Travel || New York 01 - The Journey (Back & Forth)

While in line to check-in to my United Airlines flight (UA 083), I came across one of their officers who requested me to 'volunteer' to take the next UA flight as their flight was full (read overbooked). Initially, I was shocked to hear something as outrageous as that, but later, my shock turned into amusement. Anyway, since I was heading to New York due to ‘urgent’ client meetings, I couldn’t reschedule my flight and ended up boarding the same UA flight that I had booked.

I was flying on the night of a Sunday and my flight was scheduled to land at Newark airport in the morning of the following Monday at 4 am. The departure of the flight, due to reasons unknown to me, got delayed by about an hour and we ended up departing around midnight.

If you are a traveler who doesn’t get sleep while flying, same pinch! The longest flight that I had had, before NY, was the direct Air India flight to London which lasted around 10 nightmarish hours, primarily because I can’t even nap when I’m flying, forget about ‘sleeping’.

So here I was in the economy class of a flight, sitting between a punjabi girl, who had a US Green Card, and some guy who, like me, was on an official trip. Trying to catch sleep, I decided not to turn on my ‘in-flight entertainment’ albeit I ended up watching ‘Agent Vinod’ from the guy’s screen on my left and ‘Think Like a Man’ from the girl’s screen on my right. After a while, they both fell asleep, like most of the passengers on board, and I was awake like an owl. At this point of time, I decided to let go of my decency. I kicked off my shoes (No, my shoes/feet don’t smell!), turned on my iPhone on airplane mode and plugged in my earphones to listen to Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma’s Raag Hamsadhwani (An Indian Classical piece played on a 100-stringed instrument called ‘santoor’) on repeat. After my iPhone battery gave up, I searched the goddamn in-flight entertainment for soothing instrumental music and was lucky to find some album of Anoushka Shankar. This album, as expected, was played at a subtle volume, on repeat. Result – 6 hours of sleep! (with occasional washroom breaks, of course!)

What happens when you end up getting some sleep while you are flying? No jet-lag! :D

Tip for a flyer who doesn’t get sleep like me: Please make sure you are tired before boarding the flight. And by tired, I mean both, physically & mentally exhausted. This would help you get to sleep in the flight. So what did I do? I walked like an idiot at Terminal 3, IGI Airport with (heavy) a bag full of woolen clothes & documents stuck on my shoulders while talking to all the people I could on my cell phone (Recall the death of my phone’s battery). After 2-3 hours of walking & talking, I was tired. But me being me, I still couldn’t catch sleep. Hence, the music obliged.

Feedback on UA flights: Do fly United Airlines if you get a chance. Their flight is expensive but I loved it! My flight was supposed to last around 16 hours and as I mentioned, our departure got delayed by an hour. By the time the runway got cleared, we were 1.5 hours late. However, kudos to the pilot coz the flight arrived right on time! Yes! Ask an Indian who has been a passenger with Indian Airlines and he/she will really understand the feeling of being in such a flight.

Food: Anyway, about the food, UA makes you hog. We were served dinner at midnight, which to my surprise, had some local food coz we were served fried idli along grilled chicken! J We were served breakfast before our arrival, along with tea/coffee. We were also given a packet containing a vegetarian sandwich (an aloo tikki burger), a small pack of munchies (Taka-tak), a chocolate (Dairy Milk!), a pack of cookies and a bottle of water. Alcohol is available, but you have to pay for it using your card, i.e. no cash transactions!

In-flight entertainment: Honestly, I didn’t bother. I was interested in finding some instrumental music and/or a comedy movie, and I found them both – Anoushka Shankar and The Three Stooges. I’m happy.

Journey Back

I had to board Emirates flight no EK0202 from John F Kennedy airport and my friends were kind enough to drop me there. Since I had already ‘checked in’ via Internet, I was part of a small line where I was given an actual boarding pass. The funny thing that happened with me is that I thought that 23*2 means that I am allowed to have 2 baggages, weighing 23 kilos each, i.e. I thought that each of my baggage would be weighed individually and it would be checked if they both meet the criteria. However, both my baggages were put together and the total weight was checked. Facepalm! I had increased the weight in my hand baggage for the fear of exceeding the limit in individual baggage. Thank God they didn’t weigh my hand baggage though :P

There are times when people get offended without any reason. I experienced this on my flight to Dubai. When I was trying to stuff my back-pack in the overhead bin, I found that someone’s cardigan was spread across half the over head bin. When I pushed it aside and accommodated my bag, the lady got offended (:O), and that too so much that she asked me to return her the cardigan so that she can keep it safely with her (!!). That lady sat on a seat ahead of mine and was probably unaware of the fact that I had my Louis Vuitton never full (which was full that day) and my Nine West coat perched below her seat, adjacent to my Reebok shoes. The reason why I’ve mentioned these brands here is to show that even expensive things have to be sidelined when it comes to space management & traveling, and here someone was worried about a cardigan! Huh!

