I was on an AirAsia flight from Indonesia to Kuala Lumpur with my father. It was a very short one hour flight that I usually consider as a chance to nap. Moreover, the seat next to me was empty so I considered it extra arm room. I couldn’t nap.
Right behind me and father was a family with one child. One extremely noisy and hyper child. And I am saying this as a former kindergarten teacher. From boarding till the end of the flight, the child kept chattering loudly and kicking the seat. Parents only gave token scoldings, with the mother actually encouraging the child further by laughing and playing along. Even though he wasn’t kicking my seat, I could still feel the tremors. My Shure headphones could not completely drown out the noise.
Then the child took it as a sign to poke me through the seat gaps. I had enough and gave him a Teacher Glare. He stopped for a few blessed minutes until he began shouting again.
At least it was only an hour.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
In these situations, I ask parents to control their child , at least to stop the seat kicking . I controlled my 2 children on long flights from Hong Kong to London , other people need to also .
Parents not interested in teaching their children civilisation are testing everybodys patience and understanding. Appealing to the parents usually gets you a blank stare that you do not find their little darlings as enchanting as they do.Something that often works is the following: Kindly ask the passenger sitting BEHIND the annoying parent to let you sit in his seat for about 3 minutes. Then start on the seat in front of you: kick it, grab it and shake it, reach through the gap and maybe drop some litter. The complaint will start right away. Look as innocent as you possibly can and explain that you thought that this person would enjoy that kind of treatment as it did nothing to stop the child on inflicting it on you… It usually earns me a good laugh from the passengers sitiing near by and the terror stops.
I love it! Great idea. I hope all travelers remember.
Meh, kids will be kids. If you don't like it, then drive. You were a child once, and I'm sure you annoyed the hell out of adults around you, and I'm sure your parents did the best they could before giving up. Suck it up, snowflake.
"You were a child once" So? I'm going to be a corpse someday too, doesn't mean I want to share transportation space with one. "Kids will be kids" is just bad parent speak for "I'm a lazy person raising assholes." It's really NOT that hard to be prepared to occupy your kids when on public transportation and expecting people to "just drive" if they don't want to deal with someone's poorly raised hellion is super entitled and tonedeaf. You must be really fun at parties.
Come on now. Good parenting is a 24 hour job; even on an airplane.
I hope you don't have any children! What an infantile attitude.