What happens when you mess with gravity

I love to travel.

Oooh wow shereen. Neva hurd that befo'. Yea you sooo unique n shiet. So inturresting, no one else likes traveling huh foo

...is what you are thinking. I know this, because it is exactly what people think when other people say boring stuff like "I love to travel."

Sure, your inner head voice may have a different speaking style. Mine just happens to sound like a cross between Nicki Minaj and Malibu's Most Wanted. But we all have the same reaction when people feel the need to, for example, announce on their facebook profile that they love to eat and sleep and breathe and watch tv.

Everyone does it. And no. one. cares.

I'm from the 'Bu foo

But for me, traveling is not just about exploring exotic places, or being immersed in different cultures, or updating my facebook with iphoto-enhanced pictures to make all my friends jealous. That's only about 3/4 of the fun.

What's the last 1/4 of it? The other tiny sliver of satisfaction that comes from packing my bag and leaving for a faraway place to revel in unknown beauty (and most likely subject myself to some kind of food-born illness)?

The airplane ride.

I've done the math. And if I've done it correctly (there is a high probability that I have not done it correctly), I have spent around 914 hours of my life on airplanes. That's a big chunka change, if I do say so myself. And over these 914 hours, a lot has happened- some good, some bad, and some whole bunch of crazy. These experiences have led me to form a theory, which I would like to call Airplane Theory; that is, when you mess with gravity like airplanes do (SH)IT GOES BANANAS.

For proof, please see exhibits A and B below. Or, you can skip the exhibits and read the story of The Disgruntled Flight Attendant. That's a story of Airplane Theory in action if I've ever seen it... and it will probably make you feel really good about your life.

Just saying.

Exhibit A: The Time I Almost Lost my Sanity.

Once, while flying Egypt Air with my family and pals Annie and Stephanie, I was eating a sandwich. It wasn't a very good sandwich. Pretty mediocre as far as sandwiches go. But about halfway through, I put the sandwich down on my tray to look at something, and when I turned back... it was gone. Puzzled, I looked around. I looked under my chair, on Annie's tray next to me, everywhere. But it was nowhere to be found.

Keep in mind that although the sandwich was not very good, I was hungry. And plus it was Egypt Air, so for all I knew it could have been my last chance in life to eat a sandwich. Therefore, I was pretty upset when it just disappeared like that. But I didn't dwell on it, and decided to read a book instead. The book was Harry Potter.

The exact moment is fuzzy to me, but somewhere around the page where Harry lost his godfather Sirius Black to his evil relative Bellatrix Lestrange, I got up to use the loo. And I discovered that one of my shoes was missing.

WTH OMG. AM I GOING MAD?!! I thought to myself. But you gotta go when you gotta go, so I went with one shoe. And when I came back MY HARRY POTTER BOOK WAS GONE.

Things continued to disappear from me and my friends... until we finally realized that the kids in front of us were using their small and nimble hands to reach in between their chairs in front of us snatch things out from under our noses. Thankfully, we were able to blockade the cracks between the chairs and spend the rest of the flight in peace.

And that is the time I almost lost my sanity on an airplane.

Egypt Air: All aboard the crazy train

Exhibit B: The Fight in Row 34.

We were nearing the end of our flight. The flight attendants had just passed out our immigration cards, which everyone was quietly filling out. Row 12? no problems there. Row 22? Not a peep. Fast forward to Row 34, where a big boned Nigerian man decides to start filling out his form on my father's head.

My dad turns around and asks politely for him to please use his tray instead. The man ignores him.

"Excuse me, your baber is on my head, and it is bothering me. Blease move it," says my dad.

"I am filling out my form. Move your head" says the man in a thick Nigerian accent.

Chaos ensues. My dad yells for a stewardess, the man yells for a stewardess. One starts pushing, the other starts pushing, and the man starts yelling "Stop booshing me around!" and everyone is staring. Papers and hands are flying. I've never seen such a sight in my life.

You'd think it would end as we began to disembark from the plane. Nope. The fight carries on even after we disembark from the airplane and walk into the airport, where the man tries to get my dad in trouble with airport security: "He was booshing me around, booshing me around!" but thankfully airport security had the sense to stay out of it, and we went our separate ways.

Airplane Theory. You better believe it.