Jerry: “I can’t go back to coach!”

This is from the 52nd episode of Seinfeld “The Airport”. The Hyperlink takes you to an 8-minute long collection of the best scenes from this episode. Watch from 7:20 for one of my favorite lines from my beloved TV series:

“Do you realize the people back here are getting cookies?!”

I don’t know why. I just loved it even back in 1992 when I had no idea that I would be flying frequently. In coach, nonetheless…

This post could have been titled “WTF Wednesday: How the Other Half Lives”. But seeing how it is already Thursday and I have been cheating via backdating a lot lately, I will just skip a WTF Wednesday post. This should help with my image anyway: soon I fear I will only be posting WTF posts and nothing else. Since my life seems to be full of WTF moments. Or it could just be me: I am wearing WTF Goggles as I go through life…

It suffices to say that Karma delivered. After my not-so-satisfactory-yet-definitely-great-blog-fodder-and-therefore-I-should-be-grateful-all-considered flights to Taipei, I was upgraded to Business Class for the leg between Taipei and Tokyo.

Prior to this, I had ONLY heard of the Lie-Flat Business Class outfitted for the Trans-Pacific flights. (From my beloved husband nonetheless, who will certainly get it from now on if he ever complains about his air travel…) Oh boy, was I excited. When I got to the plane, I was really nervous: I would have been greatly disappointed if for some reason this plane had only the regular Business Class seats. (Yes, one does get spoiled very quickly…) Wait. How come I could not find my row? It went straight from Row 10 to Row 19. Is it a cruel joke? The flight attendant pointed UP and said, “Your seat is on the Upper Level.”

WTF? Upper Level? There is an Upper Level? I mean: I knew there is an Upper Level on a 747 but I thought that was for the super duper Secret Society First Class seats: where they have a hot tub and possibly a stripper pole or something.

As I ascended the stairs, I could hear the angels singing, celestial music playing in the background. “Ahhhhh—–” Much to the chagrin of my seatmate, I started taking pictures as soon as I finished putting everything away. Oh my. So many choices in WHERE to store my shit that it took me a while to figure it out… (He soon exchanged seats with his wife…) I did not know that I would ever, ever, wish for a flight to last longer. Alas. It was not meant to be. The plane actually landed early. I only got to enjoy my Lazy Boy home theatre for a bit longer than two hours. So why couldn’t this flight have been diverted to Alaska? I would have been HAPPY… Very happy.

CODA: Soon afterwards, Karma delivered again. This time to balance everything out my flight from Tokyo back to Washington D.C. was delayed for TWO hours. And of course this time I was back to my coach class for the 12-hour flight. The reason for our delay? AFTER the Christmas Underpants Bomber threat, AFTER the airports around the world heightened security checks by adding a second checkpoint right at the gates for US-bound flights, AFTER we had all been searched and padded down by hand, thoroughly, some Einstein decided that it was a smart move to make a joke about a bomb with the flight attendant. She reported his dumb ass and he was hauled off the plane. Subsequently the cargo area had to be searched to rule out any suspicious material in addition to locate this guy’s checked luggage. Police and security guards were also on board to search the plane before we were allowed to take off.