FIVE TELL-TALE SIGNS THAT YOU ARE A BANGLADESHI PASSENGER
After a hectic 12-day trip to Thailand, while standing in the boarding line to board the plane to Bangladesh, I sensed that familiar deshi chaos, something I was actually missing for so long. In a flight where around 80 percent of the passengers were Bangladeshi, our boarding line got quite unmanageable and the flight got delayed for around 15 minutes. Why? Because the passengers standing in the front were engaged in a heated conversation over something silly, blocking the aisle while the rest of us stood foolishly waiting for our turn to board the plane.
There are certain behavioral patterns that are common with most travelling passengers who are originally from Bangladesh which are quite fascinating. In fact, being a proud Bangladeshi, I often find myself displaying some of these qualities, if not all of them.
You know you are on an aircraft with mostly Bangladeshis when:
1. You and your neighbours have way more hand-luggage than stipulated by the airlines
In our case, fitting the hand luggage into the overhead compartments took considerable effort and time with passengers like us running here and there in search of storage space; another reason the flight got delayed. We love to carry the things we need as well as things we don't really need with us while travelling. We came across a family of four with four tablet-sized hand-luggage along with several more bags, purses and a number of shiny shopping bags resulting from a trip to the duty-free shops. As a result, they happily encroached on the overhead storage space of other passengers. The unfortunate ones who were left with no space to keep their luggage in the overhead space had to stow their carry-on luggage under all three seats in front of them leading to zero leg space. What fun!
2. You never listen to the instructions given by the flight attendants
Given the fact that we as a nation are quite used to having risky overcrowded journeys, we pay zero attention to the security guidelines handed out by the flight attendants. Personally, I find it more important to observe everyone else around me rather than knowing how to use the oxygen mask. And my observation led me to find out that everyone else was doing something far more important than listening to the attendant explaining how they could save their lives in case of a crash. While someone was checking the reclining power of their seats by pushing it back and forth, others were trying to pose for a selfie on their phones even after the attendants' incessant requests to turn off their devices. Everyone was in a home-returning happy spirit, who needed to learn about security measures?
3. The smiles on the cabin crew members' faces fade away all too quickly
Soon the smile plastered on the air hostesses' face gets replaced by an expression that screams worry, horror and 'i-cant-wait-for-the-flight-to-land.' Given that we have countless problems regarding tray-tables and arm rests and the attendants are the answer to every crisis, they are on a roll. The overhead bin refuses to close, they are there to cast their spell on the almost exploding overhead space. The guy sitting in front of us reclines his seat in such an angle that it feels like we are sitting with his head on our lap; of course we must call the flight attendant expecting that the guy will be scolded.
“What do you want sir? Rice with fish or chicken with noodles?” one of them asks smilingly, standing with the food trolley. Instead of worrying about our original complaint, we get lost in a more complicated dilemma – what should we order? We keep her waiting for the longest time and finally decide on the fish meal when we discover that the guy next to us is having that meal and it just doesn't look very appetizing. So why shouldn't we call the attendants again and change it to the chicken meal?
4. You are loud. Very loud.
Also we love friendly chitchats with our co-passengers and we don't actually like to keep our voices low. We like to talk and laugh louder than anyone else. On top of that, if we have kids with us who throw tantrums and are hard to manage, we don't mind giving them a few slaps ignoring the fact their whines will become now fully-loaded screams and they will now definitely start kicking the seat in front of them. We also love to make other people hear the music that we hear on the headphones. Also we love to share reading materials by peeping –over our co-passengers' shoulder.
5. As the flight lands, you become the Fast and the Furious.
And finally when we could sense that the journey is coming to an end, we find it very hard to keep sitting in our seats. The moment we find out that the flight has landed, we rush to open our overhead bins and run with all our might to make our exit. Every second matters.
Our behaviour might seem quite disturbing to passengers who are not used to with this. But, honestly, I find it quite entertaining. In fact for me these mini dramas on the flight with our native co-passengers make my journey pass by in the blink of an eye leaving many stories to talk about later!
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