Sunday, May 30, 2010

Greeting from the land of Eng

Spending 30 hours on a plane is not much fun.  But at least we didn't have some kind of medical crisis en route, unlike the poor old biddy somewhere up in premium economy who did.  The announcement came over the PA system: "If there is a passenger on board who speaks Polish, please alert a flight attendant as we require your assistance.  Also, could any medical practitioners please contact an attendant."

My Smaller Half and I both immediately thought, oh please let there be a doctor on board, because I really don't want to be involved.  I'd be pretty confident if the patient just needed a prescription renewed, but something told me it might have been more complicated than that.  Even worse, I don't know much Polish.  I used to buy Polish pickled cucumbers - Polski Ogorki it said on the label - but even then I don't know if that's the brand or the Polish word for pickles.  And it seems unlikely that the person requiring medical attention on the plane was having an acute pickle attack.

Fortunately, the person sitting in front of me turned out to be a Polish-speaking doctor, thus killing two birds with one stone.  I've never seen such relieved-looking flight attendants.  The patient seemed to do okay because the doctors didn't look too stressed afterwards, plus they got upgraded to business class for their troubles.

Maybe this doctoring caper is worthwhile after all!

4 comments:

JdR said...

I'm surprised this isn't the second thing they teach you at medical school.

"Offering to help on a plane = ticket to upgrade".

In fact, if you can offer some medical advice when checking in, there's a good chance of boarding straight into first class.

PTR said...

I tried that. I suggested to the person checking us in that they might find relief from their appearance by wearing a bag on their head. Maybe that's why we ended up next to the toilets.

Anonymous said...

That's never happened to me!! Who'd you fly with? All I got was a lousy dutyfree shopping voucher which I couldn't use on one flight and a thank you on another one. Robbed...

PTR said...

We flew Qantas. Apparently if you can fly a plane you get upgraded right into the cockpit.