Feng shui or green stone, Qantas needs it
By Yeoh Siew Hoon
As I write this, I have completed my third Qantas flight in a week. Yesterday’s service to Auckland was delayed by about three hours.
Thank goodness I logged onto the internet to check in online – thank you, Shangri-La Hotel, Sydney, for the free Internet access so that I could dip in and out of the web to check on my flight.
The delay was due to the runway lights in Auckland going kaput and so no flights could get in the day before, which meant a backlog of people trying to get “across the ditch” on the day of my flight.
“Across the ditch” is what Australians say when you tell them you’re going to New Zealand – it’s a sign of the affection these two neighbours have for each other. Much like the bond between Malaysia and Singapore, really.
As it turned out, I got away lightly. I arrived in Auckland at 3.30am local time which meant by then the chaos at the airport was over and traffic was a breeze getting in. Auckland’s a dead city by 10pm, let alone 4am.
On my second Qantas flight from Melbourne to Sydney, a bag dropped on the head of a woman sitting behind me in business class.
A man had opened the overhead compartment and his briefcase (an old fashioned heavy leather brown one) just fell right out and hit her head.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “It must have moved.” There was a gash on her forehead and I saw blood on her neck. The poor thing was shaking from shock.
A woman, across the aisle, jumped to her aid. “I am sorry, it’s my fault, I moved it.” It was big of her to admit to it, and she did her best to soothe the injured passenger.
Throughout the commotion, the crew was nowhere in sight. Standing at the front of the cabin, they were oblivious to the incident until someone pointed it out to them.
I felt sorry for the woman. It could have happened to anyone and she was in the wrong spot at the wrong time.
I also felt sorry for Qantas. Poor Alan Joyce – what a terrible few weeks it’s been and if I were him, I’d call in a feng shui master right away to try and harmonise the elements at his airline, which are obviously askew.
There are just too many bad things happening all at the same time for the more superstitious among us to accept it as just coincidence.
On the day he put the A380 back to service and he went along on the flight to Singapore to prove its trustworthiness, a B747 aircraft due to fly from Sydney to London had to be grounded because of an engine failure.
And so all that effort that went into putting a positive spin on the A380 was kind of drowned out by the negative noise coming from the other story.
I am due to fly back with Qantas to Singapore via Sydney a week from now. I’ll have to make sure I am given a piece of green stone while travelling in New Zealand – I am told that will protect me against all elements.
Kia Ora.
Yeoh Siew Hoon is Editor At Large
Web In Travel/The Transit Café
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