(Fly Into the) Danger Zone

I should have known better when I saw our boarding passes were written in magic marker: this was going to be an interesting flight.

A little over a week ago, Amy and I left Myanmar for Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia, where we are now, in Bali. The first leg of the journey required a flight from Bagan, in upper Myanmar, to Yangon, where we connected to Kuala Lumpur.

By our count, we’ve flown about 20 times so far on this tour, from intercontinental jumbo jets to regional turbo-prop planes, and we’ve taken some carriers that give you a little pause for thought. Like Vietnam Airlines – sounds scary right? But they’re part of the Skyteam alliance, and an excellent carrier. Hainan Air or DragonAir? Never heard of them before. But both worked out fine getting us to and from Taiwan.

Then there was Air KBZ Flight 263, from Bagan to Yangon. First off, Air KBZ is run by Kanbawza, a government-backed bank in Myanmar. I like my banks to hand out toasters and invest in risky credit default swap schemes, thank you very much, not take the helm of shoddy, out-dated aircraft. If a bank wants to crash something, crash the housing market, not my flight. Air KBZ has been in business about three years and they have just six older planes in their fleet. In that time, one plane has overshot a runway, and just last week, they evacuated another plane in Yangon, right on the tarmac. With that ratio of planes-to-incidents, we had pretty good odds, right? Just the kind of odds Amy and I were willing to take…

We got to the airport in Bagan early, reservations in hand, and checked in. Check in was easy enough – we walked up to a “counter” that was basically a folding card table, where a dude in a black track jacket wrote out the aforementioned boarding passes in his blue magic marker. Then we handed our bags to another guy, and away they went…

Yep, that’s him, literally carrying our bags through a wooden door to the plane. Then there was the security screening. We went through metal detectors, and our bags got x-rayed, and that was it. No shoe removal, no laptops out, no liquids issues. I actually think my belt buckle set off the light, but they waved me through anyway – what’s the bigger danger, my belt, or the plane itself? So we went through the metal detectors, sat in some old plastic waiting room chairs that looked like they were shipped via time machine from 1975, and waited patiently for the plane to arrive. The Myanmar version of “The Today Show” was on a fuzzy flatscreen TV. They were interviewing a monk. He looked bored, too.

When the plane finally flew in, we were aroused from our slumbers, and it was basically “ALRIGHT – EVERYBODY ON!!” I was fairly excited because there were only about 10 to 15 people waiting for the flight, and when the plane pulled up to the doorway – er,…gate – it was clear this was a decent sized aircraft, so plenty of seats. Amy and I were schlepping a few extra carry-ons because we’d bought a bunch of souvenirs in Thailand and Myanmar. I was happy to have room in the overhead for the bags, and to be able to stretch out my legs some. Little did I know the surprise Air KBZ had in store for us.

We were loaded on to a small bus – for safety reasons I guess – which drove us about twenty feet to the aircraft. No joke, twenty feet, if that. The driver had barely put the bus into gear when he jammed on the brakes and opened the door and motioned for us to get out. With all the loading and unloading, we could have walked there in a fraction of the time. I could have thrown our bags that distance, if it came to it. I guess everyone needs a job in Myanmar, and this was his assignment, so no getting around it.

Here’s what should have been the next indication about the flight: the plane’s engines were still hot, and started up as we all boarded. It was like the pilot had pulled in the driveway, and honked the horn – “Okay, let’s go! I have to drop you off at the movies in Yangon, and then I have to pick up your brother from hockey practice in Mandalay – let’s hustle!!”

So we got off the bus, scurried through the prop-wash and loud whir of the engines, and boarded the plane in the rear of the aircraft. And when we got in, all was revealed. This flight had just come from Mandalay, and was already three-quarters full. The pilot had already been to pick up your brother, and the whole damn hockey team was crammed in as well! All the gear was stowed in the overheads, all the seats were taken…this flight was already packed to the gills, and now they were going to shoehorn us in somehow.

