I remember the first time I travelled on a plane; it was joy pure and innocent. Travelling business class for the first time was, by comparison, a lot more stressful. Because when you are flying for the first time everyone else can tell while you remain oblivious: like when you don’t remove all metallic items and place them in the tray or as you slowly (and frustratingly, for others) advance down the aisle, looking up at every row number in case they put row 23 between rows 14 and 15.
But your virgin business flight is like playing pros for the first time. You are being judged for every move you make or don’t make. Because, you see, the business class is like a college fraternity; people there bamboozled their way in. They don’t want amateurs joining in and spoiling the party-in-the-sky pictures. They even have a nod and smirk, as if to acknowledge each others’ wealth and power. The first-timer is clearly a misfit.
I remember my first few business trips. They were all virgin because every craft had its own wondrous gadgetry to befuddle me with. I didn’t know how the seat screens went up in BA or the massive beds went down in SIA, I wasn’t sure if the night-suit on Jet Airways was for me to keep, and I still can’t operate the Swiss Air seat-side tray no matter how often I fly with them. And I could tell, each time I tinkered with the switches trying to figure them out (qualifying for Mensa was easier), others secretly tut-tutted my plebeian existence. If they couldn't smell my middle-classed-ness on me before, they were all silently disapproving each time I pinged for the hostess.
For, there is no happiness among seasoned business class travellers. Don’t be fooled by their designer overnighter, the real heavyweight baggage is what they carry within. You have to look so positively bored and blasé that nothing short of Chuck Norris jumping into the cockpit and landing the plane safely in the middle of an active volcano would make you look up from your pink papers. Baby-bum-soft warm hand towels? Blah. A chef on-board and a wine cellar to put a Michelin-starred eatery to shame? So what! Full-flat beds with someone to sing lullabies in your mother’s voice? Ho-hum.
Nothing that the airline can offer should even mildly impress you. It’s that level on Maslow’s pyramid which comes beyond the 100% down pillows and 200+ thread-count sheets. That emptiness which comes after all the lobster has been eaten and all the Champagne drunk, but there still remain 40 minutes to landing; that’s the classic Ennui de Classe Affaires . One can tell a regular business class traveller from their deadpan expressions, one that hints that if I weren’t so important to be hurled across continents to sign a few documents, I would rather die.
Scared? You should be. An upgrade isn’t a gift, it’s a curse. It’s like being thrown to a pack of dogs who’ll kill not out of hunger but because they can. So the next time you are flying business, make it your business to know everything there’s to know. And if the wine and food and service bring on a smile of contentment, don’t.
This column is for anyone who gives an existential toss
