Air Asia has tiny planes. From the aisle there're only 3 seats to the left and 3 to the right. I felt like a Liliputian in a toy plane. Can this thing hold at least until we reach Kota Bharu? I chose a seat in the middle. I could see the left wing outside my little window. I wanted to be the first to see and notify the crew if any screw loosens or a bird flies into the propellers. Wombat sat next to me. I decided against voicing out my concern from her beware-I-lack-sleep-and-therefore-I-gobble-little-children-for-breakfast look. The others, equally zombified, plonked into available seats around. Gee, how could I be the only one getting excited about taking off?
I love flying. The sensation of the engines in full throttle, cruising full-speed along the runway for the final few seconds, and then feeling the plane actually lifts off into the air, into nothingness... oooooh I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it. What a thrill!
"Hey, Wombat. Can you feel it? Can you? We're about to take off! It's my favourite part of the flight!"
"It's the part where I normally puke."
Sheeeeeeesh.
"And I forgot to take my motion sickness pill this morning."
The plane suddenly shuddered. I looked out the window. Not surrounded by clouds. Shouldn't be any turbulence. The crew were looking confused, but just slightly. Another shudder. A whining noise from the propellers. Or was it the engines? The cabin crew walked up and down the aisle whispering to each other in hushed tones. They looked a tad too distressed for my comfort. My friends opened their eyes groggily. The whine grew louder, but not loud enough to drown out the orchestra of babies crying, passengers discussing about the fate of the plane and an elderly man's praying now dominating the earlier uneventful first-half of our flight. My heart was racing. Wombat was trying to say something, but I couldn't hear her. I moved in closer.
"The air-stewardess has such a prominent Adam's apple. You think she's a "he" previously?"
...And I resumed staring out of the window at the cottony clouds. The cabin crew was demonstrating how to strap on the life-jackets under our seats in time to some pre-recorded narration. Approximately 2% of the entire flight population paid attention, 1% being the 2 air-stewardesses and the other 1% being 2 pockmarked uncles who were definitely not staring appreciatively at the fluorescent life-jackets and the position of the attached whistles. The plane was still surging upwards.
"Hey Wombat, won't the plane ever level out and fly horizontally? I mean, we'd end up in space pretty soon if we keep flying at this angle."
"I think we won't be levelling out. When we reach the correct altitude it's time to descend already. Don't bug me. I wanna sleep."
We did fly in a perfect horizontal line though. For like 2 minutes. And I could see Banjaran Titiwangsa below. Awesome. We were flying across it. And then the descend started. Grrrr. Wombat was right after all. Her head lolled onto my shoulder. Oh well. At least she didn't throw up.
I love flying. The sensation of the engines in full throttle, cruising full-speed along the runway for the final few seconds, and then feeling the plane actually lifts off into the air, into nothingness... oooooh I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it. What a thrill!
"Hey, Wombat. Can you feel it? Can you? We're about to take off! It's my favourite part of the flight!"
"It's the part where I normally puke."
Sheeeeeeesh.
"And I forgot to take my motion sickness pill this morning."
The plane suddenly shuddered. I looked out the window. Not surrounded by clouds. Shouldn't be any turbulence. The crew were looking confused, but just slightly. Another shudder. A whining noise from the propellers. Or was it the engines? The cabin crew walked up and down the aisle whispering to each other in hushed tones. They looked a tad too distressed for my comfort. My friends opened their eyes groggily. The whine grew louder, but not loud enough to drown out the orchestra of babies crying, passengers discussing about the fate of the plane and an elderly man's praying now dominating the earlier uneventful first-half of our flight. My heart was racing. Wombat was trying to say something, but I couldn't hear her. I moved in closer.
"The air-stewardess has such a prominent Adam's apple. You think she's a "he" previously?"
...And I resumed staring out of the window at the cottony clouds. The cabin crew was demonstrating how to strap on the life-jackets under our seats in time to some pre-recorded narration. Approximately 2% of the entire flight population paid attention, 1% being the 2 air-stewardesses and the other 1% being 2 pockmarked uncles who were definitely not staring appreciatively at the fluorescent life-jackets and the position of the attached whistles. The plane was still surging upwards.
"Hey Wombat, won't the plane ever level out and fly horizontally? I mean, we'd end up in space pretty soon if we keep flying at this angle."
"I think we won't be levelling out. When we reach the correct altitude it's time to descend already. Don't bug me. I wanna sleep."
We did fly in a perfect horizontal line though. For like 2 minutes. And I could see Banjaran Titiwangsa below. Awesome. We were flying across it. And then the descend started. Grrrr. Wombat was right after all. Her head lolled onto my shoulder. Oh well. At least she didn't throw up.
post script: Booger. When I was passing thru' the metal detector the alarm went off. I forgot to put my pouchbag on the scanning conveyor belt. Since it was underneath my sweater and all, I had to do a stripshow before I could get the pouchbag off my shoulders. I was kinda skimpy underneath. Officers and fellow passengers had buggy eyes. My friends were bending over in bouts of laughter. The detector went off again. Turned out that it was set off because of my belt, which has a metal clipper. I wasn't feeling mirthful at all.
post post script: The part about my flight about to go down in flames was make-believe. If you didn't get it in the first place, you shouldn't be reading my blogs. We're not on the same wavelength.
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