100 Things To Do in Flight

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Recently Royal Jordanian Airlines made a fun list of 12 things to do on a 12 hour flight with no laptop or tablet, to slight the trending #electronicsban. Labee (Labeeb Ibrahim) and I started commenting underneath the original post just for (more) fun and ended up turning it into 100 things you could do (and sometimes get frowned at) while travelling on a flight. Safwat Ahsan (53-54**) and Ambilittha(Ambili Nuzarath) (55-61*) pooled in with their fun bits as well. So we thought, why not share the full list on our respective blogs? So here it is. “Fasten your seat belts (not really *wink*), sit back, relax and enjoy.”

The first 12 are here:-
 
Now, this is where the fun started. A few of them are in Malayalam and I request the non-keralite readers to ignore them. Trust me, you will not miss the fun.
13) Eat anything and everything like a barbarian.
14) Try a nap every 5 minutes.
15) Drink water a lot.
16) Wait in long queue at the toilet till life feels meaningless.
17) Take a walk.
18) Say ‘boo’ to the sleeping passengers.
19) Play tricks on passengers until they transfer you to the business class.
20) Behave erratically till they downgrade you to the backest seat. (is backest even a word??)
21) Ask for extra blanket and layer yourself up and look like a weirdo who hasn’t been in a flight ever before.
22) Drink so much coffee.
23) Drink too much tea.
24) Take off pins from your head scarf and be amused at the fellow passenger who has no idea where are all the pins coming from.
25) Play cards.
26) File nails.
27) Check out the stewards / stewardesses.
28) Flirt with them.
29) Try to peek inside cockpit and see the pilots.
30) Be a Mallu and take off your seatbelt even if the sign says not to.
31) Sing aloud, dance to your own songs, start off a party.
32) Play kallanum policeum. (A keralite game)
33) Shout at stewardess because you forgot that you are wearing headphones.
34) Play athala pithala thavalaachi on tray table. (Another keralite game)
35) Play akkutthikkutthaana varambath. (Another one)
36) Keep on popping chewing gum.
37) Close the windows just to be asked to open them. Repeat that.
38) Keep on tracking the flight.
39) Keep changing clothes for no reason and come out of the toilet as if you are walking on the ramp
40) Stare at your reflection on the TV screen and imagine you are a ghost.
41) Pretend that you can read palms.
42) Be a story teller. Read to an audience.
43) Think about all the ways you screwed up life.
44) Think about which ones you screwed up second time.
45) Errr…. and third time.
46) Calculate the time at destination and check on screen if you calculated it right. If you did, look proud
47) Checkout the time in different cities.
48) Check if there’s food on your teeth.
49) Watch Tangled movie the umpteenth time.
50) Ask for a toothpick and pretend it to be a cigarette.
51) Comb your hair for no reason.
52) Crack your knuckles.
53) Start praying by saying Allahu Akbar aloud.
54) And then watch the drama as it unfolds.
55) Say sorry when you’re pushing your seat back.
56) Say sorry when you’re asking the passenger in the front to straighten the seat.
57) Tidy up the mess on the floor before you land.
58) Observe people.
59) Desperately try not to look annoyed by that one non stop crying child.
60) Pretend you don’t see those screaming and destroying toddlers that has wrapped up their parents on their little finger.
61) Watch what others are eating.
62) Increase the volume of own headphones when kids around start crying.
63) Stare at clouds and wonder.
64) Smile at greenery when you see Kerala.
65) Get annoyed when announcement disturbs and pauses the movie.
66) Browse through duty-free books.
67) Read menu card like you are a big time connoisseur when in reality you just wanna have a Big Mac.
68) Mimic the steward/stewardess who shows the security instructions in action.
69) Try figure out what the hell has the stewardess done to her hair to make it look like that.
70) Monitor the people who tries to squish you luggage overhead.
71) Juggle with the seat belt coz no matter how many times you’ve been in flight, you don’t know how to put on the belt in one go.
72) Play cricket/football in the spaces. Remember what a bus conductor says, “avide football kalikkaan ulla sthalamundallo?”. (An everyday keralite experience)
73) Look for familiar faces in flight till you look like a creep.
74) Teach a few people some Malayalam. Make sure to fool them with a few bad words.
75) Wonder at how some people look so fresh even after a long haul flight.
76) Wonder at the fact that, wherever you go, the flight is always full of Indians.
77) Organize a mock rally inside, “inquilab Zindabad, mukhyamanthri raaji vekkuka”. (A Malayalam joke of the contemporary times)
78) Nod your head off to fellow stranger passenger.
79) Scream, looking out through the window and fool others.
80) Try to control your sleepy head, not to nod off on fellow stranger passenger.
81) Rest you head on your co-passenger and sleep.
82) Offer your shoulder for the co-passenger.
83) Try find out if your plane has its “phalange” fixed. *Phoebe in friends reference*
84) Try stop the plane by saying you have to tell someone urgently that you love him/her. *Rachel in friends reference*
85) Tell terrifying flight stories to the fellow passenger and scare the bejesus out of them. *chandler in friends reference*
86) Talk to people to find business opportunities.
87) Stare at a girl so badly that she comes up to me asking if we really had a problem and then let her know that she looks exactly like my grandmother.
88) Stare at a guy so badly that he comes up to me asking if we really had a problem and then let he know that he looks exactly like my grandfather.
89) Organize a mock parliament. You can throw the chair of the “speaker” if the chair is detachable.
90) Ask the neighbour if she/he is eating dessert, else I’ll eat it.
91) Find a partner in crime to sing “Ekaantha chandrike in the bathroom”. (A Keralite fun)
92) Ring the calling bell for steward/ess and turn it off when u see them coming.
93) Search for shoes forever and finally get it from behind passenger’s seat.
94) Step on the foot of the passenger behind, apologize, do it again.
95) Scream at your frozen numb feet.
96) Play with kids around. Fight with them.
97) Looking out the window, say, “Hi birdie, get off my plane”, loud.
98) Stare at the heavily pregnant woman and wonder if she will give birth in flight and the kid will get free tickets for life.
99) Take a big gigantic Shakespeare book in flight and pretend reading it very fast, back to back. in reality, you have no idea what the hell it is, you just wanna threw it out of window but you can’t open the window coz life is so unfair.
100) Ask for some tapioca knowing they don’t serve it on board and then lecture them about the awesomeness of Tapioca.

