When Iraq invaded the Kuwaits in 1991, the almighty USA was so caught up in our bully on the playground imperialist giddiness, we failed to deliver the knockout one-two that would have driven Sadaam to his sorry-ass knees. "Okay dick-weed, here's the deal: We'll stop pummeling you with our arsenal of smart bombs if, and only if, you agree to take over the daily operations of Kuwaiti Airlines." That's it, you delusional prick.ÿ A no strings attached gift from your American brethren and this time, no tricks up our diabolical sleeves.
I have no idea what the general Kuwaiti populace is drawn to. I do know that their work week runs Saturday through Wednesday and I have a pretty firm grasp on what they eat, the religion they by and large embrace and I know that they have more oil than Vegas has peep shows. They also seem to have more than their fair share of beautiful women; women who have rubbed themselves against the fabric of so-called western world sophistication without being sullied by its tackier elements. And I know one more thing: their airline might as well be run by the Keystone Kops, brain damaged division. The planes are cold, drafty and hopelessly outdated. Maintenance? Minimal at best. Nothing works. The toilets won't flush, my foot rest was sheered off at the base and forget about watching a movieÿ?ÿtheÿ electric motor that drives the screen to drop doesn't engage. There are no headphones and the closest thing to music was the non-stop wailing of over a dozen babies as they gulped for air through the purple-poison haze of 43 rows of chain smoking nicotine freaks.
My flight was scheduled to depart from Chicago at 7:15 in the morning and like a sucker, I arrived an hour and a half early as advised. I at least had the good sense to call ahead and was assured that Flight 116 non-stop to Amsterdam was right on time. At exactly 7:45, we were instructed to board for takeoff. I figure anytime you're stuck with flying out of the daily debacle that is O'Hare International, anything less than two hours behind schedule is a moral victory. Killer legal weed, the love of my life (or so I thought at the time) and 10 glorious days of pure European decadence were only an ocean away.
We take our seats and within moments, one of the battalion of baby brats right across the aisle from me burps up a lapful of gross-out goo that looks like something between bile and a liquefied Hershey bar all over his mother's white cotton pants suit. She's the world's most ill-prepared mother. She's got no towels, no baby wipes, not so much as a lousy Kleenex and she starts calling her baby names like "stupid little shit-head" and "worthless bastard" and airline personnel are nowhere to be seen, like vanished. By now, some of the passengers are gagging and puking too, and the baby is screaming like he's been dipped in boiling oil and still no sign of the crew in sight. There's a man with ping-pong sized growths all over his face sitting in the very rear corner of the plane trying to stay invisible and finally, reluctantly, when he can't stand another second of the shrieking and the piercing stench, he struggles to his feet and tries to hand a Kleenex to the near hysterical mother. She recoils in horror and yells with a voice that sounds like gravel in a blender; "You can keep your disease ridden tissues you filthy leper! Can somebody please help me here?" The man, this poor, frightened, sweet soul of a man who made the Elephant Man look like Paul Newman at his most dashing and was just trying to lend assistance, slinks back to his seat and covers up his hideous face with hands that look like shriveled bacon. Finally, a prim flight attendant with a Cleopatra haircut and an undisguised expression of disgust, emerges from her hiding place and tosses a soggy towel in the general direction of the mayhem. Wordlessly, she sneers and disappears again.
Two hours crawl by. No music, no explanations, not even so much as a crummy cocktail as a filled to capacity jet-liner perches on the tarmac like a giant, dead bird. Outside, the thermometer hovers at 25 below. Finally, a catering truck wheels up to the rear hatch and the door swings open. Arctic air rushes along the fuselage and three stewardesses scurry up the aisle like cockroaches, seeking warmth. A small army of expressionless catering employees begin their maneuvers, methodically loading tonight's meal of glorified TV dinners into several racks of warming ovens. The temperature in the back of the plane drops almost instantly to the near freezing mark and within seconds, you could see your own breath. Needless to say, Mickey Mouse Airlines Incorporated doesn't have a single blanket onboard. This is what you get for enlisting the services of the only airline left in the universe that still allows smoking during a flight.
At 10:45, a full three and a half hours after the scheduled departure time, the captain delivers a garbled apology in a thick Arabic accent but still doesn't bother with an explanation. The ancient aircraft shudders in protest as our fearless leader applies full throttle to the power source, an overworked Rolls Royce that has surely been in action since the Eisenhower administration. Something didn't feel right....ÿ I've flown enough to know when an aircraft ought to be achieving lift-off and this flimsy, vomit soaked beast clearly should have been in the air by now. I glanced at one of the flight attendants and could tell by the look on her perfect little face that I wasn't the only one who thought we were about to die. We barely cleared the fence at the end of the runway and almost clipped a grove of oak trees due east of the airport. Babies scream, the leper bows his head in prayer and 43 rows of nicotine junkies from all over the world simultaneously fire up their poison of choice.
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