I was on a long haul flight. Four Russian sailors were seated in the row in front of me. What could possibly go wrong?
Before we had even taken off the flight attendant came round and offered me free drinks.
“Trust me” she said, firing a glance at the four men in their matching blue-striped sailor t-shirts, “When those guys get going you are going to want a little something to take the edge off. Besides, they usually drink all the booze. So you had better get some now”.
I ordered a whisky and asked her to tell me more.
“They’re Russian sailors”, she said. “They sail oil tankers across the Pacific and then fly back to pick up the next tanker. Every month they fly with us. It is always the same routine…”
As I discovered first hand, their routine happened in the following order:
- Drink an insane amount of hard liquor. I suspect they had already started before they even got on the airplane.
- Hang out near the lavatory and try to pick up women. This is difficult when (a) you are blocking access to the toilet for women who need to pee, (b) you have too much chest hair, (c) you behave like a Russian-accented Burt Reynolds, and (d) you absolutely reek of booze. Just an observation.
- Hug your buddies and sing Russian sailor songs very, very loudly. Continue to drink.
- Throw up into to your air sick bag while your buddies laugh at you. You laugh at them when it is their turn to throw up.
- Take off all clothes except underwear. No kidding: they all stripped down to their undies.
- Get on your knees, facing your airline seat, and pray to God in Russian while moaning and periodically throwing up.
I asked the flight attendant about the clothing removal.
“Yeah. I don’t know about that part”, she said. “We can’t tell if that is a Russian thing or a sailor thing”.
[If you know someone else who might enjoy a lighthearted story to begin their week, kindly forward them WordsfortheWeary. The more the merrier.]
[Image credit: Quikmeme]