Amy grabbed the first seat she could, and I saw an open seat a few rows back from her. I opened the overhead to store the souvenir bag, and had to play Tetris with the other bags to make ours fit. I took my seat next to a clearly miserable fellow who first acknowledged me by starting up the old “elbow game” with the shared armrest. I’m relentless with that game, by the way, so it ended up being his elbow front-half, mine back-half. We were both working up a sweat, it was pretty hot and humid on the aircraft by this point, no wonder he was miserable. Then I saw what was going on in the seats directly behind me…

They were packed with luggage! Just piled up on the seats. But there were still people who needed to sit down. Where were they going to go? I looked up to see if there was any additional overhead space, and I saw this:

Yup, that sucker is broken and TAPED SHUT with cheap packing tape. I assume they used clear tape in the hope that no one would notice – very tricky, Air KBZ. Nothing was going in that overhead. So get this – they took the bags from behind me and put them a) in the aisle (to trip over, clearly), and b) in the crew’s service area, where they prepare the meals, etc. I think the crew just sat on them, probably, while they drew straws to see who would get the last parachute. Eventually we were all in our seats, and the flight took off.

Here’s an example of the kind of loose program being run on Air KBZ: do you see this guy? He’s got an ANTENNA on his head, a radio antenna. He’s listening to Burma’s Top 40, or having a short-wave conversation with someone in Bangladesh. During takeoff!

Clearly this is okay, or at least it’s not frowned-upon. I like to think he was sitting over the wing and letting the cockpit know if the flaps were actually working.

I’m normally not afraid of flying, but I thought about it. This plane was overloaded. It was an older plane (taped together, mind you), and we were flying in remote upper Myanmar. When you hear about plane crashes on the news, where “two Americans are among the missing”…this is that situation. I began to recite the old Sioux battle cry: “Today is a good day to die.”

And sure enough, about halfway through the flight, terror struck — but in non-lethal form. A sudden disturbance erupted about ten rows ahead of me. A very concerned Asian gentlemen popped up immediately and motioned wildly for a crew member. What could be happening?! And we found out all too soon: a young white girl was barfing violently, like a drunk cheerleader on prom night. It could have been the heat on that flight, or it could have been the turbulence – it could have been the fear of death! – but this poor girl’s insides were on the outside now. I’m glad I didn’t see the results, but I know this much – when she was escorted to the back of the plane to freshen up (slaloming the excess luggage, of course), her face looked as pale and sickly as the Crypt Keeper’s. And the clean up! Oh man…

The poor male flight attendant – he had nothing to use but old newspapers to sop up the mess, and he must have gone through the equivalent of the Sunday New York Times, including the Magazine, the real estate inserts, and the Sunday Styles section, “Vows” and all. This poor guy single-handedly cleaned up the likes of the Exxon Valdez spill up there in Row 12. He deserved some kind of medal. Or at least the last parachute…

With that excitement soon behind us, and a few sprays of Burmese Lysol around the cabin, we all looked forward to landing in Yangon. And what a better way to land in Yangon than to have massive crosswinds pushing the plane off the runway.

Yes, that’s right. We were basically coming in sideways as we landed – I think the pilot watched a little too much “Dukes of Hazzard” growing up. There was the first initial “squelch” of the tires, followed by a little bit of a fishtail, and then another “squelch,” and then a quick straightening out in the other direction. My stomach turned – I thought we were going to need more newspaper, pronto. There were a few gasps, and then…sighs of relief. We’d actually made it. The guy next to me looked over at me, wide-eyed and giggly. It was the sort of look someone gives you when they just got away with something, like getting out of a speeding ticket in Georgia, or returning the golf cart they drove into the water hazard. Or in this case, cheating death.

And then it was all over, as quick as it began. We all unloaded, and got put on to another bus for the twelve second drive to baggage claim. “Baggage Claim” is basically a garage door where you wait for some guys in uniforms to transfer your bags off an old pickup truck and on to a big pile of other luggage, as if they planned on burning them all, and then you pay another guy (not in a uniform) a dollar because he found your bag in the pile, and put it on a luggage cart for you.

That’s just how it works in Myanmar, all of it. It wouldn’t make sense any other way, really.

Maybe next time, we’ll fly Yangon Airways.