The Great Indian flying joint Gujju family

It was a bright sunny (discounting one burst of heavy rain) day. Jignes, Sailes, Rames along with their better (and seemingly stronger) halves and their kids decided to travel from Kolkata to Kochi. And being the well to do types decided to travel Jet airways.

Unfortunately on this given day some bright lady at the check in counter inadvertently decided to spread them out over a few rows one of them being the emergency exit. By a strange coincidence, it was this same day that a hard working gentleman who had worked 2 weeks continuously decided to take an emergency exit window seat on the Kol - Mumbai flight. He considered himself to be the types who wanted to see the cloudy sky and all. His name was Pranay Harish Rao, a humble Asst. Brand manager.

Anyway Jignes et all landed up in the same flight with Pranay and sat just next to him. What ensued was most interesting. First Rames, Jignes's younger brother decided that his slender frame required more space than Pranay's much healthier one. Pranay, generally the peace loving types (unless he's playing football) gave him the entire armrest which encouraged Rames to push into Pranay's ribs. Upon receiving this jab, Pranay looked at Rames and telepathically communicated the consequences of trying to push into his body which had Rames politely conceding space.

Suddenly Sailes realizing the lack of an in flight entertainment system decided to wear his new Bose headphones which were connected to his brick sized Nokia Nsomething. Unfortunately due to some failure in the system (the exact reason still unknown) the music blared loudly from his phone speakers. This was when the airhostesses ran to him and convinced him that his device, flight mode or not should be switched off. This was also the first instance when Pranay having been woken up from his sleep rather rudely considered reducing their further flight expenses by the price of one ticket.

Then Sailes having failed in his first attempt at general entertainment decided to get his young nephew into action. If it were not enough that his nephew was generally a little loud, Sailes and Rames decided to add their own voices to what was the Kathiawari version of Metallica. It was at this moment that Pranay having been tutored by the nice airhostess lady on how to open the emergency exit window considered opening the exit and feeding Kailes and Rames to the engines. Fortunately the kid scared by the strange sounds ran back to his parents.

Pranay had just heaved a sigh of relief when the kid's mother decided that since the air hostesses had cleared the snacks (pronounced snakes), they should have some gupshup in the middle of the plane. Since this was the only opportunity the poor people had had in all their years together to open their hearts out to each other, their loud conversation and slightly louder laughter was absolutely necessary. Pranay by then was wide awake. Sleep was a small sacrifice when compared to hearing about little Bhaves and his trials at potty training.

Unfortunately Bhaves had not practiced enough of what he had just learnt and his poor mother had to take him and get him cleaned. Pranay felt a great sense of pity for the lady who would have to soon clean potty especially since she was dressed in her Sunday best probably a designer copy of one of the female protagonists in her favourite Saans Bahu serial.

The lack of entertainment had lulled Pranay into a false sense of security and a sleep with dreams of this most wonderful woman when thud! and he was woken up by this strange piece of turbulence. Thud! it happened again. strangely the turbulence had missed both his neighbours. Thud!. It was then that Pranay realized that Akhiles, probably a not so distant cousin of Bhavis suddenly realized that he had contributed almost nothing to the events till then. So he most delightfully decided to kick the seat right in front of him to give Pranay that extra bit of entertainment.

Pranay decided to try and reason with the little angel and looked back only to look into the eyes of his mother. Wildlife enthusiasts simply over react when they speak about the fierce maternal instincts of elephants, etc. The look in Akhiles's mother's eyes would make mothers of any other species of animal seem like wimps. She had had to pay an extravagantly high amount of money for a kid who could hardly fill out half his seat. If he wanted to kick the seat in front of him to keep himself happy, he bloody well could.

Thus, seeing his courage ebb to a dangerously low level, Pranay decided to sleep in between his neighbours conversations across rows and the periodical and methodical assault on his back.

Suddenly the plane on it's descent to Mumbai entered one rough air pocket which ensured that the plane shook like a phone on vibrator. Sailes, Jignes and family were shaken. Pranay experienced flyer that he was nonchalantly stretched his arms and took off his blankets while the plane shook till there was a moment when only white clouds could be seen outside the window and the plane seemed to be immobile. Loads of thoughts ran through Pranay's mind, not least of all undiluted pleasure and absolute bliss. He saw Jignes n family turning as white as the cloud outside while he leafed through the newspaper.

The plane landed lightly and Pranay smiled. He had taken on the great Indian flying joint Gujju family and (courtesy an act of god) had emerged victorious. Nothing else in life could ever faze him when Thud! Akhiles realized that his legs were idle too long. Pranay, jumped out of his seat and ran out with his strolley and his packet of sweets. He had learnt his lesson.

Never mess with the Joint family.

Luv,

P.R.