Third Hand
Another “safe landing” today on Garuda Airlines, screeching into a Sulawesi airstrip with a burst tire. Passengers didn’t panic until they exited to see the welcoming parade of fire trucks & ambulances. No harm done.
Garuda is the name of a giant mythological bird, which in Hindu / Buddhist lore is the god Vishnu’s mount. The airline’s recent series albatross aperies—burst tires, ‘hard landings’, outright crashes—slanders the mythical bird in ways that might inspire fears of divine vengeance.
As Spaulding Gray, may he rest in peace, once said of Garuda air: he “won’t fly on any airline where the pilots believe in reincarnation.”
On our one-hour Adam Air flight to Bali, E noticed two old signs still posted in the Indonesian airplane’s bathroom: one was American, warning of a US dollar fine for smoking; one read: ‘Tampering with smoke detectors is prohibited by Icelandic law.’
Good: third-hand plane. Nevertheless, we arrived without incident.
Garuda is the name of a giant mythological bird, which in Hindu / Buddhist lore is the god Vishnu’s mount. The airline’s recent series albatross aperies—burst tires, ‘hard landings’, outright crashes—slanders the mythical bird in ways that might inspire fears of divine vengeance.
As Spaulding Gray, may he rest in peace, once said of Garuda air: he “won’t fly on any airline where the pilots believe in reincarnation.”
On our one-hour Adam Air flight to Bali, E noticed two old signs still posted in the Indonesian airplane’s bathroom: one was American, warning of a US dollar fine for smoking; one read: ‘Tampering with smoke detectors is prohibited by Icelandic law.’
Good: third-hand plane. Nevertheless, we arrived without incident.
posted by Anne E. Campisi at 10:53 AM
1 Comments:
How "pure" must a culture be to be "authentic"?
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