The look of Catch Me If You Can
Posted on 06/08/2005 6:17:39 AM PDT by Constitution Day
Fly Me a River
The King Hussein Center happens to be stocked with lissome young ladies,” wrote Jay Nordlinger the other day. He was reporting for National Review Online from the Davos Middle Eastern confab in Jordan, and, although he had many insightful observations to make about the big geopolitical socioeconomic questions of our time, it was the “lissome young ladies” who caught my eye, as evidently they had caught his. Jay’s no slouch at the in-depth investigative-journalism stuff, so, warming to his theme, he went on to report that many of the “hostesses” were wearing the uniform of Royal Jordanian Airlines. Ah, yes, I sighed contentedly, as the memories came flooding back. In recent years, my flights to the Middle East have begun with a little US Airways twin-prop down to Boston or New York — no “cabin service” at all; they don’t have any on their bigger planes either, but at least on the twin-props there’s no hatchet-faced “flight attendant” in shiny stretch pants and flat shoes shuffling along the aisle doling out mini-bags of mini-pretzels to remind you of all the “cabin service” you’re not getting. In Boston or New York, I switch to Virgin — much better: proper “trolley dollies” in bright smart red skirts and heels and the best kind of peppy Estuary English accents that make you feel like you’re Austin Powers and they’re at least prepared to pretend you’re shagadelic. And then in London, for the final leg (as it were), it’s Royal Jordanian to Amman — bliss: “air hostesses” in dapper stylish uniforms that, like Singapore and the other great Asian airlines, are an artful combination of native elements from local culture and retro cool from our own. East is East and West is West and ne’er the twain shall meet, but on the best national carriers from east of Suez they come pretty close. The Royal Jordanian gals had our man Nordlinger waxing nostalgic. “These uniforms are a real throwback, to the America of the 1950s or so,” he wrote. “You remember that movie in which Leonardo DiCaprio played that conman, who posed as a pilot for Eastern or something? You remember that bevy of fresh, eager, fetching stewardesses (and in those days, you could use the word ‘stewardess’ — ‘flight attendant’ was a long way off)?”
If you want to see America’s worst-dressed gay men, take a plane.
Catch Me If You Can, the DiCaprio caper in question, does a grand job of evoking that era — the jet-age glamour of the air terminals with the flying-saucer shapes; Sinatra singing “Come Fly with Me” with that marvelous Billy May intro that sounds like an orchestral Boeing taxi-ing down the runway and taking off into the blue; and, of course, the gals.
Which begs the question: Where did it all go? In America, that is. U.S. air travel is the exception that proves the rule about American service: In a Welsh restaurant or Austrian department store, I long for American waitresses and sales clerks. But on USAir or Northwest or Continental, I pine fondly for Royal Jordanian or British or Thai Airways. I yield to no one in the amount of derision I’m willing to heap on “Old Europe,” but, if it’s a choice between Delta and Air France, or United and Lufthansa, I’m with Jacques and Gerhard in wanting to put as much distance as possible between me and the arrogant bullying unilateralist Yank, if only when airborne and pushing a cart of Clamato cans.
Two years ago, an American Express survey revealed that 55 percent of customers had found a “noticeable decline” in cabin service since 9/11, which is pretty amazing because it was a good nine-tenths down the abyss before 9/11. The Wall Street Journal reported the dissatisfactions of “flight attendants” — “A lot of us,” said Glenda Talley of US Airways, “are in a terrible mood before we even set foot on the plane.” “There’s more stress to the job,” complained Kristi Tucker of Delta. “As human beings we can only take so much,” said someone from United. Yeah, fly me a river, baby.
Or how about this? According to flight attendant René Foss, “It didn’t take long after Sept. 11 for people to start acting like complete idiots again.” The first sign you’re acting like a complete idiot is when you book a ticket with these guys. The Journal proposed eight improvements airlines could introduce — more legroom, junk the cart, predictable stuff. But no one thought to address the most obvious defect — that U.S. airlines look just awful, beginning with the shiny shapeless prison-warden garb of their staff, the product of some malign combination of unionization and feminism. I’m not being sexist here — if you want to see America’s worst-dressed gay men, take a plane; when the networks have exhausted every other lame makeover reality-show concept, they should do Queer Eye for the Fly Guy. But the point is, for many folks, an airline ticket is one of the biggest single payments we make other than for a car or house, and in return we get a grubby bus ride with seat restraints.
