many instances of such rage, so many over-reactions to situations that needn’t be responded to with venom.

  There are now even reports of ‘flight attendant rage’ – yes, it is not just the passengers who can be rude and thoughtless. I have seen some flight attendants be just as bad-mannered as some of the passengers. We often have to put up with a lot, and sometimes crew members do react. In most jobs if something or someone really gets under your skin, you can step outside and get some fresh air and reassess the situation. You can’t do that in the confines of an aircraft.

  Now, as I walk along the aisles while passengers board, with a calm smile still stuck on my face, one of the passengers stops me to ask for a drink, even before he has even taken his seat. Actually, it is not so much that he asked for the drink that tests my patience, but it is how he asked for it. Some of the passengers from the subcontinent can be a little condescending, and I don’t usually put up with such disrespect. However, I control my anger and politely tell him that I will bring him his drink after take-off.

  On one of my earlier flights from India, an experienced hostie became frustrated at the rudeness of one such demanding passenger and told him so.

  ‘In my country you would be a servant,’ he had snapped at her.

  Without batting an eyelid, she had snapped back, ‘And in my country you would be a taxi driver.’

  Touché.

  Although I am trying my hardest to avoid confrontation, the man asks me again. And he chooses to ask me while I am in the middle of performing my safety demonstration.

  ‘Could I have my drink now,’ he calls out to me. My problem-passenger alarm bell has begun to ring. I know that pesky passengers like him ask every crew member for drinks. By the time we figure out that each flight attendant has given him three drinks, he is totally hammered – and we are usually only an hour into the flight then.