Every time I read a front page about Airmalta – which admittedly is very frequent these days –I find myself subconsciously smelling that airplane odour, hearing that whir-whir muffled noise, and somewhere deep down, I get the urge to stretch.
I don’t mind planes as such. But I am particularly particular about the seating. I always have to have an aisle seat. As I type this, the Significant Other just pointed at an article in this week’s Economist, called ‘Where do you sit? A plane’s aisle seat is for cynics’. Hmph. He is a window man.
I was not always an aisle seat girl, although the disposition for it was always there: my granny who, when we were little, used to travel regularly to new York to visit my uncle, would always come back with tales of huge, bulky, sweaty passengers sitting next to her and the moral, delivered with a raised eyebrow, used to be “always take an aisle seat on a plane”.
Therefore, whenever I sat next to a window on a plane, and the inevitable contact with strangers’ elbows took place, granny’s voice would always echo in my head. Eventually I gave in to her advice, firstly because often enough I was having to shake up people from lumber sleep each time I wanted to go to the loo; and secondly because I once happened to have a Hygienically Challenged Passenger sitting in the middle seat next to me. As I stuck my lip balm in my nose for three whole hours, I swore never again.
Consequently, my views from the plane of the Sahara, the jagged snowy Alps, the vast Atlantic ocean and the highest point in Kenya, I always had someone’s nose stuck against the window pane, at the edge. I always got a sneak peek so to say, while the window passengers got the full view.
Admittedly, the aisle seat has other advantages. “If I have to evacuate, I will be out quicker,” said my British expat friend who travels to and fro. My sister, rather long-legged, never contemplates sitting anywhere else because she wouldn’t be able to stretch her legs. “Windows make me feel claustrophobic,” she says. (It is also the reason why she never ever sits next to the emergency exit because she fears she’ll get the urge to open the door mid-sky, but that’s another story).
The least popular is the middle seat
Several of my friends are aisle people – for similar reasons: not having to clamber over everybody else to go to the loo; easier to walk up and down when your legs go numb; quicker to snatch the luggage at the end of the flight. One girlfriend has another reason for the aisle seat: “I prefer spying on other passengers than looking at Malta from the air – those stretches of land void of greenery are too depressing.”
There was an aisle seat disadvantage: “I took a flight from Athens to the Greek island of Kos and a snake fell out of the overhead compartments onto the passengers’ back.” (Sharp intake of breath and communal shudder from all of us when she told us this story.)
The window fans – which apart from the SO also include my daughter, the Teenager and my mother (granny didn’t work on her enough) – are equally vociferous. “I prefer window if it’s a long flight as it’s easier to sleep if you can lean against the window”; “No one bugs you to get up so they go to the toilet”; “Food carts and passengers wont bump into you”.
They all laud the once-in-a-lifetime views of the sun shining on the Alps; of random sky rainstorms; amazing sunrises and sunsets; clouds looking like cotton balls; mysterious cities in fog; twinkling cities at night. But the sweetest reason was definitely the “I love the fact that you can sort of say hello to the place you’re about to start discovering, and then a goodbye”.
What does it say about both our characters? According to The Economist, the aisle seat is for the “wizened cynics” who value utility above all. The window seat in contrast, is for those who retain a “sense of adventure”. It is for those who “hold on to a sense of wonderment as they hurtle down the runway and watch the ground disappear beneath them; for those who cherish that sense of excitement as they descend, into the blinking lights of a never-before-visited city.”
Surveys have been compiled on this matter and it looks like most travellers prefer a window seat, unless they are frequent fliers, in which case their preference is for an aisle one.
What is certain is that the least popular is the middle seat. Although I know lots of people who, when travelling en famille, have to sit in the middle – it’s never out of choice. I have yet to find someone who at the check in desk specifically asks for ‘the middle seat’ – what would that say about you, I wonder?
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Twitter: @KrisChetcuti