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An interview with Naomi Campbell about her recent "day in court" was aired on E! News last night. She claimed a member of the BA cabin crew called her a "Golliwog Supermodel".
If that is true, which I doubt, I would be shocked and horrified:-
BA has working cabin crew old enough to remember Golliwogs
If that is true, which I doubt, I would be shocked and horrified:-
BA has working cabin crew old enough to remember Golliwogs
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Windows
Sadly as I was brought up under the flight path of London Heathrow airport I have always had an interest in aeroplanes.
However I found one my mother's Spanish phrasebooks from her first trip to Spain decades earlier. The phrase book had a section of 'At the airport' and included questions for onboard. A Spanish phrase that my mother somehow never needed was "Do you mind if I open a window".
However I found one my mother's Spanish phrasebooks from her first trip to Spain decades earlier. The phrase book had a section of 'At the airport' and included questions for onboard. A Spanish phrase that my mother somehow never needed was "Do you mind if I open a window".
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An interview with Naomi Campbell about her recent "day in court" was aired on E! News last night. She claimed a member of the BA cabin crew called her a "Golliwog Supermodel".
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Flying for ATC is, sometimes at least, an amusing experience.
Back when I was younger and had more hair, flying from EDI to LGW for my first Class 1 medical prior to ATC training, I was on an AirUK 146 and had a free seat next to me. I got out my instructions for finding the CAA medical centre, on CAA-headed paper, and this caught the eye of a male FA. He sat on the arm of the free seat and asked about ATC recruitment, saying he might want to try it "you know, if I start a family or something." It may be a cliche, but he was more camp than a field full of tents! I'm guessing the "or something" was more likely...
Once trained and working for a living, stand-by tickets became a nice perk when I could get them. I got onto a full flight from GLA to Sanford, Orlando, riding in the jump seat for take-off and approach/landing, and back in the galley for the cruise. I was given a handful of miniatures of wine and a plastic cup with a little water in the bottom, with the instructions "smoke 'em if you've got 'em!" For much of the flight, the FAs tried to fix me up with their one single member (alas, the only one I didn't fancy
).
Flying from Orlando to LGW, stand-by with Birdseed, I wore my best "upgrade attire" as I approached check-in. But then, these were American check-in staff, presumably trained by Greyhound. First they asked if I'd listed for the flight. "Sorry, I'm not BA staff; I didn't know I had to." In an attempt to get a smile out of this Abu Ghraib guard, I jokingly suggested (with a sliver of hope) that an upgrade would be nice. "You don't have that kind of authority, sir." Yes, I know. "I'll check with my supervisor." PLEASE DON'T! Supervisor comes up and says "you don't have that kind of authority, sir." Yes, I know, I heard... Don't you people have a sense of humour??? I kept that to myself, along with the line, "don't you know how much a p*ssed off controller can cost an airline?" Luckily, as I trudged away from check-in, a BA captain walked into the terminal! A quick hello, and I didn't stay in economy for long.
Then there was the time I was upgraded going from LHR to BOS. I was the idiot passenger that time, and thought my tablecloth was my napkin. D'oh!
Heading back from BOS, and having bought a beautiful teddybear for my nephew, I joked at check-in that while I wouldn't normally (complete lie...) ask for an upgrade, my bear would really appreciate it! Again with the no SOH in the USA!?! Then I connected onto the shuttle to EDI, got an exit row opposite a lovely FA, told her the story, and she spent most of the flight playing with my teddybear!!!
Worst experience was with Air Canada, service with a sneer. I had PAID for a business class ticket, LHR to deepest Canada. I just happened to be on crutches, with wheelchair service at the airports. The AC meal gave me a slight digestive tract issue, not helped by strong painkillers, so I had to visit the toilet a lot. This ain't easy on crutches. Before the previous leg, I was merrily smoking away at the departure lounge bar until 5 minutes before boarding, but then at LHR I had a shower and a change of clothes, followed by outside-only smoking in the breeze. I had less cig smell on me than on any other flight since I left school! And so.....I was accused (wrongly, I might add) of smoking in the toilet, and I pointed out that the only times I had ever smoked on aircraft where when it was legal to do so, and when invited by the CC. Then the service just stopped dead. Needing another visit to the bathroom RIGHT NOW, but having a meal tray infront of me and not enough hands to hold both the tray and my crutches, I rang the call button 6 times over a period of 20 minutes before someone finally took my tray. It's a miracle I didn't poop in my pants...
