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When Kingfisher and Vijay Mallya promised a â ˜Fly with the Good Timesâ ™ experience, I wish they had been speaking the truth. Dr Vijay Mallya might be referred to as the â ˜King of Good Timesâ ™ and perhaps in his personal life he is. However flying with his airline can be anything but good at times. Mind you, I am not belittling the quality of the aircrafts themselves. I certainly believe the King when he says that he is proud of his fleet of new aircrafts that are fitted with the latest safety technologies. I even accept the cutting edge technology that is guaranteed. And perhaps the best is the checkin assistance you get with baggage etc.

But is that all it takes to make an airline enjoyable. Perhaps not. There is a key word called Hospitality which seems to be missing from the air-hostesses parlance altogether. One look at the air-hostesses in red and we perhaps begin to see just what the King meant by â ˜Good Timesâ ™. Tight and even tighter pants and skirts to the point of being tasteless would best describe these so called pagans of hospitality. In the Chairmanâ ™s message on the airlines branded website, Dr Mallya proudly talks about personnaly hand-picking the crew himself. Perhaps that is why they are all stereotyped with packs of foundation to hide away the â ˜Indianessâ ™ of their heritage. I have not heard of any unwritten rule that insists air-hostesses to be pale to the point of being ghostly and the tropical Indian weather makes this effort even more incredulous.

Vijay Mallya also boasts of the fact that every crew is instructed to treat a guest in the same manner as when they visit his home. Having flown Kingfisher a few times, I can only say that if this is true, nobody would be visiting the king. 10 minutes after being seated by the haunted, anorexic looking hostess, you are handed this little red pouch which might excite a 2 year old and that too perhaps. We are mostly adults in the flight and I see no joy in being woken up only to be handed something I definitely do not want. I mean â “ what happened to Class or is cheapness the way to fame these days. You sit back for a re-nap with what you hope is a do not disturb sign on you and this time it is the juice. Then it is the fact that you have to listen to the long speech prepared in case of emergencies because you are sitting on the emergency exit. All attempts to tell the lady that you would rather shift your seat in the half empty flight fall on deaf ears since the lady is not listening lest she loose track of the tirade she has memorized. So you just walk off into the next row mid sentence to settle down once again to sleep â “ hopefully. Food, tea-coffee means more awakenings and by now you are beginning to take on the look and mood of Hagar the horrible. I know that Mr Mallya demands individual attention and he supposes that his guests do to, but perhaps this is taking things a bit to far.

The rest of the experience can only be described as terribly ordinary. Neither the food nor the service is exceptionally different from any other airline in the country. In fact I would rather fly Indian Airlines where even if the air-hostesses are nothing much to look at, years of experience ensure comfort whilst flying.

The individual in-flight entertainment system so proudly mentioned in the Chairmanâ ™s speech exists. But is it entertaining â “ no. Unless you mean being forced to listen to ads being run over and over again at top volume. Most international flights provide headphones so that you may or may not listen at your discretion and the entertainment entails a movie or two. Something Vijay Mallya needs to learn about.

Would I accept an invitation to fly the Good Times. Probably not. Would most of the male population of country. I think definitely yes. After all the red stirs a hidden though trashy inner cord in some bizarre way. Perhaps exactly what the King calls â ˜Good Timesâ ™.

Zorba - CafeSpeak
http://www.cafe-speak.blogspot.com