Foreign trip – indeed a matter of pride. For all of us in our girl gang, it was a moment to live by listening to her experience. However, it was beyond me, then, gauging the emotions of excitement as well as perplexity at the same time. Like any other girl of my age, I was more invested in understanding reactions of fellow students than dissecting my own emotions.
First Solo flight – all hell broke loose and all I could see is myself among the white spongy stack of clouds, while I am looking right into the eyes of the sun as of telling him, “Look dear, I can match your zenith, I’m a big girl, now”. Appears childish? Well, not at all.
Each one thought it is yet another journey for me (yes, I travel a lot, these days), but it wasn’t. This journey was in many ways filled with many firsts. To begin with, the medium of the commute was different. Nobody, except my inner being, experience the turbulence.
The security check, the boarding pass, the wait, the boarding line, the bus, and the gigantic airplane standing in front of my eyes. The old days from the school notebooks were standing in front of me. Waiting for me!
I stepped into it. A charming and smiling face welcomed me. F-14 read my seat number. A-1, B-1, C-1 read the right side while D-1, E-1, f-1 the left. “God will have to walk long…”. Ha! Didn’t knew the return Indigo flight would read F-25!
“Are they suffering from a kind of compulsive disorder”, I thought only to joke. Although it was first flight ever, the announcement, the security drill, emergency instructions, and After certain announcements, emergency instructions, and “fasten your seatbelt” instruction appeared so familiar to me. It was fun watching an aircraft dancing towards the runway to plunge into the sky.
I was told, had seen pictures, videos heard experiences from so many, but everything appeared meaningless compared to this first self-attained experience. I did not tell anyone but as the flight took off – a trickle of water fell from the left eye. A big tick marked on the first flight!
I imagined a complete animated series with my anime’s hair all up and she yelled to the extreme!
I heard the air hostess telling a passenger to keep his bag in the above compartment as that was the emergency seats. He was adamant since the bottle in the bag contained water from Shri Jagannath and was complaining about already spilling two bottles in his previous flight.
I saw two elderly ladies behind my seats discussing their household chores. How one of them now does not ask anything from her children, she is satisfied with what she is informed and is now least bothered. However, constantly grumbling about how her kids are settled in foreign countries and her daughter-in-law will have to come home. Well, she does not interfere in their chores, she repeated.
The feeling was surreal – which is only sensed once. The second solo flight was not such unique. I peeped down while the flight took off. How tiny the houses turned and eventually disappeared into the clouds. When I observed the sky the clouds, a thought popped into my mind – dude you’re not on Earth!
For a few moments, I was in the parallel world – a different surrounding – in a different space! A lot many thoughts poured into my mind that time, every scene was so iconic that it poured a splash of freshness on me.
Although a very small portion was visible to me, the wings of the plane definitely gave me an opportunity to click some celestial views! And how could I miss it?
I experienced some sensation in my ears – it was because of the air pressure and I was so engrossed and mesmerized and living my first flight, and forgot to wear earbuds.
Well, it was then the captain confirming our reach to the airport and that it was the time to land.
Can you recall the giggle you experience when the giant wheel comes down? Exactly that was the giggle I experienced when the flight was landing. It was for a mere 5 seconds – but only when in the first flight!
How crazy it was to feel that a 500 km of distance was covered in just 50 minutes! When you have all your journeys in cars all your life, having a first flight engraves diff memories in life.