Most pathetic attempt at an upgrade was on my honeymoon.... My wife's flowers had been left in a car overnight in -25C after our wedding reception, so they were beginning to look a little sad, but she took them to the airport anyway in the hope of a congratulatory upgrade. We connected in Denver, still clutching the flowers, minus a few heads now, and still no upgrade! We ended up leaving them in our rental car. On the way back, we connected at San Francisco, and oh those gay gate staff were great! Showing them the rings did the trick, and we had 1st Class on an RJ to ourselves! They did, however, make a PA announcement at the gate along the lines of "the couple in first class who look as if they've had no sleep lately are returning from their honeymoon", so we got a few stares!
Back when I was younger and had more hair, flying from EDI to LGW for my first Class 1 medical prior to ATC training, I was on an AirUK 146 and had a free seat next to me. I got out my instructions for finding the CAA medical centre, on CAA-headed paper, and this caught the eye of a male FA. He sat on the arm of the free seat and asked about ATC recruitment, saying he might want to try it "you know, if I start a family or something." It may be a cliche, but he was more camp than a field full of tents! I'm guessing the "or something" was more likely...
Once trained and working for a living, stand-by tickets became a nice perk when I could get them. I got onto a full flight from GLA to Sanford, Orlando, riding in the jump seat for take-off and approach/landing, and back in the galley for the cruise. I was given a handful of miniatures of wine and a plastic cup with a little water in the bottom, with the instructions "smoke 'em if you've got 'em!" For much of the flight, the FAs tried to fix me up with their one single member (alas, the only one I didn't fancy
).Flying from Orlando to LGW, stand-by with Birdseed, I wore my best "upgrade attire" as I approached check-in. But then, these were American check-in staff, presumably trained by Greyhound. First they asked if I'd listed for the flight. "Sorry, I'm not BA staff; I didn't know I had to." In an attempt to get a smile out of this Abu Ghraib guard, I jokingly suggested (with a sliver of hope) that an upgrade would be nice. "You don't have that kind of authority, sir." Yes, I know. "I'll check with my supervisor." PLEASE DON'T! Supervisor comes up and says "you don't have that kind of authority, sir." Yes, I know, I heard... Don't you people have a sense of humour??? I kept that to myself, along with the line, "don't you know how much a p*ssed off controller can cost an airline?" Luckily, as I trudged away from check-in, a BA captain walked into the terminal! A quick hello, and I didn't stay in economy for long.
Then there was the time I was upgraded going from LHR to BOS. I was the idiot passenger that time, and thought my tablecloth was my napkin. D'oh!
Heading back from BOS, and having bought a beautiful teddybear for my nephew, I joked at check-in that while I wouldn't normally (complete lie...) ask for an upgrade, my bear would really appreciate it! Again with the no SOH in the USA!?! Then I connected onto the shuttle to EDI, got an exit row opposite a lovely FA, told her the story, and she spent most of the flight playing with my teddybear!!!
Worst experience was with Air Canada, service with a sneer. I had PAID for a business class ticket, LHR to deepest Canada. I just happened to be on crutches, with wheelchair service at the airports. The AC meal gave me a slight digestive tract issue, not helped by strong painkillers, so I had to visit the toilet a lot. This ain't easy on crutches. Before the previous leg, I was merrily smoking away at the departure lounge bar until 5 minutes before boarding, but then at LHR I had a shower and a change of clothes, followed by outside-only smoking in the breeze. I had less cig smell on me than on any other flight since I left school! And so.....I was accused (wrongly, I might add) of smoking in the toilet, and I pointed out that the only times I had ever smoked on aircraft where when it was legal to do so, and when invited by the CC. Then the service just stopped dead. Needing another visit to the bathroom RIGHT NOW, but having a meal tray infront of me and not enough hands to hold both the tray and my crutches, I rang the call button 6 times over a period of 20 minutes before someone finally took my tray. It's a miracle I didn't poop in my pants...
Most pathetic attempt at an upgrade was on my honeymoon.... My wife's flowers had been left in a car overnight in -25C after our wedding reception, so they were beginning to look a little sad, but she took them to the airport anyway in the hope of a congratulatory upgrade. We connected in Denver, still clutching the flowers, minus a few heads now, and still no upgrade! We ended up leaving them in our rental car. On the way back, we connected at San Francisco, and oh those gay gate staff were great! Showing them the rings did the trick, and we had 1st Class on an RJ to ourselves! They did, however, make a PA announcement at the gate along the lines of "the couple in first class who look as if they've had no sleep lately are returning from their honeymoon", so we got a few stares!
