First came Here, There and Everywhere...Memoirs of an Air Hostess. Now i give you Here, There and Everywhere Else; for stories I had to leave out in the first book. Some are from my flying days, during my 11 and a half years as a Flight Attendant; o...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Romeo, Romeo, get thou lost Romeo
Does anyone remember this catchy, fabulous song from the 60s, sung by the Reflections? It's a celebration, I guess of the two legendary lovers we're all familiar with. However, this is where the similarity ends with the event I'm about to relate. The original lovers as I recall, were equally enamoured of each other. Not so in this case.
One of our senior pilots had a huge crush, or should I say, infatuation with one of our hostesses. The pilot should have received the message loud and clear, that his Juliet (I'll keep the Shakespearean names to protect identity) was not in the least interested. She wasn't into him, as we say today.
If I was crewing a flight with Romeo and Juliet, it was an embarrassment. Romeo would dilly dally in the aircraft, while we were preparing the cabin for the arrival of passengers. He would try to engage Juliet in any conversation he could and would delay his round the aircraft check just so he could snatch five minutes with the object of his infatuation. In retrospect I think he did see her as just that; an object. Juliet was a very attractive girl, but that didn't excuse Romeo's ridiculous behaviour.
Whenever they finished a flight at the same time, Romeo would hasten along to the hostess lounge, where Juliet was signing off and making preparation to go home to her boyfriend or husband. I can't remember whether or not she was married, but she had a partner and as I've already said, she had no interest in Romeo.
As a senior pilot, he really should have known better, but he was like a lovesick schoolboy with his flushed face, puppy dog eyes and silly grin. Sometimes he couldn't get any words out, but just stood there, in the lounge gazing at Juliet. It would have been comical, had it not been upsetting and unwelcome for Juliet. Today we'd call this behaviour stalking or sexual harassment or both.
In the end our hostess manager intervened and informed the flight operations manager of the situation. The flight operations manager delivered a stern lecture to Romeo and only then did his behaviour stop.
We all noticed that his eyes still followed Juliet with longing gazes.
Did Juliet encourage his behaviour by not telling him to get lost. No, of course not. I do think she found it hard to be outright rude, but that's understandable, given that pilots always seemed to have the balance of power in their favour, at least back then. She had no way of knowing whether he would twist events to make it seem as if she was encouraging him or even enjoying the attention.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
It's a version of the same old story, that some men think they can behave anyway they please, even if they are married with children, as Romeo was.
