Edisi Teringat Zaman Lalu...

Waalaikumsalam uolssss.....ye, kepada yang dah memberi salam dengan pertanyaan, bila nak hapdate blog. Wahh wahh..idok ke nak Tanya, makji dah makan? Meh saya hantar kepci delivery sekotak.

 

Sejujurnya..hik hik hik..I mmg la busy. Nak tulis pun takde benda yang sensasi nak ditulis. Kalau start menulis kang, ada pulak yang terasa I tulis pasal depa and start beremosi. See, cerita hidup kita serupa dgn cerita hidup orang lain kenkadang kannn? Watak je beza. Kalau kita ingat laki kita ja drama queen, laki orang lain pun ada drama jugak malah agaknya drama besaq ngalahkan Chef Wan.

 

Kita gaduh or hangat hati dgn BFF kita, orang lain pun gitu gak masalah nya. We may have different subject of issues altogether but between people, tetap akan ada issue.

 

Blog ni tak ada manfaat lebih-lebih lagi apa yang I terasa nak tulis adalah kutukan terhadap orang-orang yang menyakitkan hati I. But again, as much as I ni cepat rasa sakit hati kat orang, macam tu lah juga orang lain kat I.

 

So marilah kita menulis tentang benda-benda yang boleh dijadikan iktibar. Ye lah sangat.

 

You know, suatu ketika dahulu saya pernah memegang kerjaya serupa Mak Piah. Contracy saya dua tahun saja dgn kompeni tu. Tapi saya hanya sempat berkhidmat selama 18 bulan.

 

Kerjaya itu amatlah tak disenangi oleh aruah Appa. His insolence towards the career is somewhat generalised. Mungkin jugak dia berdoa supaya jodoh I dgn syarikat tu tak lama.

 

Tapikan uolsss.....kalaulah tak kerana pengalaman dalam kompeni tu, I rasa, idoklah I menjadi manusia yang macam sekarang. Dahulu kala, I amatlah sombong ya...well still is, but ada jua masa dan ketika nya. Dulu I tak suka jumpa orang, senyum jauh sekali dan dok lah menyorok bila orang dating rumah. In school, I was the last one dapat kawan. Dah nak dekat hujung tahun, baru orang sedar I ni wujud. Masuk asrama sangatlah menyeksakan. Sampai ada orang cakap dengan I, I ni dalam hitlist untuk dibuli sebab tak tegur senior.

 

To those who envied us the kebaya ketat ladies, well don't be. You don't know what it was like to get past stressful days when all you want to do is cry. Wahh wahh....

 

Okay..aokay lahhhh. Flight attendant it's not a BAD job. There are always two sides to something. I came home to a recession period. I don't come back to gomen or GLC office. I had to apply for jobs and lucky enough to be accepted in that bank depan restoran Syed tu. How ancient this was, bank tu pun dah melingkup.

I ada love-hate relationship with the job. On the surface, memang lah glamer ya...ko malam ni fly gi mana nyehh? Ohh I ada London flight gittew. I got the pleasure to have breakfast in Tokyo and dinner at LAX.

 

But the work is ya tuhan. Yes I earned minimum of SGD 1800 (in the 90's ye) but I can tell you, I have never work any harder than that! Flight crew adalah juga...

 

1. Waitress

2. Safety Officer

3. Baggage Porter

4. Bar Tender

5. Toilet Cleaner

6. Baby Sitter

7. Policeman

 

If you are not good at taking photos, you are still expected to operate a camera. Syukur pada tuahn, masa tu idoknya ada digital camera yang ko boleh try test tengok gambor kau, kalau tak, sokmo ko kena buat dua tiga take, kan?

 

All you can think about was, bila la bond aku nak habis nehhh sebab aku nak resign dah hehhh. Training nya 3 bulan ya. Please don't think that training tu hanya mengajar cara2 tolak trolley. Ko ada exams segala yang passing mark nya ialah 80%. Tu belum lagi trainers dok drumming into you how you need to look after yourselves as it is part of corporate image.

I enjoyed flying during my the first few months. I enjoyed the work, probably because it was new to me and quite challenging. Selepas itu, ianya menjadi macam SIAL! At times I was sooo sick of it. The agony of the irregular eating/sleeping hours, ko rasa hidup kau bak pesakit HIV jaa...demam tak baik-baik. Before probation, ko takut nak amik MC ye sebab takut kena extend. Ko kena kilat kasut your ward leader...sebab dialah akan menentukan ko pass probation ke tak. Crew dalam probation dipanggil P Plates dan dimasa ko memegang lessen P ni, adalah haram jika ko amik MC. I have days when I really have to drag my feet to work. Ko mandi bersabun banyak mana pun ko tetap gak rasa badan ko tak segar. Kan Mak Piah?

 

Sometimes for me it was bad that I akan nangis masa mandi dan tetengah blow rambut. I cried because I dreaded going to work, I dreaded the work itself- the nonstop labour intensive work where you literally walk to London.

 

Nak pulak masa standby. Standby meaning that control centre could call you up for any flight, especially if a crew had reported sick on that particular flight so you have to take her place. Ko jadi patung cendana tau kat rumah...nak keluar beli eskerim pun takut. Tu belum lagi ko dapat flight bangang....ie turnaround flight.

I don't know about other airlines but I am sure our works is almost identical. It is a super labour intensive!! Crew will enter the aircraft about 20 minutes before boarding of passengers. In 20 minutes here's your checklist...

