I was waiting impatiently in the airport lounge, to board Nippon Airways, and reach my destination.
Finally the boarding announcement came floating over the air. “Ladies and gentlemen. Please prepare to board flight NA007. Note that we have changed our boarding protocol. People with empty bladders now have the priority to board the plane, followed by all others”
I was not sure what the announcement meant. I lined up anyway and when I approached the gate, after passing through a booth, the lady at the other end stopped me and pointing to my crotch said. “Please step aside, sir. The X-ray machine has detected that you have a full bladder, bursting at its seams. You have the option to relieve yourself before boarding or pay a fine of $500 if you do not want to”.
I took the money-wise option and took flight to the nearest loo. In the loo, it dawned on me!. I remembered reading in the newspapers about Nippon Airways’ initiative for cutting carbon dioxide emissions, by reducing the aircraft weight in flight, by asking their passengers to go to the toilet before boarding their planes!! The Nippon spokesperson had said, “Lighter passengers mean lighter planes. If the flight is lighter, we use less fuel which is good for the environment ”
You may be pee-ved by this and think this to be loo-driculous but think again. The idea is not crap-pee!!
After settling in my seat, I pulled out my notepad to write a letter to the CEO of Nippon Airways, to congratulate him on this initiative. I wrote
Hajimemashite Yoroshiku,
I am thrilled by your idea for lightening your planes and thereby reducing global warming effects. Allow me to suggest a few more weight-reducing ideas for your consideration.
You could get your passengers to empty their bowels before they board the plane as some of them would be full of s%$#t. You will make more savings in weight if you implement this strategy or you could ask them to fast the day before and board the plane on empty stomachs
I could recommend that you get your passengers to travel nude but it may not be a workable idea. If they can at least adopt the dress styles of Bollywood item number girls, IPL cheerleader girls and Bollywood actors, your savings in weight would be tremendous. Salmon Khan, the Bollywood actor, has been an environmentalist for ages. He is shirtless wherever he goes. With everyone dressed in Bollywood attire, including your air hostesses, you could do away with all your in-flight entertainment devices such as TVs.
As a bare minimum, you could at least get your passengers not to wear footwear and headwear while boarding. You could also request you male passengers to shave their heads, moustaches, beards and hairy chests and backs. The women should be asked to shave their legs (and moustaches and beards, if any).
Also learn from the recent measures that Hawa Indiya airlines took – they grounded their overweight airhostesses, thus reducing the weight-in-air by more than half!!
If you introduce self-service on the flight, you would be able to cut down on the number of airhostesses required. Think about using auto-pilot or a robot to fly the planes instead of pilots.
I suggest that you remove all seats and let passengers sit on the floor on picnic mats. This would be good for a change. Passengers can then organise themselves in groups and engage in singing bhajans, playing teen patti or antakshari
To discourage passengers from using the lavatories, you may charge them for its usage, at the rate of $10 per minute or have their Frequent Flyers points deducted instead.
I am seriously asking you to consider imposing a “fat surcharge” on obese people and charge them by the kilo for excess weight. By doing this, you would do the world a great social service. Magna Subanski could be interested in promoting this idea for you but be aware that you will run the risk of allowing wafer-thin catwalk models travel ticketless!!
The pilot interrupted my train of thoughts when he announced over the public address system. “Good morning folks. Hope you are enjoying our environmentally-friendly “green plane”. Thank you for co-operating with us in running a light flight. Light meals will now be served on banana leaves, to be eco-friendly”.
“You will notice that we have not added salt to your food or drizzled olive oil over your salads to avoid increasing the weight of the food. We are not providing you with any cutlery, so please go ahead and use your fingers. Napkins and tissues are not available but do not hesitate to use your shirt sleeves to wipe your mouths”.
“Water will not be served in plastic cups. Instead, please cup your palms together and our friendly staff will pour water into them. If anyone needs to read the newspaper or magazine, we have one copy of each circulating on board. Please wait patiently for your turn”.
“We are extremely sorry that we are not in a position to supply blankets, pillows and socks. So cuddle up to your co-passenger if you feel cold”
“As there are no entertainment devices on board, any one of our staff members will take request from you to sing your favourite song. For the benefit of the Indiyan passengers, we will keep them updated of the latest cricket scores. Please feel free to whistle for the airhostess. Enjoy your flight. ”
I continued with my letter writing.
You may think that I am on a fantasy flight with the next few suggestions but please consider them
Instead of landing at the airport, you may consider dropping the passengers off over their suburbs. Of course, the passengers would jump off the plane using their BYO parachutes. Have you thought of using pizza boxes or plywood in the manufacture of our planes?
A good catchy slogan for your campaign would be- “Travel right. Travel light, pee-ple”
Suddenly, we hit turbulence. I felt sick. I feverishly looked for a sick bag in the pockets of the seat in front of me. I could not find one. I suppose they had been removed to reduce the weight of the plane!!
No worries! The seat pocket will do me just fine!!!
