We all go through strange situations at work every once in a while, but while most of us can try and escape the awkward situation by leaving the room, flight attendants, on the other hand, have it the worst. That’s because they’re basically trapped with the rest of the passengers in a tube flying thousands of miles in the air.
So we reached out to some of them to tell us their stories, and they didn’t disappoint. We got everything from the bizarre to the funny and wholesome.
Someone Really Had To Go
Amira explains that she was on an Indian flight, standing with the rest of the cabin crew near one of the plane’s doors. Moments later, a woman made her way there, stood opposite the door, and got into a squat position in front of it.
She sat like that for a while, so Amira walked toward her and asked if she could offer the woman any form of assistance; the woman just looked back at her and asked for water.
Amira quickly brought the woman a cup of water, but the woman didn’t move, stayed in that squatting position, and made weird facial expressions, which made the situation awkward.
Amira asked her if everything was ok. When the woman didn’t respond, she politely asked her to return to her seat; that’s when the woman stood up, took the cup of water, and left. After the ordeal was finally over, to Amira’s horror, she found that the woman had pooped on the floor.
Not So Universal
Flights can be deafeningly noisy; the plane is soaring in the air, there’s sometimes turbulence, and it’s normal to see flight attendants using hand gestures to relay messages across to indicate yes or no. Unfortunately for Mona, things didn’t go well on one of her flights to Barcelona, Spain.
While on a noisy flight, one of the passengers asked for something to drink, and since Mona was a bit far from him, she gave him the thumbs up to indicate that she understood what he wanted and went to fetch it.
However, as soon as she turned around, the man jumped out of his seat and started yelling that she was rude and that he couldn’t believe how someone from the crew could be so unprofessional. Mona was taken aback by the remarks since she didn’t know what she had done wrong. This led the passenger sitting next to the yelling man to be confused and try to calm him down.
After some deliberation and talking to understand why the man was so angry, they found the source that led to this misunderstanding. It turns out that the thumbs-up hand gesture from where the man comes from is an insult rather than meaning ok, which made him feel offended when Mona did it.
The crew swiftly diffused the situation, and things got back to normal. Let this be a lesson to you if you meet someone from Iraq, Iran, Greece, and parts of Italy, never make the thumbs-up gesture as it’s an insult there.
Meeting New People
If you’re ever on a plane, you’ll find a button above you to call on one of the flight attendants if you need anything, like a drink or a pillow. When you press that button, they get a notification and come straight away to assist you, turning it off to indicate that they resolved the situation. One man on Noha’s flight liked that button, a little too much perhaps.
On a flight to Bangladesh having a complete female cabin crew except for a male supervisor, a first-time passenger pressed the button, not knowing what it did, so when Noha appeared to help the man, he was very confused.
Noha asked him if he needed anything, but he continued to stare at her with astonishment. She asked him if he was ok or if he needed any medical assistance, but the man kept looking at her. Repeating her question, he finally snapped out of his trance, thanked her, and rejected needing anything; so she turned off the button and left.
A few moments later, the man pressed the button again, prompting another female flight attendant to go, and the same situation happened to her. She asked if the man needed anything to drink, but he just stared, rejected assistance, and the flight attendant left, turning off the button as she did so.
Noha stated that this situation kept happening several times, with the man doing the same thing over and over again until he pretty much saw all the crew on the flight. So the crew decided to confront him to understand what was going on. However, the supervisor stepped in and went to talk to the man himself to figure out what the problem was and defuse the situation.
He walked up to the passenger and asked if he needed any assistance or something to drink; the passenger finally responded, “whenever I press this button, a beautiful lady appears, and I want to see all the nationalities you have.”
While some people might see this situation as endearing, others find it a bit uncomfortable, so if you’re a first-time flier, please respect their time, as they have a whole lot of other passengers to work with.
Not As Advertised
There’s a certain GCC airline that’s known for the impressive features on their planes, such as a lounge and showers area; however, that bit of information led to an awkward situation on Salma’s flight.
On a flight to Budapest, Hungary, things started fine, the plane took off smoothly without any issues, and as soon as the captain turned off the seatbelts sign, a man stood up, got a large towel from his bag, and made his way to the crew’s area. He asked Salma where the bathrooms were, which she indicated were at the end of the aisle. She kept an eye on the economy class passenger as he made his way to the bathroom, got in, and then instantly got back out again, confused.
The passenger came back to Salma, asking about the showers, leading her to explain that the showers area was in first and business class and that there wasn’t one in economy class. This information shocked the passenger, who stood there confused, both he and Salma silently looking at each other.
Unfortunately, he felt defeated and went back to the bathroom and got inside, leaving Salma confused since there were very small sinks in there and he couldn’t wash up there.
Love in the Air
If you thought your proposal was cute, check this one out.
Khaled shared how one of his fellow flight attendants got proposed to by her significant other on a flight he was on.
The boyfriend collaborated with the rest of the cabin crew and got on the plane without her knowing. He gave the crew a large bouquet to hide and distributed printed-out masks of his face to the rest of the passengers with instructions on what to do next.
After the flight took off, everyone wore the masks he passed out, creating a sea of people with the same face stunning the flight attendant; he then showed up, revealing that it was actually him.
While the flight attendant was still surprised by his presence, he got down on one knee and proposed to her on the flight. After saying yes, the crew appeared with the hidden bouquet, which he handed her all while everybody on the flight cheered and applauded.
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