Hey! Look us Fly


After a long but somewhat entertained wait in the lounge room; even I once felt sleepy; I came to know about the changed terminal for my first ever flight of life. It happened finally with me. And I was now directed towards the way to board my flight. I walked down the gallery, the red carpet indeed. The gallery was a bit long and gradually I found myself inside the flight. I never came to know that it was an artificial gallery, movable and its opening was directed right into the door of flight. I expected that I will be climbing stairs to board the flight (this I did later in Hong Kong for the second flight). Finally I was in and occupied 52A seat of mine. After boarding the flight I had a very long conversation with mom. She was happy as well as sad about me going that away from her. It was an emotional moment over phone. But ultimately I had to switch it off. The flight was ready to take off now. Signals from electronic devices disrupt communication of flight with air traffic.

Cathay flight had a small screen in front of every seat. So I was updated about important statistics viz. distance between source and destination; local times of source and destination, a GPS map and cockpit view of the flight. The cockpit view was of my immense interest. I remembered “A pilgrim through the roads of Mumbai” when I had a view of the flight taking on and off the runway, from a very nearby distance on Andheri Kurla road. The cockpit view enabled me to have the best view of the linear perspective of my life. I felt “that’s a Bournville moment of my life”. Indeed it was! The aero-dynamic giant started running the runway. Through the side window I assessed the acceleration of the machine. Then a gentle push and we were in sky. The giant wings of plane, seen through the window were stretched wide open in sky. Throughout the journey they made adjustments through different panes in it to enable aero dynamicity of the fleet. The wheel shown through the cockpit view started returning back inside the flight. That was a moment before dawn in Mumbai. Around 4:55 AM we took of. Hence, it was still darkness around.

Through the window I saw myself moving away from Mumbai. It was an awesome view. It was a golden view. All the yellow street lights lit together the roads of Mumbai resembled golden laces spread and sparkled all over. Straight and curved roads with so many lights from slums and posh buildings gradually meshed together in a distant view of my Mumbai. The flight reached the clouds. Oh, some tiny rain clouds are next to me. I sensed the moisture in them. However they weren’t of that intensity which can damp Mumbai. But I was with them. Holy Smoke! And gradually I got above the clouds too. Mumbai was now faded. Now I am away from it probably for next three months. Perhaps, we crossed the Thane creek, followed by Western Ghats. Then I saw the redness in the sky. I can see SuryaDev (The Sun) behind the blanket of clouds through the cockpit view channel in the screen. There were several layers of cloud we surpassed. White clouds, grey clouds, we were all above them. It was a moment when the man-made world was in full rhythm with nature. Not above it at all. Because nature is immense and man made materialism is nothing but a part of it.

At some point of time I recalled one of my recurring dream. In those dreams I’m equipped with superpowers/ abilities. I can run very fast, I jump to run faster and observe I can float in my movements. From the terrace of my Gorakhpur house I see myself jumping towards zenith, with first jump through Sri Ram Vanvasi Hostel building. Initially I gets amateur approach but gradually I excels and see myself crossing Atlantic ocean. Well, that recurrent dream is similar as well as different with my flight experience. Well, this dream is just one of the many reasons because of which I strongly associate myself very much with Superheroes.

Gradually, the sun got strong and it was advised by the on board staff (Air hostess-of course!) to close the window cover. I enjoyed some recorded videos and some radio channels. Omelet served in breakfast was nice. I slept and reached Bangkok after 3000 kms of air journey through maximum height attained above sea level around 9000 kms. We almost touched the stratosphere all above the troposphere. It crossed Maharashtra, Deccan, MP, Orissa and Bay of Bengal. It was all displayed through the GPS map in the front screen.

Bangkok was the only halt for the flight before Hong Kong. It was day time and the aerial view of Bangkok was fabulous. Bangkok had too much of water bodies, I wonder it was recent rains or it has that much of water anytime. I saw straight and parallel roads meshed throughout and many building stood in discipline with majority of them in white with orange tops. We passed some golf course. Golf always fascinates me, and top view of them made me curious for not missing any inch of it. Gradually the height reduced between us and the earth and we landed on Bangkok airport.

It was a halt for 45 minutes, some cleaning, some alighted, some boarded, change in on board staff and we finally resumed voyage towards Hong Kong. Ariel view of Mumbai was glazing, Bangkok’s view was fabulous but view of Hong Kong was MIND BLOWING. It appeared every building in HK was a sky scrapper only. They all stood in as in uniform and in discipline. As if they were all monitoring Macau. Somewhere in between there was a building very distinct, certainly the tallest building in Hong Kong. Hong Kong is surrounded by water from all sides, with coastal mountains adding value to the Aerial view of the “Asia’s World city”* There were numerous boats and water sports can be seen from the sky of Hong Kong. The airport, which is very vast in area itself, is on an island. It is quite away from the main land which is called as Macau. Finally my first ever flight journey came to a memorable end in some 6 hours.

The Hong Kong airport is huge, and it has world class infrastructures. There was an escalator like arrangement to enable people to speed up their walk. I call it a flat escalator, which enabled folks to walk down the corridors with faster speeds. I had to board another flight for Manila. It was on some far off terminal of HK airport. I was surprised to know that there was also an internal train in airport. I had to take one such train (it was like a metro train) to reach security point for my flight’s terminal. And then a Bus with no seats took us all to board the Manila flight.

RaZZevZ.com/ Travelogue

* Asia’s World City: A promotion of Hong Kong by Cathay Pacific. Cathay Pacific is headquartered in Hong Kong.
Blog title is taken from movie "The Kid"

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  2. When I wrote this blog, I mistook Macau as the main island of Hong Kong.

    Thankfully, an year later (June 2010 and August 2010) i had opportunities to visit Macau (Vegas of East). Macau is also an SAR under China, like Hong Kong

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