10 things you always wanted to ask a flight attendant. (Part 1)

So I’m a dude and I’m a flight attendant.  One thing I have not told a lot of people is how I have had the most “effeminate” jobs in my lifetime.  I might as well print my resume on a scented stationary and call it a day.  Hair salon? check.  Server? check.  Massage therapist? check.  Retail? check.  Flight Attendant?  check.  And on my free time. a side business of scented soy candles!I could have been a welder, or a construction worker, or someone that uses their brute strength and hiss on people, or yell for no reason, but no. So to those unemployed gay men out there, my apologies for stealing your jobs.  Nothing personal, It’s all about the money.But enough about me. Lets get down to the nitty gritty shall we? Here are some questions that I have been asked over the years …

“My girl is a flight attendant, do you think she’s cheating on me?”

Bruh, if you think your girl is messing around, you need to have yourself checked. Not to say that flight attendants are incapable of cheating, but let me give you a downlow of what a typical day of a flight attendant looks like, then tell me what you think.Unlike pilots who can only fly for 9 hours, flight attendants’ duty days can get up to 16 hours (in extreme circumstances.) That doesnt even include the 2 hours spent getting ready, the other two hours driving and checking in to work. Flight attendants are tired, and by the time we actually get to our hotel rooms, another hour has passed and we have to be back on the plane in less than 8 hours. Its a physically tough job and the last thing in our minds is to fuck around. Besides, who are these girls going to mess around with? Married pilots wearing their standard issue hawaiian shirts, Costco court classic tennis shoes, and cargo shorts? No just no. Don’t believe me? Go with your girl on one of her trips and you’ll be lucky if you get laid yourself.

“I wanna go to Paris, theres this girl I went to high school with who’s a flight attendant, you think she can hook me up with some tickets?

Yes and no but actually no. First of all f you if I havent talked to you in 20 years and out of the blue, you’ll slide into my fb messenger and ask for a buddy pass? No. Different airlines have different rules in regards to buddy passes or companion passes but generally all airlines do have some sort of companion pass program. These passes are really tricky and we take those seriously. Any misuse of a buddy pass can get us fired, so we only hand them to those that we know can behave like a civilized human. We dont give those out to random people. If someone ever gives you a buddy pass, please be polite, act accordingly and do not give an attitude. You are flying for cheap! Also buddy passes are the bottom of the totem pole as far as priority seating. You might find yourself being pulled out of your seat for whatever reason. If this happens, take it like a champ and try for the next flight.

Any celebs on your flight? Are they nice? Who’s the most famous ones you’ve ever seen?

Well I used to, when our airline was still cool! There seemed to be one every week lol. Once I had Cameron Diaz and she was the only female in first. She was nice and polite. The other passengers played it cool until she got off and everyone in first hooted and hollered. So dumb. I also had the Jenner/Kardashian kids once. Nice kids, they actually let some people take pictures of them even after I tried to intervene. I had Kevin Hart, LL Cool J, Common, Jeremy Lin, Marshawn Lynch, and countless others. Most of the time these celebs just sleep the whole flight. I had one celeb that would not look me in the eye, or even acknowledge my presence and had his assistant talk to me in his behalf. They were the first to board, Mr. Celeb was wearing sunglasses and the assistant told me “not to let anyone bother Mr. comedian”. In my mind, I was like no one will ever bother his tired, has-been ass. I had one celeb who vaped in the bathroom. (a big no no) It was so obvious as vapor was coming out from every part of his face. A colleague of mine had Klay Thompson and Steph Curry once. I would have died.

“Mile high club. Yes or no?”

The plane is one of the most disgusting places you can ever be. It has to be. Bathrooms are tiny and so fucking gross. If your horny self can even muster the power to bone someone on the plane, more power to you, but it does happen, just not as often as you might think.  My wife had this couple banging each other behind the front galley curtain. She opens the galley and they there were going at it. As she closes the galley, she tells them “ok guys please finish up right now as I need my workspace.” They did, and offered her a 20 dollar tip. She goes, are you guys effing serious? Please go back to your seats!

“When you tell us to fasten our seatbelts are you guys just on a power trip?”

99 percent of the time no. The other one percent of the time, you were probably just being an asshole thats why. But actually, if you were being a dick, I wouldnt want you to wear one, and I hope we hit one big turbulence so I get to see your dumbass fly in the air. If you see us strapped in to our jumpseat, you might wanna strap in yourself. We dont fuck around with turbulence.

“But really how do I get with your co-worker over durrrrrr.”

Dude, just like how you would every other decent girl. Dont be an ass wipe, be nice and have some manners. Take a shower. Flight attendants live busier lives then normal people. Although we can be in as much as 3 cities in one day, our interaction with the outside world is relegated to the confines of work so the dating pool is limited. Because of this, the first homo sapien to exhibit compassion, looked at the mirror in the morning and is not a dumbass should get a nice heads up.Dating a FA comes with a few caveats though, you need to not be needy, as we can’t just be there when you need something; on the other hand, you need to be available at any time, all the time, when we need you cause we dont have a lot of time. Also, this goes back to the cheating issue; you need to rid yourself of all your insecurities to not think that your girl is sleeping around.

“Do people die on planes?”

Yes but technically no. None of us are doctors so we can never pronounce anyone as dead. Even then, they die at the jet bridge and never inside the planes. Although if youre ever going to have a heart attack, if you cant have it in a hospital, you might as well have it on a plane as we have those AEDs within arms reach, and are trained to use them.

“What is the scariest flight you have ever been on?”

It was this one time when this guy got on board wearing sandals with socks on, and nonchalantly took his socks off and clipped his toenails right on the tray table.  That was horrific.

“How much money do you make?”

How dare you ask that question?  How much money do YOU make?  You can make serious bank in this job but that requires you to not have a life, and be on the plane for every waking hour of your life.  I won’t go into details about hourly rates as you can look it up online yourself, but we do get a few extras, like per diems when you are on a layover, international pay, sit pay, extra pay after you fly a set amount of hours in a month, the opportunity for premium double pay, on those days that coverage is pretty slim, among others.

“Can you hook me up with a job as a flight attendant? It looks pretty easy.”

If I think I can stand being with you for 4 whole days at a time, I can probably give you a referral, but as far as the job being pretty easy? I don’t know about that. I have only worked for one carrier but if I can venture a guess, our hiring procedure is pretty standard.  You submit an application online, they contact you, you take an assessment test, maybe you pass, they invite you for an interview, they like you, you go through an extensive background check than they invite you for TRAINING.

Training is definitely the hardest thing I ever have to do in my entire life.  It is a 6 week, militaristic, intensive training.  It’s like learning a foreign language that you have never heard in your entire life.  It involves memorizing manuals that are thicker than those old phone books. Fighting fires, knowing how to evacuate people from a burning plane, saving lives, are among the few things we learn about in training.  We probably spend an hour in the whole 6 weeks on how to pour a diet coke, that’s it so no, we are not waiters.  In addition, training involves being on your toes for the whole duration of the training program.,  You exhibit the appearance of being asleep?  Fired.  Late for a minute? Gone.  Looking like crap?  Bye.  Say something inappropriate?  See ya.  It is nerve wracking, and cut-throat.  Unfortunately, a lot of people do not complete the training program.  Your life is hanging in the balance for the whole 6 weeks.  If you think that’s easy well go ahead and submit your application, and see you on the line.

There you have it folks.  If you have any other questions, please submit your questions to stewardude@gmail.com.  Next time, I’ll have my colleagues answer some of them for me, That should be fun.

Fly safe and be kind to your flight attendant!