Locomotoring

If one likes traveling then every journey builds up anticipation regardless of how seasoned a traveller one might be. Not everyone has George Clooney’s sang froid. But this anticipation must eventually face the reality of air travel. Yes, we are inured to our water bottles being taken away in the name of security. Yes, we know that we will have to contort ourselves into seats that serve dual use at Guantanamo. But we are still not used to the truly execrable food airlines see fit to serve to their hapless passengers. This was our first meal at the Air Canada flight from SFO to Toronto.

Dinner on Air Canada

Some Air Canada employee has a cruel sense of humor to inflict a Cup O’Noodles at poor folks at 30000 feet. And they made us pay $3 for the privilege too. The sandwich was no better – third rate bread, soggy cold cuts, some unidentifiable sauce. Hmmmm, maybe it is not sense of humor but an actively malicious intent behind this. Only that would explain why they could not source good bread from a city that houses Acme Bread Company.

But hey maybe that was a flight from US to Canada, practically a domestic flight. And we are used to getting peanuts, literally, on domestic flights. Maybe the next leg from Toronto to Paris would be a little better.

“Chicken or beef, sir?” Chicken or beef what, I thought. “Chicken, please.” What I got was a plate of watery pasta, a couple of tablespoons of jarred pasta sauce glooped onto it, with a few pieces of chicken which clearly showed that that chicken had died in vain. They did try to complete the meal with a cold vegetable salad whose most prominent feature was an intensely garlicky vinaigrette. That malicious intent again. Here we are, a couple of hundred people in a narrow metal tube, in closer proximity than good manners allow, and you want to feed us loads of garlic? We just could not bring ourselves to try the chocolate brownie like thing on the tray.

Is this a foreshadowing of what we will eat in Paris? Tune in to find out.