With a Telegu lady (who lived in Long Island, NY) on my left and a Malayali middle-aged couple on my right, I knew that there would be no room for any conversation and I’ll have to force myself to sleep, all over again! Sigh! So what did I do to sleep? Hehe … This time I found AR Rahman’s greatest hits on the entertainment and, as expected, put it on repeat and slept. Total sleep – 7 hours, I think.

Feedback: The Emirates staff is extremely courteous (and hot, yes). The flights are well-lit. The in-flight entertainment offers a crazy variety in everything. They also give you a brochure of purchases you wish to make using money/miles.

Food: Again, quite a bit to handle. They have proper menu cards printed and offer food according to the destination for which the flight is bound, i.e. the Dubai flight would have continental food and a larger variety of non-vegetarian food than vegetarian. On the other hand, the India bound flight would have Indian dishes in their menu. Alcohol is available, and you don’t have to pay for it. (Yes, free). And luckily, the staff doesn’t have any issues with your nationality, religion or gender, while serving you alcohol.

Stopover: The stopover was in Dubai and I think Dubai International Airport is the fanciest shopping mall I’ve ever seen. I’m sorry but I have no other words to describe it. I observed one thing … All the items that were offered by Emirates (and were mentioned in their brochure) were available at the airport’s duty free shops at the same price, neither more, nor less. I’m not saying whether this is good/bad/new, I’m just saying that I observed this.

Back in Delhi, I faced a bit of melodrama. My brother-in-law, who had to pick me up from the airport, as usual, got late. In the mean time, I picked up two bottles of his requested alcohol from the duty-free shop, while gathering all my baggage & immigration papers. Incidentally, I met my high school Science teacher at the airport. She was waiting for her daughter-in-law & grandson to arrive. After meeting Mom, post lots of hugs & kisses, it was time to head back home with “Dilli ki khushboo” (Delhi’s fragrance) in my nose!

Immigration

Everyone fears immigration officers & counters. Relax! They’re just ordinary people like you and me. It is just that they are in-charge of a serious business and have to be very serious, crisp & observant about the whole thing. This gives them an aura of “no-nonsense” but that doesn’t mean that you have to be scared of them. Greet your immigration officer with a smile and try to feel and try to feel something that has been tested many times off-late, humanity! Come on; try to be genuinely sweet, for a change!

Anyway, I’ll talk only about the immigration check in US because the checks in our home countries and relatively relaxed. So my immigration officer at Newark airport asked me why was I in USA and asked me if my company had made arrangements for my stay. That’s it! He was nice & polite and contrary to popular belief of immigration officers checking/scrutinizing everything, he was concerned about my stay in his country. That is why he wanted to ensure my safety & convenience by ensuring that my company has arranged my stay. People say that things were nice coz I’m a female … May be. I’m glad someone treated me with grace, unlike my own countrymen!

Airports:

Newark – Post immigration check, the passengers need to go down to the conveyor belts to get their luggage. The green/red channels are on the left. Crossing them, straight ahead was the exit to get a taxi, for parking you need to go left and on your right is a Starbucks! I waited here for my friend to pick me up, but that is another story. Oh and in case you require a payphone, you’ll see the arrow there.

JFK – Check-in areas are crowded but the rest of the airport is empty. The security check is a sight, especially if you have Indian passengers coz there are women who refuse to take off their gold ornaments. What’s better is that Indian men also refuse to take off their gold ornaments, and are requested to get in line to be checked using the full body scanner. The departure terminal had limited eating options and ultra-expensive souvenirs.

IGI – Terminal 3 is a fancy shopping area where people sleep on the couches while covering their faces & bodies with shawls & stoles. Immigration counters on arrival are full of confusion despite all the requisite pointers. The alcohol shops are thronged upon for reasons I don’t need to mention.

Dubai – I reiterate: Dubai International Airport is the fanciest shopping mall I have ever seen. It is clean and abuzz with lights & people. Some men of my ‘race’ got surprised to see a single woman walking confidently around but I chose to ignore them, just like I ignore such looks in my own country. The wifi is free and has good connectivity!

The story about UA’s “take the next flight” request:

From what I’ve heard is that United Airlines ends up over-booking their flights on a lot of occasions. In such circumstances, they request some passengers (like me) to ‘volunteer’ to take the next flight. At times, they provide incentives like upgrading to business class, or offering compensation in cash. In case the flight is on the next day, the airline pays for the hotel for the passengers. Since I didn’t volunteer to change my flight, I don’t know if they ever offer such incentives or not! All this about ‘incentives’ is something that I have heard from people and would like to experiment some day ;-)