Last edited by Scooby Don't; 26th Jun 2008 at 21:37.
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Senior on a certain North's Favourite Low Cost Airline flight yesterday: "Anything from the trolley, madam?"
Female pax: "A bar of chocolate, please".
Senior hands pax the last remaining bar of chocolate which happens to be broken.
Pax: "It's broken, have you not got another?"
Senior: "Madam, if you can get a whole bar of chocolate in your mouth without breaking it, I'll give you twenty quid".
Pax looks stunned for a moment, then says: "Good call, I'll give you that one!"
First five rows break into laughter.
Female pax: "A bar of chocolate, please".
Senior hands pax the last remaining bar of chocolate which happens to be broken.
Pax: "It's broken, have you not got another?"
Senior: "Madam, if you can get a whole bar of chocolate in your mouth without breaking it, I'll give you twenty quid".
Pax looks stunned for a moment, then says: "Good call, I'll give you that one!"
First five rows break into laughter.
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It never ceases to amaze me - a day at work
Closed the main door and was doing the F/D and CC PA introduction to pax. Ready for safety demo.
1B (whilst i still was on the PA) gets up and goes to the galley. Me, amazed, rushes to finish the PA and then ask her: Are you ok madam?
Pax: I just want a glass of wine.
Me: There's going to be a drinks service just after take off, can you please return to your seat?
Pax: But i have a voucher for it
Me:
"Voucher madam? I'm afraid you're mistaken the airline, we don't do vouchers. Now if you can please take your seat...."
Pax: But the man who sold it to me said it's worth £20 and i can use it for anything"
Me: "Where and from who exactly did you buy this voucher madam?"
Pax: The man with the beard in the white van.
The voucher in cause was made of a regular A4 paper, cut to a card size, with big blue letters written on it:
£20 VOUCHER
.................
1B (whilst i still was on the PA) gets up and goes to the galley. Me, amazed, rushes to finish the PA and then ask her: Are you ok madam?
Pax: I just want a glass of wine.
Me: There's going to be a drinks service just after take off, can you please return to your seat?
Pax: But i have a voucher for it
Me:
"Voucher madam? I'm afraid you're mistaken the airline, we don't do vouchers. Now if you can please take your seat...."
Pax: But the man who sold it to me said it's worth £20 and i can use it for anything"
Me: "Where and from who exactly did you buy this voucher madam?"
Pax: The man with the beard in the white van.
The voucher in cause was made of a regular A4 paper, cut to a card size, with big blue letters written on it:£20 VOUCHER
.................
The man with the beard in the white van
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Abusing_the_sky and Getoutofmygalley
although we don´t sell food but have the ¨old style service¨ we hand out menus after T/O. And each and every time at least 1/3 of the pax when we ask if they made up their mind about the choice, reply:¨what´s the choice?¨
(repeat for 3 courses in Business)
although we don´t sell food but have the ¨old style service¨ we hand out menus after T/O. And each and every time at least 1/3 of the pax when we ask if they made up their mind about the choice, reply:¨what´s the choice?¨
(repeat for 3 courses in Business)
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I heard this from my Navigation Instructor, Once over chinese skies, in a Chinese Airline, a Brit was travelling, he made many trips over a peroid of weeks and noticed, the CC did not do any pre flight safety briefing,so this Brit chap asked the CC, why not ???
She replied, ' we crash you die'
Subtle , but the way our Instructor said masking accents made us laugh that day
She replied, ' we crash you die'
Subtle , but the way our Instructor said masking accents made us laugh that day
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Nasty but funny
Now I like to pride myself sometimes on my ingenious comedian ideas.
Dumb surfy teenager from Gold Coast comes down the back galley on a 737 giving me a dumb look. I give him a dumb look. He then goes "ummm errrrr where's the toilet?"
Me: "I'm sorry it's only the girls toilets down the back here"
Pax: "Ummm errr wheres the blokes one?"
Me: "It's all the way up the front mate"
Pax: Walks all the way up front and has to wait for toilet
Me: Watches, then Bwwwahahahahhahahaha!
Still didn't tell him!
Oh and another from when I was new
Pax comes down the back to use toilet.
I observe they have no shoes on upon them exiting toilet.
Me: "Excuse me maam, I don't mean to be rude but could you please wear shoes next time you visit the lavatory?"
Pax: **Looking at me like I'm sort of alien** "What, wear shoes???"