And the bonus,

101) Compile this list and publish and pretend that its not lame and be a star. 😉 (Too ambitious!!)

Edited.

fridak1

 

Many years ago (2010 to be exact), I read the biography of Frida Kahlo, a well known self-portrait painter. I fell in love with her painfully then. She took up painting vigorously after an accident that crippled her health in many forms for a lifetime. Painting was the only thing that kept her sane; sane being a relative word of course.. I scribbled this whilst reading the book and had forgotten about it (forgetfulness is quickly becoming my soul mate). So I thought.. why not add it here, as yet another scribble.
They are me
My estranged reality
My wings of freedom
My crude self
————————–
They are mine
The loves of my life
The lights for my soul
My heeding children
—————————-
Oh cruel earth
You broke my body
You broke my heart
So I took yours
—————————-
I held your sands
I took your water
I cut your grass
I gave you life
—————————-
Oh dear earth
I leave a spark behind
You consumed my pain
We are one.
—————————-
To Frida. To Art. To Life.
—————————-
Afternote:- This is an abstract writing, unlike her unforgivable mind-to-paper paintings. Because this is a six year old draft, even I couldn’t understand fully when I read it again recently. Of course I ‘deciphered’ eventually and have edited this ever so slightly. My past six year younger self might not have entertained too much intrusion.
The 1st stanza is about her uni-brow which made her face fiercely striking. The 2nd stanza.. her palms, the only ones that had mobility after the accident. The 3rd.. her unfortunate accident itself. The 4th.. her invincible painting era. The 5th.. her death and her quintessential impact on art.

Unedited

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Found this in my gmail drafts. I wrote it in 2010 apparently and had forgotten about it until I saw it yesterday. Don’t think I’ll write like a hopeless romantic in 2016 🙂 Nonetheless, sharing unedited..
Give me space
Not distance.
Give me paths
Not direction.
Give me peace
Not silence.
Leave me alone
Not lonely.
Hold me close
Not too tight.
Break the ice
Not my heart.
Fight for me
Not for my sins.
Help me fly
Not from my roots.
Give me promises
Not just hopes.
Love me more
Let me love most.