Plane Rides across Jordan, USA, France and KSA
Travel tip: Planes fly counter Earth’s
rotation to reach destination faster.
Jordan: We jump into the car & leave to the airport. We’re glad
to be heading back to Jordan. The twist this time is that our grandma is coming
with us. Being carried away with the music,
I did not realize if we missed the exit to the airport or not. So my brother
told me to take the first one coming up ahead, when in reality it was the one
after. As I turned right, my brother yelled “It’s the next one!” so I did my
best to swerve back on to the main road. Drifting with joy, my grandma yells
out “Who’s following us!? Are We being followed!?”, anxiously looking back. Awkward
silence looms the car as she’s been watching to many police dramas.
We arrive at the airport & drop
our bags off. As we are ascending the escalator to the waiting lounge, I ask my
sister to hand over my pack of hollow cigarettes. As she did so, the pack fell
open, scattering all the cigarettes over the moving steps. As we rushed to pick
them up, the security guard at the top of the stairs must have suspected us of
being drug smugglers. I can’t imagine what could have hinted that. It can’t be
my sister’s reaction of screaming “You & your pot head friends!” at the top
of her lungs.
My sister was seated next to my grandma
and I was seated next to my brother. I
did not get any sleep the night before, so I was drowsing off upon departure.
My iPhone was next to me on the armrest. I knew it would slide off but I did
not expect it to fly off into infinity. There was nothing I could do about it
being under the influence of Zzz. We could not call my phone, as it was in
airplane mode -__- but luckily everyone was kind enough to help out using the
flashlights of their phones. I turned the whole cabin into a strobe light
search party for the hearing impaired. To my dismay, we found it at the end of
the business class after almost giving up.
Once the seatbelt signs were switched
off, my grandma decided to put on a pair of earrings. She could not find the
holes in her ears without a mirror so she simply pierced new ones by forcing
the earrings in. Ah the joy of narcotics. The head stewardess’ expression was
priceless as she tried to keep a poker face on, taking orders from my grandma
with bleeding ears.
USA: Surprisingly,
Rochester Airport, Minnesota was never an international airport until a Saudi
Prince landed there on a direct flight from Saudi Arabia. On long flights, it’s
a Saadoun tradition to watch recap episodes of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. on the plane.
Usually it’s always me who is on Cloud 9
between flights, so it felt good to be on the other side this time picking my
brother up at the airport. My brother was flying in on Delta Airlines and it
hit me right then and there, how absurd their safety video is. When I first saw
it, I thought my drink was spiked. Then again, if I compare it with ME Airlines
in-flight video, theirs is much wackier showing clubbing
scenes & strippers for family
tourism.
My brother was
in the States on a surprise visit to his fiancé. Her mom’s from Kuwait, and
their passports are blue. When waiting in line at TSA checkpoints, Americans always
whisper “I never knew we had a State of Kuwait”. No comment…
France: What
can I say, the craziest country in the world. One of their ex-colonies, St.
Martin Island, has a beach called Maho in which planes fly over tanning bystanders at minimum altitude.
On a domestic flight between Paris-Cannes, I
had to get rid of most of my toiletries and bottles. So now, each time I see happy
passengers with their bottles of water, I think to myself “Smile now, but
they'll make you throw it away later.”
As I waited in the security line to scan my
luggage, an officer in charge kept chanting what to throw away and what to
keep. Little did she know is that my bottle of water was Orange Sparkle all the
way from NYC, which cannot be found on European shores. My bottle was clearly
half full and she insisted that I toss it aside. I tried to explain to her the
significance of my drink, but she interrupted me by asking “Where are you
flying to?” I told her I was heading to Cannes. She responded “Well, there is plenty
of water there! In the trash please.” And that was the end of my short-lived indulgence.
After retrieving my bag from the scanner, a
French TSA officer urged me to open my bag. Half my bottles were for my hair,
given the fact that I was flying to a humid destination (Diana Ross
flash backs). It was evident that all my bottles had a ¼
left in them but since they were labeled 200ML, the officer remained stubborn.
To my left were Algerian officers who must have felt sorry for the Bedouin trying to
negotiate, so they rushed to my aid. But it was too late. As bottles were
dramatically tossed in slow motion before my eyes, the only bottle that I could
salvage was my deodorant.
My advice to
passengers with carry-on luggage is to always carry bottles of 150ML &
below. And if you ever find yourself in my situation, then ask for a
declaration form to salvage what you can.
KSA: Since
2009, my flights to Jeddah have been somewhat jinxing pop stars. When I first
arrived the week of 21 June, Michael Jackson passed away. Fast-forward to 2012,
on a transit flight via Jeddah, Whitney Houston passes away that same day. 0_o
Speaking of
transits, I hate it when Lebanese lie, saying they lived in a particular
country or city when they have only stayed at the airport for a few hours. Some
even go the whole 9 yards, claiming they forgot how to speak Arabic! I would
not be surprised if some of them forget themselves into oblivion, believing
they have suddenly become Mexican with an identity crisis in less than 2 hours.
By now, I think I am jinx-free because no celebrity, I know of, has
parted this life so far.