True, many of those spiffy foreign airlines are either state-owned or de facto monopolies. But America’s federally-bailed-out basket-case carriers aren’t exactly shining exemplars of ruthless capitalism. And their government-subsidized contempt for the public starts with the look — the look of the planes and the look of the staff, the look that says, “Who needs a look?” When the Arabs understand customer service better than you do, you know you’ve got a problem.
First class is simply NOT what it used to be, especially within the continental United States. The level of service has deteriorated remarkably in the last few years. For three to five times the price of a cattle class ticket, I expect better.
You just don't get it. The airlines are going bankrupt because of the employee union demands. The snotty service doesn't make the public feel any sympathy. Plus, the public now resents that tax dollars are needed to bail out ludicrous pension plans that the thugs extorted. Your smugness never ends and certainly isn't appealing to most hard working people that are forced to fly on the lousy US airlines. No one is demanding anything other than courtesy, which you obviously feel you are too superior to give to a paying customer.
Wrong. They are going under because they borrowed too much money, bought too many planes, kept their old planes flying too long and didn't hedge enough fuel when oil was $30/bbl. The cost of labour is the smallest expense item on the ledger.
Do the math- the salaries of the aircrew on a 100-seat jet (two pilots, two cabin crew) would come to roughly $200k to $300k per year. A typical short-haul schedule means two round trips per day, meaning the crew will schlep 400 people around the country on a typical workday. Assuming that the average crewmember works 200 days in a year, that means that $300k paid to the crew was covered by 80,000 one-way pax. Which means that the services of that hostie, whose primary responsibility is the protection of human life and whom you so desire to vituperate, plus the services of the other crew on board, are costing you the princely sum of $3.75.
Exactly. Some "choice" that is... Hardly anyone pays for those seats, most are frequent flyers who upgrade. It drives me nuts that people use "first class" as some standard. Its a sad standard. I expect what is in first class throughout the entire plane. When I'm paying $400 to fly from San Antonio to Orlando round trip, I want something a little more than feeling like a sardine having pretzels (yeah, not peanuts anymore... more PC crap) tossed at me. If I wanted that, I'd fly Southwest! People don't pay more just for the heck of it. They do it because they expect more. Until the "big three" get this... they will continue to go down hill.
I know but I've been in the mood for a good rant all day and haven't posted any in ages. I'm tempted to thank him for inspiring me to let off some steam :-D
So that's why you're so smug. You think federal law will protect your a$$ from outside competition no matter how poor the service you dish up to the public. Considering the financial state of most domestic airlines nowadays, I wouldn't count on it.
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
Yeah but can they do CPR? ;-)
(make that 92)
Heh...you have a good point, but there is a valid distinction. Hooters Air flights have the number of trained flight attendants required by law, plus two Hooters hostesses who have no training but who will wear tight clothes for probably low wages. Maybe if airlines had flight attendants who were the FAA-required cabin safety representatives plus differently-uniformed "hostesses" whose job it was to get drinks and listen to whiny businessmen, people would understand the distinction between the primary safety role and secondary comfort service role of flight attendants.
There was once a day when SWA attendants wore orange hot pants and boots.
And, boy, did they look good wearing them!
Since you made the effort of researching the cabotage reg I'm disappointed that you didn't also read the thread more carefully. Neither turbo nor I have any involvement with the industry beyond the role of self-loading freight.
Considering the financial state of most domestic airlines nowadays, I wouldn't count on it.
If by "most domestic airlines" you are referring to the two (out of several national and hundreds of regional carriers) that are at risk of insolvency, you should realize that the rest of the industry would take about five minutes to rebook any pax left stranded by them.
Serves you right for posting a photo in the middle of a good old-fashions flame war.
But seriously, can she do CPR?
I agree. All the glamor has been taken out of flying.
Too bad. I was really looking forward to having a heart attack while the girl in pos 92 was on duty.
How hard can it be? Afterall, she's a trained wing server.
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