Me: "Yes Maam, we cannot guarantee that the lavatory floor is hygenic as we only clean them every hour"
Pax: **Looks at me as if I'm a ******** and walks off**
Dumb surfy teenager from Gold Coast comes down the back galley on a 737 giving me a dumb look. I give him a dumb look. He then goes "ummm errrrr where's the toilet?"
Me: "I'm sorry it's only the girls toilets down the back here"
Pax: "Ummm errr wheres the blokes one?"
Me: "It's all the way up the front mate"
Pax: Walks all the way up front and has to wait for toilet
Me: Watches, then Bwwwahahahahhahahaha!
Still didn't tell him!
Oh and another from when I was new
Pax comes down the back to use toilet.
I observe they have no shoes on upon them exiting toilet.
Me: "Excuse me maam, I don't mean to be rude but could you please wear shoes next time you visit the lavatory?"
Pax: **Looking at me like I'm sort of alien** "What, wear shoes???"
Me: "Yes Maam, we cannot guarantee that the lavatory floor is hygenic as we only clean them every hour"
Pax: **Looks at me as if I'm a ******** and walks off**
Last edited by cargoattendant; 3rd Jul 2008 at 12:36.
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Oh and Gallimero,
Quote:
Abusing_the_sky and Getoutofmygalley
although we don´t sell food but have the ¨old style service¨ we hand out menus after T/O. And each and every time at least 1/3 of the pax when we ask if they made up their mind about the choice, reply:¨what´s the choice?¨ (repeat for 3 courses in Business)
We have an inflight menu, and while the same principle applies (yet you have to pay) After takeoff a PA is made saying we have a range of drinks and snacks available, our menu is called XXX and its located in your seat pocket.
Anyway, come out with the carts and I ask someone if they'd like something from the menu and they ignore me, I ask them again, they pull their earphones out and go WHAT????? I ask them again a 3rd time and they go "umm what is there?" So I pull the menu out of the seatpocket for them and tell them I'll give them a few minutes to decide.
While I'm serving the next pax, they bark their order at me!
"Yeah I'll be with you in a moment sir/madam!"
While I can't say 1/3 of pax do it, I reckon about 1 in 10 do it! It's still pretty irritating. I mean if you were to go to a restaurant they don't make a PA saying "Ladies and Gentleman please refer to our restaurant menu!"
Quote:
Abusing_the_sky and Getoutofmygalley
although we don´t sell food but have the ¨old style service¨ we hand out menus after T/O. And each and every time at least 1/3 of the pax when we ask if they made up their mind about the choice, reply:¨what´s the choice?¨
(repeat for 3 courses in Business)We have an inflight menu, and while the same principle applies (yet you have to pay) After takeoff a PA is made saying we have a range of drinks and snacks available, our menu is called XXX and its located in your seat pocket.
Anyway, come out with the carts and I ask someone if they'd like something from the menu and they ignore me, I ask them again, they pull their earphones out and go WHAT????? I ask them again a 3rd time and they go "umm what is there?" So I pull the menu out of the seatpocket for them and tell them I'll give them a few minutes to decide.
While I'm serving the next pax, they bark their order at me!
"Yeah I'll be with you in a moment sir/madam!"
While I can't say 1/3 of pax do it, I reckon about 1 in 10 do it! It's still pretty irritating. I mean if you were to go to a restaurant they don't make a PA saying "Ladies and Gentleman please refer to our restaurant menu!"
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cargoattendant I can sooo agree with you on that one!
And I reckon that ratio is at least 1 in 10 like you said. The good ol' "whaddaya have??" If I'm in a good customer service mood, just having a good day, I might run through the menu items at about a hundred miles an hour and then refer them to the menu card if they still didn't catch it, or on a bad day I'll just do as you said, leave them with the menu and come back.
The same could be said when we're distributing our video-on-demand players - we tell them in an after takeoff PA that the movie and TV choices can be found in the entertainment section of the Jetstar magazine on page XXX, but still we get pax who insist on holding up what should be a quick distribution prior to the service and ask "what movies are there??". On shorter sectors I'll refer them to the mag and come back to them, or on longer ones and if I'm being nice, I'll show them the list of movies on the actual player.
And I reckon that ratio is at least 1 in 10 like you said. The good ol' "whaddaya have??" If I'm in a good customer service mood, just having a good day, I might run through the menu items at about a hundred miles an hour and then refer them to the menu card if they still didn't catch it, or on a bad day I'll just do as you said, leave them with the menu and come back.