•Set up newspaper trolley, cut all the newspapers meant for 200+ people and display them nicely

•Arrange the menu cards

•Dress the toilets with moisturiser, edt, toilet paper and rolls, make sure lavatory call light is working

• Combine headset bags, 3 into 2 because 1 bag only has 50 headsets and there are probably more than 120 people in the cabin.

• Heat up towels

• Do a security sweep for the cabins

 

Crew jantan..lain lak keroje nya ye.

 

Stewardess are the ones who face and serve passengers most. Our duties are all cabin-related. Jantans are in the galleys. Macam chef tapi chef kepada benda yang dah siap masak. They prepared drinks too. The stewardesses are the ones who face the wrath of passengers most of the time.

 

If you must know, stewardesses aren't allowed be seen in their uniform apart from the airport. On the way balik kalau ko rasa nak tapau Nasik ayam kat SS19 tu, toksah mimpi okay? Buang sampah depan rumah pakai uniform pun takleh. So, sila lah tahu yang cerita Pilot Café tu adalah penipu dimana stewardess bley pulak dok berganding dgn Captain. Mau mati meh?

 

Bila touch down, all you want to do is to go home, remove your makeup and take a shower and sleep. You know the feeling of being so tired to the point where you can't sleep? Happened to me so many times. When I get home I cry and remove makeup at the same time in my bed, when it takes me so long to fall asleep. I think there was countless times and unknowingly I cried myself to sleep. It's that bad.

 

By the way, I was such (still is) a docile person. I jarang kena zassss dengan senior crew. You know, hierarchy is a big thing in the airlines. Nak makan pun kena tunggu lepas senior ko kata, okay..u go and eat now. SQ. Like even when you eat you must ask your senior to eat first etc). I didn't get bullied or anything. I do know of other crews who did get it hard from the baju hijau. Err, kak Long pakai baju hijau ye...kita budak hingusan pakai yang kaler biru.

 

In this job, still in your blue kebaya, don't bother argue or explain your actions. For example if your Kak Long asks you "why you do this??" And if you try explaining yourself, it is seen as being argumentative and defensive. You should just say "sorry I won't do it again". Even if you are right, you are wrong sometimes. It doesn't make sense and I hate this.

And if your boss tells you off and tells you how to do things the "correct" way, you just got to just say  "oh I'm so sorry. Thank you for sharing with me I will take note". I cannot stand it. Obviously I don't mean it but I HAVE to do this to survive.

I tell you, passengers are easier to deal with as compared to the crew. Once you have awesome crew, it's considered a good flight even though you have nasty passengers. We fear passengers sometimes. We cannot say no. This is really bad because it has led to some passengers being so spoilt, unreasonable and they demand for the moon.

Let me tell you ya...local and SEA routes have the highest complaints rate. Ko buat flight Europe sector, aman damaiiiii. Orang Tanah besar, orang Tanah gersang gelap..and orang melayu kalau mengomplen....wahhhh nombor satu. Kalau ada nombor yang awal dari nombor satu maka itulah dia.

How do I handle nasty passengers? When someone is nice to me, I will be nice to them too. Kindness begets kindness, it's really natural for you to treat someone who is nice to you the same way. But for those who are rude to me, I will still treat them with some respect cause after all they are paying customers however obviously I won't be as nice to them as I am to really nice passengers. It's so difficult to be nice to nasty people.

Ada passenger yang buat ko macam....ye lah sebab dia rasa dia bayar flight tu maka dia bayar kau lah...nak mintak ayor, idoklah kata please ke menda. Picit lampu, got attended and seraya gampang anak satu dia akan cakap, APPLE Juice !

 

Tu belum lagi Yenna yang terasa dia set-set educated ber Englishkan Downtown Abbey yang buat remark condescending seperti, aren't you not going to offer to hang my coat off? Dia tu dah lah naik class EY aje ya?

 

Business class are a lot easier because all they want to do is sleep. Semuanya supermodel yang taknak makan...sampai ko pulak rasa takut dia pengsan sebab tak makan. Class EY pulak..hok olohhh...call lights bergemerlapan macam pokok Xmas adanya.

 

Passengers Mat Salleh adalah paling cool....suka jenjalan datang galley dan mintak air. Passenger Tanah Besar? Duduk sejengkal je dari galley, tetap gak tekan call lights ye. Fookey sangat.

 

On top of all these, I tell you...I really learned a lot. My tolerance capacity tank has increased. So much I am able to tahan my current job now.

 

I am also thankful that for this work, I travelled so much. I did fall into a bad trap dan ngabihkan duit shopping. I saved a lot of money.

 

I do come across young and bitchy crew who think they are good and right at everything. Now with FB segala, macam macam luahan perasaan yang you boleh baca. Hek lehhh. You think you so important ka? Don't fight the world la sayang.

 

Think again, kalau pangkat susah sangat nak naik during those time you keep on banging about how you can just tell people off yang tak kena dek mata kau, perhaps ko buat scene reflection sikit. Analyse sikit mulut kau yang macam longkang tu. Humble pie doesn't taste nice but, it is edible.

 

So yes...I appreciate little things and how I can spot air around people's head from miles away.

 

I learn to apply make up on...(not that I practise it anyway), buat bun cantik2...and maintain fringe cantik2. My weight is never 61kg above sebab kebaya do not come stretchable.

 

So...that's all for now. Yes..kerjaya glamer..but ko hidup dalam macam dlm goldfish bowl most of the times. Expected to look nice and moving about.