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February 11, 2004

Flying home

Have been out of circulation for a day or so. Flew to Munich yesterday. Back today. In between: 24 hours of just-about-bearable corporate hotel, engaging corporate meetings and stupidly corporate plane behaviour. Until I got home that is. It's always a great feeling to be back home after corporate excursions like this. Some observations picked up on the way: It snowed quite heavily overnight in Munich. Why is it that Munich seems to function perfectly as normal the day after the night that it snows? (Unlike London.)
Snow-covered Munich: a city in standstill? Most definitely not!
Why is it that the stupid majority of people on the aeroplane cannot understand what it means when the captain says that you should remain seated until the seatbelt light is switched off - even after landing and parking? I cannot understand this. On today's flight back to London (having been upgraded to Business Class due to a full flight) - and despite the allegedly higher clicks of intelligence and civility that you'd expect from the folks who pay through the nose to sit in Business Class - you still find that the majority of these spoilt terds are still incapable of following very simple and straightforward aircraft safety instructions. Of course: they do it absolutely deliberately - as if to make make some sort of point about being of some higher intelligence than the crew that got them home safely. Sorry - I'm getting carried away there - but I was incensed even more by the bloke sitting next to me who was "tutting" furiously when I stayed put in my seat until the seatbelt light was switched off. Preventing him from getting up and getting his stuff together so that he could make the sharpest possible exit from the plane. I was probably the only person on the entire plane who followed this particular safety instruction - and this particular guy had the fucking nerve to tut at me for doing so. Sheeesh. (I grinned as big a grin as I could every time I encountered the same terd of a guy waiting behind me in queues at passport control and customs etc.)
A view of the airfield at Munich Airport - whilst waiting at the gate for boarding.
And similarly - why can't people understand the instruction to NOT switch on their mobile phones until they have left the aircraft? Why is it that within seconds after the plane stopping at the air-bridge you can hear "beep-beep-beep, beeeeeeep-beeeeeeep-beeeeeeeep, beep-beeep-beep" echoing up and down the aeroplane as people switch on their mobile phones and backlogged text messages come flooding through. Don't these people understand simple instructions? Once again - perhaps they really do believe that they know better ... Anyway - it's always good to get back home after such trips: the very shabby-ness of Heathrow Terminal 2 compared to Munich's gleaming new terminal building is enough to make you feel like you're back on home territory. And it feels good too. The best moment for me was the bus part of the trip home: how great it felt to be sitting at the very back of a dirty, smelly, graffiti-ridden, top-deck of a suburban London Bus for the last few miles of the journey home.
The good ol' bus journey home.

Posted by jag at February 11, 2004 08:51 PM

Comments

Nice pictures Jag. I especially like the one at the airport. Good stuff!

Posted by: Stu at February 11, 2004 11:16 PM

Not one of the new all singing all dancing route 79 buses then?

Posted by: Annie Mole at February 12, 2004 12:51 AM

Nice pics of a snowed in city.
The reason for not obeying the rules - is the urgency to get up and go; they cant even wait for a minute inside the plane any longer - because they feel that they have more than a 1001 things to do. And probably because they may fear that if they stay a minute longer, they may get kidnapped - or the plane may get hijacked/crashed/exploded and all other possible eventualities.
And for keeping cell phones off - they should probably put some magnetic shielding of some sort to block the waves - they somehow did that in one of our auditoriums so that the reception is abysmal

Posted by: sat at February 12, 2004 04:24 AM

I'm often the only one left sitting in my seat at those times as well. I guess when you're "important" you have urgent "important" things to do. Just imagine how much money a rich person is wasting by just sitting when they could be doing "important" things like making money? :-D

Posted by: Lisa at February 12, 2004 07:26 AM

Well I should be the expert on why things work in Munich when it snows. No. 1: almost everyone has winter tyres with deeper tread. No. 2: the council has contingency plans for clearing the roads when it does snow. But autumn: that's a different matter. Every time the leaves fall off the trees and land on the rails of the S-Bahn railway, they get crushed by trains into a slippery mess and the trains can't brake. Sends the whole timetable haywire. Strange that, how autumn seems to have become a problem that no-one thought of before.
Hope you had a good time here; just remember to take a taxi if you ever come in October.

David

Posted by: David at February 12, 2004 12:39 PM

Loved the picture of Munich in the snow :)

Posted by: Pewari at February 12, 2004 12:59 PM

Stu: Thx a lot - my favourite is the airport one too!

Sat: Agree with the point re these people think they have 1001 better things to do. And yes - I always wonder why the airlines don't block or "jam" mobile phone signals within the airframe. It would solve the problem of people breaking the rules surely?

Lise: Indeed. The world needs more "rule-abiding" people like us!

David: Thanks for the tip regarding Autumn in Munich! It seems that London could learn a lot from Munich with regard to keeping the city running after heavy snow though. Perhaps I should point this out to our Mayor Ken?

Posted by: Jag at February 12, 2004 11:01 PM

Annie: no brand-new bus this time! In fact - this was not a Route79 - but a Route 204: which shares some of the same stops as Route79. You see: when you ride the buses you get to practise the art of "bus-hopping" - which is when you catch several different buses in order to wend yourself to your destination in the quickest possible time. Route79 has mostly brand new buses - whereas Route204 has some old ones. The good news is though that Route204 delivers me to a stop not far from where I live: not as close as Route79 - but close enough for me to be able to walk the rest of the distance home. There is an "art" to being a bus-rider you see ... :-)

Posted by: Jag at February 12, 2004 11:05 PM

Pew: many thx. Yes - the pic is rather pretty. Pity I didn't take some more close-ups - as they would have revealed that the snow was extremely "fluffy". Much better than what we got here a few weeks back.

Posted by: Jag at February 12, 2004 11:13 PM

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