September Update

Standby Month has been gruesome!

My first trip, i was at home waiting and crewing happened to call at the worst possible moment when i couldnt make the next train, which meant i woud miss the next crew bus from gatwick....long story short, i was way later to the airport than the allowed 2 hours... so i got rolled onto a dubai flight.

was actually the best thing that could have happened since i havent been there before. Was a bit of a killer arriving there during Ramadan...it meant i couldnt have a cigarette until we were actually in our hotel room... bugger!

But wow! what a room they gave us.

At night, in the one and only restaurant that was open, even then we had to wait unti 7pm before they would serve us alcohol... oh well.. when in rome...

The buffet dinner at the hotel was awesome... and i dont think i have ever eaten so much.... oysters, lobster, prawns, steak...... i must have gone back about 9 times to fill my plate.

my 2nd trip was a quick shuttle to New York... only there for 16 hours... but the highlight of my tri was i actually got to close the rear left hand door of the aircraft. We Never get to close or opens doors..ever... so this was a real treat!
(we only practice opening the doors in emergency drills in a rig never on the real aircraft...in case you wondered)

On the down side... we got our rosters for October.. and the dreaded time has finally arrived. My annual recurrent exams. The yearly exams that all flight attendants dread. If we fail these exams we no longer have a job. They are gruelling to say the least, there are 4 major exams, and a whole day of practical exercises to get thru..including all kinds of emergency evac situations, cabin fires, decompression, dangerous goods drills.....pilot incapitation, emergency opening of all door types on all aircraft types.... shame is we dont get to go down the slide again... bugger that.. that was way too much fun.

so the next 4 weeks are going to be filled with study...the exams are quite hard so you have to know every line of the manuals.

just as well i have practiced my reading. i have recently discovered a series of books by Stephanie Meyers. The Twilight saga.. and lord if i havent become addicted. I have read all 4 books in 5 days. thats 3x600 pages and 1 x700 pages.
The first book is due to be released as a movie in nov, but ima bit worried they will not capture the true essence of the book.. oh well.. ill still go see it.

As luck wud have it, scott requested a Sydney trip, which is 9 days,and wouldnt you know it, they gave it to him, exactly during my exams.. so i will be faced to do my first recurrent alone without any support. i cant tell you how pissed off i was at this, but i am used to having to deal with most things on my own so i will just muddle thru. it wud have been nice to have him here to support me as i will be stressed and terrified, but i guess i have fallen into the trap/lure of having someone to depend upon and support me, where i have usually in the past been so fiercely independant and un-needing of bolstering from others. So its a good reality check for me.

time to go hit the manuals i guess....

What Dan did in august

Just to prove i have waaaaaay too much time on my hands, here is a vid clip of my journeys in August

Whilst i always try to be tolerant of other cultures, i have to admit, jamaica was the worst trips i have ever been on. its so dangerous there we cant leave our hotel. Add on top of this they are extremely violent towards homosexuals, and are white racist to the extreme too. so you can imagine the fun we had on the flights.

we fly into montego bay, stay a night and then transfer as passengers on board an air jamaica flight to kingston and then stay the night before crewing home. The air Jamaica flight takes 20 mins, but can you believe it takes us 6 hours to actually do it.... with the airports being soooooo bad, with long long lines for everything. we were in the check in queue for 2 hours.

managed to finally get into manhattan this month and fell in love with the place.

st Lucia was great too.... we got a 4 hour catamaran booze cruise....i was so drunk when i got off that thing....lol