i trust that the reader has returned after a restful sleep, an invigorating shower and so forth to read this augmentation of the tale that i began relating in my previous blog...
as gayatri pointed out in her comment, i endeavored to maintain a nonchalant (for the want of a better term) disposition throughout the tense wait at the airport, chiefly by "cracking silly jokes" as put by gayatri very simply and effectively. and although her levels of patience must have soared to new heights, i am sure she would agree with me that the technique was more than effective in lightening the atmosphere. in fact, i even remotely remember the presence of a song on my lips as we rode to the hotel and checked in.
however, the atmosphere did not remain light for too long. it was one of those instances where one inadvertantly makes oneself look like a fool. imagine this scenario. A and B check into a hotel and are allotted rooms P and Q respectively. A agrees to meet B in 30 minutes at room Q so that they can proceed together to the buffet room for dinner. A then goes to his room, shaves, showers, dresses and leaves the room to meet B as planned. suddenly he realizes that he has forgotten the exact digits that Q is comprised of. you will now know exactly why i alluded to the instances that i alluded to when you learn that A knocked on the doors of rooms such R, S, T, and so forth trying to locate B, getting educated in pejoritives in the process, only to finally find B already on her way in the elevator to the buffet room!
dinner wasn't too bad, and the bed wasn't bad either. morning saw me fully reconditioned for the day. everything went smoothly as we checked in our bags and things and waited for the announcement to board the flight through cleveland via cincinnati, until we were told by the airline official that the flight was full and we couldn't get in! and our bags had already gone with the earlier flight! the events that followed consequently were dramatic and have been arranged chonologically below:
we found ourselves back on terra firma. an intense discussion between me and gayatri brought us to believe that we were practically helpless. more so because of the absence of boarding passes (refer above to point #19); we couldn't even prove to anyone that we were actually on the flight, even if we were to fight our case with the officials. there was only one thing that we could think of, namely, hunt for our old friend mr. asterix and reclaim our boarding passes.
and believe me, JFK is not the place to be in when you are in such a situation. we had to run all the way back to the terminal at which we had begun the running to get into the flight (refer above to point #13). i do not remember the exact time for which we were running, but it seemed like eternity. we did finally reach our destination and we also found good ol' asterix, but only to learn that he had destroyed the boarding passes long back!
following good ol' asterix's advice, we retraced our path to the place where we had gotten out of the flight. after about an hour's wait, we heard the announcement that the door had been fixed and the flight was reay to depart!
and the reader would again undoubtedly assume that all was well. i again do not blame the reader. we were not allowed to enter the flight because we didn't have boarding passes on us! a long discussion ensued after this, the participants of the discussion being the airline official (who denied the possibility of the presence of a mr. asterix who would do all that mr. asterix did), self and gayatri (who tried to convince the official otherwise), and co passangers (who finally convinced the official about the existance of a mr. asterix and the truth in our words). we finally entered the airplane. the flight took off and we reached cleveland.
popular television soaps owe their success to "fast-forward"ing the story. as usual, i shall emulate the makers of these soaps. my next blog will not be a continuation to this story. the events shall be more current (hopefully). the reader may now breathe more easily...
as gayatri pointed out in her comment, i endeavored to maintain a nonchalant (for the want of a better term) disposition throughout the tense wait at the airport, chiefly by "cracking silly jokes" as put by gayatri very simply and effectively. and although her levels of patience must have soared to new heights, i am sure she would agree with me that the technique was more than effective in lightening the atmosphere. in fact, i even remotely remember the presence of a song on my lips as we rode to the hotel and checked in.
however, the atmosphere did not remain light for too long. it was one of those instances where one inadvertantly makes oneself look like a fool. imagine this scenario. A and B check into a hotel and are allotted rooms P and Q respectively. A agrees to meet B in 30 minutes at room Q so that they can proceed together to the buffet room for dinner. A then goes to his room, shaves, showers, dresses and leaves the room to meet B as planned. suddenly he realizes that he has forgotten the exact digits that Q is comprised of. you will now know exactly why i alluded to the instances that i alluded to when you learn that A knocked on the doors of rooms such R, S, T, and so forth trying to locate B, getting educated in pejoritives in the process, only to finally find B already on her way in the elevator to the buffet room!
dinner wasn't too bad, and the bed wasn't bad either. morning saw me fully reconditioned for the day. everything went smoothly as we checked in our bags and things and waited for the announcement to board the flight through cleveland via cincinnati, until we were told by the airline official that the flight was full and we couldn't get in! and our bags had already gone with the earlier flight! the events that followed consequently were dramatic and have been arranged chonologically below:
- we look at the airline guy in disbelief.
- the airline guy (let's call him mr. asterix, just for convenience) looks at us with a serious face but with a small sadistic smile playing on the corners of his lips.
- a second official walks up and expresses concern, but simply walks off.
- we try to plead our case.
- we are told by mr. asterix that the boarding passes that we have are "standing" tickets (believe me, this is exactly how he described our boarding passes) and there is no way he can get us on the flight.
- all of us see the flight taking off.
- we look at each other in disbelief.
- mr. asterix smiles.
- a third official walks up and mumbles something about a direct flight to cleveland scheduled to leave in 5 minutes, and walks off.
- we plead to mr. asterix to put us on the flight.
- this time, ol' asterix looks at us in disbelief (tit for tat i guess... it was some relief!).
- ol' asterix makes call to the captain of the flight and learns about exactly 2 vacancies on the flight.
- good ol' asterix starts running.
- we take the cue and copy him. we run in the order: good ol' asterix - self - gayatri.
- as all of us achive a speed that would embarass athletes, a bus looms large. the automobile presumably was to take us to the imminent flight.
- the automobile performs the function descibed in point #15. we reach the airplane, but only to see the door closing!
- our dear pal asterix jumps out of the running bus (a proclivity i had hitherto observed only in passangers at indian railway stations and bus stops) and knocks on the door of the airplane.
- the door opens (believe me.. all this is true) and we get in.
- before asterix bids us good bye (read the following carefully because it shall be of importance later) he takes away our boarding passes.
- the door closes.
we found ourselves back on terra firma. an intense discussion between me and gayatri brought us to believe that we were practically helpless. more so because of the absence of boarding passes (refer above to point #19); we couldn't even prove to anyone that we were actually on the flight, even if we were to fight our case with the officials. there was only one thing that we could think of, namely, hunt for our old friend mr. asterix and reclaim our boarding passes.
and believe me, JFK is not the place to be in when you are in such a situation. we had to run all the way back to the terminal at which we had begun the running to get into the flight (refer above to point #13). i do not remember the exact time for which we were running, but it seemed like eternity. we did finally reach our destination and we also found good ol' asterix, but only to learn that he had destroyed the boarding passes long back!
following good ol' asterix's advice, we retraced our path to the place where we had gotten out of the flight. after about an hour's wait, we heard the announcement that the door had been fixed and the flight was reay to depart!
and the reader would again undoubtedly assume that all was well. i again do not blame the reader. we were not allowed to enter the flight because we didn't have boarding passes on us! a long discussion ensued after this, the participants of the discussion being the airline official (who denied the possibility of the presence of a mr. asterix who would do all that mr. asterix did), self and gayatri (who tried to convince the official otherwise), and co passangers (who finally convinced the official about the existance of a mr. asterix and the truth in our words). we finally entered the airplane. the flight took off and we reached cleveland.
popular television soaps owe their success to "fast-forward"ing the story. as usual, i shall emulate the makers of these soaps. my next blog will not be a continuation to this story. the events shall be more current (hopefully). the reader may now breathe more easily...
No comments:
Post a Comment