By some stroke of luck, and no thanks to the unhelpful check-in counter guy at KL Sentral who told me otherwise, I’ve somehow managed to end up in an aisle seat right at the back of the plane, on a flight full of transit passengers from London. They wanted the seat I was initially assigned to (middle, d’oh) to seat a family of four in return for an aisle seat right at the back. Aisle seat! I almost kissed the woman at the boarding gate. And this was before I found out I was to have NO SEAT MATES! To top it off, a gorgeous steward cheekily slips plastic cupfuls of Ferrero Rochers to me, and offers me an extra Magnum after meal service as if he knew I needed the chocolate. I did. Or maybe he spotted the Godiva bag my fingers were constantly disappearing into.
I hate day flights. No matter that I only managed to get about two hours’ worth of shut eye the night before, unless I’m on my second 2hour/night cycle, majorly jetlagged or sick and drugged up, it is almost impossible for me to sleep during day hours.
We chat about my iPod. I am just a tiny bit disappointed to learn he is a Westlife fan (don’t I sound like such the snob!), but he quickly redeems himself by sharing stories, wonderful thought-provoking stories about life in the air and how by tonight he will have been on his feet for a good 18 hours, and though he looked up the weather in the Gold Coast (flight goes to Brisbane after Sydney) I suspect the poor boy wouldn’t be seeing any sand before he gets on the KL-bound 1pm tomorrow. Are you married, he asks. Hah – married! I think about the boy in KL who slaps me on the shoulder by way of hello, in lieu of a kiss on the cheek. No, I laugh, I’ll need to find someone to marry first! We talk about relationships: you are always on the move, it must be hard, he says. I wonder if I some times use it as an excuse but I think he would understand. I nod. He nods back at me. Let me get you a drink. White wine?
Perhaps this trip back has started okay after all. Funny what some food, chocolate and a random conversation can do. Bravo to MAS for serving a kickass breakfast of nasi lemak with chicken curry, precisely what I felt like at 10am, starving after spending the last of my RM on a train ticket at 7am with only enough spare change for a coffee at the airport which cost an arm and a leg. I feel better already.
It must be exciting, I say. All these new places, new faces. It’s not all fun, he says. It pays the bills. There isn’t much after, career-wise. But such a transient existence, I wish I had that privilege some times! It’s easy to be at your best for a day, but for days on end? I sigh. He smiles at me, tells me it’s not really all that. I find my friends catching up to me pretty fast on the salary scale. I may not do this for too long, who knows? Yeah, who knows. I shrug.
Who knows anything? Six months ago if you’d had told me about the boy, I would have laughed. I would have laughed because we are from such different worlds, or so I thought. Never saw him in this light, not in all these years. Then again, we’ve changed plenty through the course of said years. Did I ever mention the boy is a private school boy? I’d have laughed at that too, incredulously, had I known before. Wouldn’t have picked it in a million years.
I try to sleep, but after half an hour I lose all feeling in my left leg. I resort to reading instead – and more wine. I type this out on my iPhone. It’s shite trying to kill time on a day flight where I know I won’t be getting any real sleep. We chat a little more, and before I knew it I we were back on the ground.. much as I miss KL, I found myself more than a little relieved to be back in Sydney. And then it was straight on ’til sunrise:
[Found a neat image watermarking tool at JetPhoto! I know I'm only about a decade behind.. yes this is my tenth year blogging!]
