Chinese air passengers have hit severe turbulence in recent months over their cabin manners. Air rage by Communist party officials captured on video; the beating of flight attendants reported on Weibo; a pair of sozzled businessmen bagging mini bottles of booze from the Air France trolley as they disembarked – “they’re free, innit (hic)!”
But is it really such a big deal? Anecdotally, this flyer has witnessed the use of mobile phones seconds before takeoff, the scramble for luggage seconds after landing, or the watching of movies on laptops without headphones. It’s hardly Con-Air; more ‘Disgusted at 40,000 Feet’, with, one suspects, a dab of snobbery toward the Chinese by those more seasoned flying nations. New money, eh?
