Air travel is a different thing when you consider the 'trapped' situation you are in. A plane load of strangers and no way off, even tho it is sitting peacefully on the ground - produces a certain amount of panic, which is a bit contagious of course.Definitely agree with this. I think in general there is not such a stigma about creating smalltalk with strangers, or saying hi to them, like there is in the states. BUT, the one place I have no patience for complaining, just because it's a place people LOVE to complain, is on an airplane. you are being carried through the air hundreds/thousands of miles, and it's a feat of engineering that saves us all hours/days and affords us the ability to travel, yet we all lose our s%^# if we have to wait 20 extra minutes to board the plane.
Anyway, you should have seen the reaction when I came back from Bariloche in March. our flight arrived about 30 minutes EARLIER than planned, so early in fact that the buses that were supposed to drive us from the plane to the terminal (we didnt have a gate) were not available to us yet. So in true airplane fashion, since everyone was already standing in the aisles from the moment the seatbelt sign went off, instead of taking their seats again to wait for the buses, everyone started yelling outrage at the helpless flight attendants who couldn't do anything about it. In fact there was NOTHING the LAN employees could do as they told us they sub-contract the buses from, you guessed it, aerolineas argentina, and had no control over the schedule. And then the complaining started because people were going to miss their connecting flights (keep in mind that we landed a half hour earlier than scheduled, and waited a total of 30 minutes) and it was as though took every fiber of my being not to give them all a big "SIENTENSE Y CALLENSE!!!!"
I guess when someone has really been treated unjustly, I'm ok with complaining, but this was a situation in which clearly nothing could be done about it, and was an extremely minor inconvenience, and everyone just made it 10 times worse by all standing, squashed in the aisles, taking turns yelling at the flight attendants. People need to understand that sometimes things happen that nobody can control, and that's part of life, and that "don't sweat the small stuff" really makes a big difference in the overall quality of your life.
Disclaimer: this is a global air travel behavior problem, not an argentine problem, but it fits the bill as it happened in argentina with a plane full of argentines
Wouldn't it be nice if people could relate to 'isn't is a beautiful day?' As well as they relate to complaints about heat/cold?
