Different, thats how to sum it up. First think you notice is that no one can enter the terminal building unless they are a ticketed passenger… and to get in you show your id and ticket (its an e ticket though).
The man you show your ticket to at the door to the terminal has a very large automatic rifle slung over his shoulder… and even though all the gates are in the same room, you must go in a specific door for your airline… even though it isn’t marked!
Once you are in , all checked bags must be x rayed by your airlines x ray machine, once they x ray it, they affix a zip tie to the zipper and put a sticker over the zip tie. You then find your check in desk and check in like a normal airline check in.
But now the fun begins, as you now need to locate the gate your flight will fly out of, in Kolkata they still have one of those little clicketey clacking old boards for the departures. Once your flight clacks into the ‘Security’ status that you locate your gate and go through yet another security check.
At the security check you get x rayed as everyone go’s off as the walk through the metal detector, the women get to go behind a screen for their frisking, but the men go and stand on a box in the middle of it all and get a very personal wanding! The guy really thought I had a gun in my shoe or inside my foot too, and it took a while to convince him that :
A: it was really a human foot attached to my ankle
B: no my toes were not the barrel of the gun and my ankle couldn’t be hit hard enough for the bullet to fire out my toes
c: yes you silly man, my shoe has steel in it, hence your wand is making a noise!
Now I mosey to the gate… we get a boarding announcement that we will board through the emergency exit of the boarding area!, now thats a first . Taking the fire exit just to get on to plane, WTF is the flight going to like! But once again you have to show your ticket… and your carry on bags are checked… which is where the next problem occurs, I don’t have a sticker. Now what is the sticker?? I don’t know, so in Hindi the beastly security woman says to the gate agent sticker, he hands me 2 labels, they look like luggage tags, and tells me to get them stamped back at the x ray machine. Ok, so I go get them stamped back at the security point and return to the line. (I still dont know the point of this exercise)
I get re inspected and allowed to exit the fire escape to the bus to the plane… of course I must be reinspected before boarding my plane for luggage tag stamps, and tickets…
On the plane – This should be a study in human behavior….
Seat belts.
Its a simple concept, they join together and will make a click noise. The woman across from me had a real problem with this seat belt concept, and when the hostess came past she would hold it together, she just couldn’t grasp it at all.
Keep your seat upright for takeoff people
They announce that seats must be upright, and they go through the cabin and make sure everyone has their seats upright…but the locals haven’t figured there is a reason they do this. So as soon as they have finished their checks and sat down then the seats get reclined for takeoff again and stay that way.
If you are seated at the window its not polite to climb over people
Now this was strange, the guy at the window seat decides he needs to pee, he doesn’t imply or ask he needs to get out, he simply climbs across everyone! This isnt just in my row, the poor old lady 2 rows up has a fat old guy do the same thing to her!
Seat numbers
Yes people in a plane you are assigned a seat, a simple concept designed so that no one is standing during the flight and everyone has a seat (ie no need to sit out on the wing or roof). So to the lady who had seat 1b, your freaking seat is in the front of the plane, don’t go down just sitting in a spare seat and then get pissed when you are told to move to seat 1b (although her in defense, the hostesses(yes they are still called this here) didn’t actually point out seat 1b is in the first row)
Toilets
WTF is the obsession with going to the loo on the plane, as soon as you take off there is a line for the lav, and it doesn’t stop until the wheels go down…literally! That crap tank must be really full of shit one every flight… and yes you have to slide the little latch so the door locks and people wont open it on you and seeing your bare ass as you stand on the seat doing a poo! And if you are standing in line for the lav and someone goes in, yes there really is just a single holer in there!, I lost count of the times the person would go in, the next in line would wait 1 minute and then open the door (as of course it was never locked), I personally never thought of a airplane lav being capable of being the Tardis.
Stay seated until the aircraft has come to a stop
They announce it in 10 languages, and still you get up and start walking around the cabin whilst we are taxiing in, forcing the poor hosty to come and berate you. There is a reason they have this rule people, the people who made the taxi ways at the airport here didn’t have spirit levels, it feels like the plane is taxiing down a pot holed dirt road.
Getting off the plane, what a drama
Air bridges are few and far between, so get used to walking down steep stairs, and once at the bottom of the stairs you must show your boarding pass again! People its called a BOARDING PASS for a reason, and it should stand out, its for boarding! WhyTF do I have to show you I have it still when I get off?
And remember in the interests of national security no cameras are allowed and no photographs will be taken in a plane or at the airport. God forbid if someone tells them google earth has online free pics in high resolution of Sanjay peeing on the street corner, let alone of their secret airports, but we wont go here.
A chicken club to the others in the office is expensive, but to me its cheap…here is the bill (and no I didn’t eat 3 of them!).
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