The same could be said when we're distributing our video-on-demand players - we tell them in an after takeoff PA that the movie and TV choices can be found in the entertainment section of the Jetstar magazine on page XXX, but still we get pax who insist on holding up what should be a quick distribution prior to the service and ask "what movies are there??". On shorter sectors I'll refer them to the mag and come back to them, or on longer ones and if I'm being nice, I'll show them the list of movies on the actual player.
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Re The Man Of Color
I believe that story goes that the CC offers to "see if there's any room in economy" then returns to inform the lovely lady that she has found HER a seat in economy....
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Oh one of my most "stress free" (NOT) flight has to be the ones to BHD or DUB. It feels like a 30secs flight and yet pax decide they want hot food wich they end up eating on landing! I do say "it'll take about 10mins in the oven" and they still want it!!! I mean it's a 30 secs flight "love", why pay a ridiculous amount of money for a slice of horrible so called pizza when you can get a whole pizza at your destination for the same price?
Oh pax, they never cease to amaze me...
Oh pax, they never cease to amaze me...
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Talk about a thick Purser I had recently......................
Was doing my galley checks when I discovered that the galley bins hadnt been emptied from the previous sector from the previous crew. So I rang the purser to get onto them to being emptied as its a security breach to have them not emptied. Anyway she informed me that it would probably delay the aircraft & asked me would I be happy just to leave it????? I told her it was ultimately her call but that we probably would need the space for more rubbish for our sector. She then said "oh well after takeoff when I have time I will put some gloves on & dig through the trash to see if I can find anything suspicious like a bomb!!!!!" WTF????????????????: ugh:
Errrrrrrrrrrr might be a bit late by then honey!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Was doing my galley checks when I discovered that the galley bins hadnt been emptied from the previous sector from the previous crew. So I rang the purser to get onto them to being emptied as its a security breach to have them not emptied. Anyway she informed me that it would probably delay the aircraft & asked me would I be happy just to leave it????? I told her it was ultimately her call but that we probably would need the space for more rubbish for our sector. She then said "oh well after takeoff when I have time I will put some gloves on & dig through the trash to see if I can find anything suspicious like a bomb!!!!!" WTF????????????????
: ugh:Errrrrrrrrrrr might be a bit late by then honey!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Dumb ass dads
my best one was coming back from egypt.
Handling agent in egypt as purser if we wanted to fly a family back that were disruptive in terminal, all crew had a quick chat and said yes we will.
turned out family was (I assume) 2 dads and children. The kids were lovely, no trouble, dads on other hand were drunk and a pain in the a**e.
halfway through flight one of the dads decides to have a cigarette in toilet and the other one was sleeping. Obviously the captain was informed but rather than get the police he wanted us to keep him back so he could talk to him once landed in gatwick.
So we get the passengers off including the rest of the guys family, Meanwhile while bus is waiting, the other dad decides to get off the bus and light up a cigarette next to our aircraft, so i ran downstairs like a mad woman shouting you can't smoke here to which he replied '' well I can't see any no smoking signs'' to which i pointed to the engine and said '' how big a bloody sign do you want'' and walked off whilst the other people on the bus clapped
Handling agent in egypt as purser if we wanted to fly a family back that were disruptive in terminal, all crew had a quick chat and said yes we will.
turned out family was (I assume) 2 dads and children. The kids were lovely, no trouble, dads on other hand were drunk and a pain in the a**e.
halfway through flight one of the dads decides to have a cigarette in toilet and the other one was sleeping. Obviously the captain was informed but rather than get the police he wanted us to keep him back so he could talk to him once landed in gatwick.
So we get the passengers off including the rest of the guys family, Meanwhile while bus is waiting, the other dad decides to get off the bus and light up a cigarette next to our aircraft, so i ran downstairs like a mad woman shouting you can't smoke here to which he replied '' well I can't see any no smoking signs'' to which i pointed to the engine and said '' how big a bloody sign do you want''
and walked off whilst the other people on the bus clapped
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This is a story relayed to me by my wife after she got home from a six sector day yesterday. They were standing in for BA doing a LCY-AMS. As she greeted the pax on boarding one of the replies to her charming 'Hello, welcome onboard' was..."you are not BA, who the hell are you and how do I know you aren't going to crash?"
My wife's reply... "I am not sure Sir let me check" opened the flight deck door and shouted "sorry to interupt guys but who the hell are we and I dont suppose you know if we are going to crash or not today".
My wife's reply... "I am not sure Sir let me check" opened the flight deck door and shouted "sorry to interupt guys but who the hell are we and I dont suppose you know if we are going to crash or not today".
