Terrified, back rigid the young lady held the aircraft arm rests with a death grip. With eyes glazed forward she sat unmoving throughout the entire flight. Did I say young? She was little more than a girl, perhaps a teen. I sat next to my temporary traveling companion and tried conversing with her but she didn’t hear or see me. I doubt if she saw anything though her intense concentration.

It was a short flight but I had plenty of time to inspect my fellow traveler. She was more than pretty. Actually with her smooth skin and taut, athletic body beautiful is the word I’d use. Dressed in a bright orange native costume of some type she made a striking impression even while sitting and obviously scared (I couldn’t find a picture that really illustrates her costume. The wedding dress of the couple shown above is somewhat of the same style but my companions dress was more colorful with more elaborate designs.).

This was the start of one of the many interesting encounters that occurred during my frequent business travels. At first I was seduced by my frequent but necessary travel trips. Fly the skies and see the world! Sounds inviting but the reality was somewhat less exciting (all cities tend to look similar to the business traveler; a room with four featureless walls, a conference table in the middle and a ceiling with florescent lighting) but at times no less interesting. Before I was disabled I worked as a consultant using my physics background to trouble shoot a variety of commercial and government programs. This necessitated frequent air travel on my part and in the process I acquired a number of interesting stories; some of which can even be verified by grandma Oddball (someday I’ll get her to tell you our armadillo story!).

In the early days of our marriage I usually had to take “day” trips where I boarded the plane in the morning, flew to our clients, and then returned home that night. Back then air travel was far more relaxed than now. No security to speak of and seldom were the planes fully occupied. In fact the late night (red-eye) flights were so empty I usually could put the arm rests up and sprawl across the seats and use them as a makeshift bed to get some sleep.

Unfortunately, at first, I had to actually travel in “business” attire. This often created some confusion in airports where people invariably confused me with an airport employee probably because I looked quite young for my age. I was constantly badgered with requests for help, directions or vilified by some outraged traveler. Eventually I graduated to “real” business trips where encounters such as with this young lady sometimes occurred.

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Tags: airline, Nigeria, travel

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