The Nadaam festival. Ulan Bataar, Mongolia
It's so incongrous, that I would be sitting here in front of a terminal, air conditioned room, sipping my fermented horse's milk, wondering what medieval viand I'll end up eating for dinner- Lamb Kebab, or roast beef....
I need to back up a bit, and give some background - after finishing my students grades and posting a copy to them, I hopped my flight Sunday, getting to the airport in record time. I even managed to get the 'bulkhead' seat - actually the emergency door aisle- that is so coveted among die hard air travellers. It seemed as if everything was going so well.
I surfed internet until the last boarding minute, then ran down the corridor and got into my spacious leg-room-enough-for-a-basketball-player seat, basking in the warm smiles of the Korean Air flight attendants, and started drinking my last Hoegarden beer. I had also brought a tub of homemade Shrimp Gumbo (in honor of Bubba on Forrest Gump) and some homemade cheese. It was going to be a great flight.
The man in the aisle across from me appeared to be Mongolian. At least that is what I assumed from the evidence: his skin was sunburnt and wrinkled, and he seemed to be uttering gibberish, from a Korean linguistic perspective anyways. Mongolian has that half-russian, half Korean sound to it, and is one of the aurally most dense languages I've heard in my travels.
He smelled of spirits, and strong ones at that. Fine, I reasoned...the man has a reason to celebrate...he's returning home in triumph after having made good money in Korea, and he's just in time for his country's national Festival - what better reason could there be to celebrate?
I assured the very worried looking stewardess that the worst was over, but he kept escalating the situation, getting louder and more belligerent, throwing things and finally grabbing my wrist in a death-grip, I reacted without thinking and bent his elbow around backwards and said quietly 'Stop!'
The man finished the flight handcuffed to a flight attendant's chair in the galley. The police were waiting at the airport and he seemed as amused as ever. I'm not sure what the moral to the story is, but I suppose I got off quite lucky, only having a slightly marred flight experience - at the same time, a friend of mine was 'attacked by a maniac with a tire iron' while enjoying Beijing and wrote me from the hospital. Yes, travel CAN BE dangerous.
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