My Maiden
Flight
Vasant Hattangadi
The day I was to fly down to Canberra had dawned at last! After years of
slogging in BARC, I had bagged a two-month assignment in Australia!! It was to
be my first air travel and I was already feeling pretty goosey about it. I
tried, of course, not to show it as I knew my wife was feeling nervous too. I
spent the whole night dreaming about my plane crashing in the Pacific! Keeping my fingers crossed I had cheerfully
reassured my wife, however, not to worry and that I would be back in one piece.
Both my sons were so excited about their Papa going abroad in a jet airliner
that they kept boasting about it to their friends. The younger one was
especially thrilled that he was to go to the airport in a taxi! While I was
trying to hurry up everyone lest I miss the flight, he was gleefully saying,
“Papa, how nice it will be if you missed the plane! Then, you too can come back
with us in the taxi!”
When we
landed at Sahar, we found Mehtas, Khannas and other friends already there to
wish me ‘Bon Voyage’. Instantly, I got busy checking-in the luggage, collecting
my Boarding Pass etc and getting last minute instructions from spouse regarding
taking my medicines and writing letters home regularly, abstinence and
self-restraint! During this entire melee, someone quietly pulled me aside and
told me, in a very confidential undertone, not to forget the goodbye kiss! It
was charming Mrs. Khanna, from whom I had least expected such ‘gallantry’!! I politely asked her as to how
ever I could possibly oblige with that well-built, athletic husband of hers
lingering around. “I meant your wife, you dope!” she yelled. Some people will
never learn.
Our
aircraft was a Boeing 747, named Kanishka, which would be blown up to pieces in
mid-air over the Atlantic by a terrorist bomb just three years hence. How nice
it is that we don’t know the future! Else, it would have only added to my
misery; what with those horrific scenes of plane crash from old movies already
haunting me. For some reason there were very few fellow travelers on the plane,
that day. I was reminded of an old British film, in which a psychic air
traveler gets a premonition of the pending plane crash and she shares it with
her co-passengers. Soon, the news spreads like wild fire and reaches the pilot,
who loses his nerves and transforms the nightmare into a virtual reality. I was
feeling so tense myself that I did not even notice the beautiful airhostess at
the entrance!
Seated
just behind me was a young Maharashtrian couple with a small kid, probably
going on a holiday to Singapore. The lady was pulling up her spouse for
hovering longer than necessary at the entrance, while the poor fellow was at
his wit’s end trying to explain that the air hostess was just a long lost,
distant cousin! Meanwhile, the kid was getting restless and started pestering
his father as to when the plane would take off. The hapless husband at once
took the opportunity to escape his wife’s diatribe by starting a long discourse
on how the plane would first taxi down to the runway, how it would then
gradually pick up speed and finally take-off majestically like an eagle into
the sky.
“And
then what? ” asked the kid. “Why, then we will fly down to Singapore, of
course!” “Daddy, does the plane have a horn like our car?” asked the
inquisitive little boy. Daddy was not sure if planes are fitted with horns.
“But, they must have a horn, Daddy” insisted the boy. “What if another plane
comes along and there’s an accident!” The man tried his best to explain that
air travel was safe and there was hardly any chance of a mid-air collision.
But, the kid wouldn’t agree. “Why do they have their headlights on, then?”
After a while he asked, “Daddy, when will our plane fall down?” I jumped in my
seat! But, the kid kept quizzing his father: “Won’t our plane plunge into the
sea?” “When we reach Singapore, will it crash land at least? ”
Suddenly, our aircraft momentarily dropped down a few hundred feet and
immediately soared up again as we passed through an ‘air pocket’, replicating a
similar upheaval in my stomach! The little rascal in the hind row started
clapping with glee! The pilot came on the public address system to announce,
“Sorry about that little bump, gentlemen. In such inclement weather, some
turbulence is quite normal. It’ll pass off soon. Nothing to worry” Just then,
the pretty, young airhostess came running and heaved herself into the next
seat. She looked pale white with fear in her eyes. She started praying crossing
herself repeatedly by her right hand while squeezing mine with her left. “Hope
you won’t mind, Uncle. I’m so scared, no! This is my maiden flight, you see.”
“So is mine, baby!” I tried to comfort her, patting her hands gently like a
true, affectionate uncle. What else could I do?
The rest
of the journey was smooth and without an incident. The kid, tired from his own
incessant questioning, went to sleep. The couple finally disembarked at
Singapore and I heaved a great sigh of relief. Thank God for small mercies.
Early next morning, we landed in Sydney and for the first time I set my foot
‘down under’.
(Published KS, LXXXIV, No 10, p19, Oct 2003)
