Heather Poole - Cruising Attitude

The women took turns whispering a three-digit number as the others scribbled it down on the back of paper-covered key cards. As I watched them waiting for the elevator, another crew walked in, an army of matching flight attendants, all with sleek black hair pulled back to expose luminous pale skin and blood red lips. Thirty sensible low heels clickity-clacked single-file to the desk. Each woman pulled a black roll-aboard exactly like mine at home, along with a gigantic hard-case Samsonite on wheels. More questions filled my head. I could have sat there all day watching the parade of different crews from around the world, but unfortunately my date didn’t show up late and he had no desire to stick around the lobby. Not when there was a sports bar serving cold beer on tap with spicy chicken wings and greasy potato skins within walking distance.

Not every pilot is so quick to turn away from the international allure. Jane’s latest boyfriend, an Airbus captain based out of Miami, proved to be one of them. I ran into him at our layover hotel in São Paulo as I was on my way out to grab a quick lunch before pick-up. He walked through the revolving doors trailing behind a crew of ten tired-looking flight attendants and two pilots with tennis rackets strapped to their backs. Immediately I recognized Jane’s future fiancé from a framed photograph she kept in her room on the bedside table: the two of them arm-in-arm, helmets in hand, on top of a mountain with dirt bikes on the ground behind them. He had to be a good two feet taller than her.

“What do you have planned for your layover?” I asked, just to be nice, after officially introducing myself for the first time.

One of the other pilots, the youngest-looking one, spun around and slapped him hard on the back, a thin gold wedding band wrapped around his ring finger. “He’s coming with me to check out the Finn Air flight attendants! I hear they lay out topless.”

“Oh really,” I said, and that’s all I said. The future father of Jane’s children blushed.

Thirty minutes later I was peering through the glass doors leading out to the sun deck, under strict orders from New York to go up to the rooftop deck and check out the situation now ! I was happy to report back to Jane over the phone that there were only four attractive blondes lounging around the pool in string bikinis, all eight nipples barely covered, but hidden nonetheless. As I stood in the doorway, I couldn’t help but wonder if the buff, bronzed dude getting out of the pool might be a Finn Air pilot dreaming about a soon-to-be bikini-clad American me!

“If I made as much money as passengers thought I made, worked as little as my neighbors thought I did, or had as much fun on layovers as my friends think I do, I’d have one helluva of a job!” exclaimed one of my friends after he heard me trying to explain what it’s like , really like, to work for an airline without enough seniority to hold the good trips.

If you meet a flight attendant and you’re wondering if he or she works international routes, don’t bother asking. Those who do will make it known ten minutes into a conversation. Or the moment they walk into flight operations and find themselves surrounded by lowly junior flight attendants like me. It starts out innocently enough, I’ll give them that, but very quickly it becomes quite unbearable. It goes something like this:

“Anyone working to Paris?”

“Nope. Tokyo. Again.”

“I thought you did the Caribbean?”

“Thought I’d try something new. Have you been to the new layover hotel in Delhi?”

“No, but I hear the one in Frankfurt is wonderful!”

The rest of us will silently print out our itineraries, and then, sooner rather than later, make our way down to a gate where a small jet is departing to a city like Jacksonville, which now sounds even less glamorous than it did before sign-in. If I sound jealous it’s probably because I am. How could I not be?!

What most international flight attendants don’t realize is we know who they are—they don’t have to rub it in. Their age and uniform size is the first thing that gives it away. So do the number of bags they’re carrying. All that shopping requires extra luggage, making them look more like glamorous homeless people than flight attendants. One senior mama travels to London with a lunch bag, a computer bag, a tote bag, and two roll-aboards: one for clothes and the other for a full-size espresso machine. All for just a twenty-four-hour layover! In the morning she likes to make coffee in her room for the entire crew because the hotel only provides electric teapots for their guests. At the airport, the pilots have to help her up the metal stairs after the van drops us off on the tarmac underneath the belly of the plane at London’s Heathrow Airport.

Junior flight attendants normally get stuck with the short hops on single-aisle aircraft. An aircraft with two aisles means your crew is either on reserve or has quite a bit of seniority with the airline. The size of the aircraft is the second clue you might be on an international flight (the first and most obvious being the flight’s listed destination). Longer flights require bigger planes and, in many cases, an extra pilot, so when one takes a break there are always two in the cockpit. Bigger planes equate to nicer flights for a flight attendant. Not just because they’re more comfortable for passengers, which makes for far less complaining and a lot more snoring, but because flight attendants have extra places to hide out if someone does become difficult. Because longer flights almost always result in longer trips for passengers, there’s a lot more overpacking taking place. This means their luggage will get checked. After all, if they have to wait around baggage claim for one suitcase, they might as well wait around for all their bags, which is why they walk on board empty-handed and looking, dare I say it, happy! A stress-free boarding will do that. Trust me, there’s nothing more worrisome for passengers (and flight attendants) than overhead bin space—or lack thereof. But when passengers check their luggage, as most international passengers do, flights get off to a good start. Flights that start off well usually go well. Passengers will actually thank us for a great trip as they deplane.

Domestic flights rarely start out as nicely as the international ones do. With passengers arguing over where to stow belongings, the first impression of the flight crew is usually negative, and before long, nobody on board is smiling, including the flight attendants. Airline employees will do anything to keep from being cited with a late departure and subsequently fined. Someone has to take the blame and if that person is written up too many times he or she won’t have a job for long. We end up barking orders over the PA about stepping into the rows while stowing bags so others can get by and we can depart on time. The rule is that an agent can’t shut the aircraft door until all bins are closed and all passengers seated, so when the overhead bins seem full, instead of smiling and making small talk, my colleagues and I have to frantically move bags around to magically create more space for the last few passengers. Otherwise the agent is going to try to put the blame on the crew.

“Hey, that’s my bag!” I often hear.

“I’m just going to move your bag right… over… here,” I’ll say, struggling to get it into a nearby bin without dropping it on another passenger’s head.

“If I wanted my bag in that bin, I would have put it there!” Here’s my question: Would you rather have your bag in a particular overhead bin or get to your destination or connecting flight on time?

“Are you going to bring my bag to me when we land?!” one man spit when I pointed to an empty bin three rows behind his seat after he flagged me down to inform me there was no place to stow his bag. Based on the frequent-flier bag tag attached to the handle of his suitcase, I knew that he knew the answer, but some people just need a punching bag. Unfortunately, that often ends up being me!