I thought I was lucky at the time. Only 5 days after launch of the route, I was rostered to operate Copenhagen. It was to be the highlight of what was an undesirable roster – no where I bid for, 3 turns, the 5 days off before my leave that I requested were not granted, wheras others in my bid group who were less senior than I was were granted the days off they requested. I was going to be missing out on the Reykjavik marathon, and I wasn’t happy.

I guess the first problems were that it was overbooked in Economy, so with an originally empty First Class this was expected to fill up quite fast. We arrived at the aircraft to discover that we were catered 8 out of a possible 12, but the ground dispatcher told us to be expecting a full house. As the galley operator for the flight, this is quite frustrating, since the catering personnel has to load the new catering by hand, and on the Airbus 330 there isn’t a lot of room left in the chillers for the dine-on-demand top up. Maybe back when we bought the aircraft and it was a scheduled full service the galley was useable, but with both breakfast and lunch for dine-on-demand it is just unworkable with a full cabin.

When everyone boarded, we saw that about half of the passengers were upgrades, and the other half staff. Pilots, to be specific. When staff travel they’re not permitted to use the lounges in the terminal, so almost all of them will eat on the plane. The upgrades would have all had J/C lounge access, but after finding out they had First Class boarding cards, they ordered what they were not normally entitled to otherwise, such as the caviar and the Dom Peringnon. I take a lot of pride in serving our caviar – but the plating is extremely problematic and chews up a good 10 minutes of a single crew’s time just to make the plate look first class standard. Every single passenger ordered the caviar, some ordered seconds, 6 did so at the same time, and it really felt like I was working at McDonalds, but instead of compiling burgers I was plating caviar worth almost 100 USD a tin.

The service just didn’t stop. The only time I had to sit down was in the cockpit waiting for the pilots to get their tray table out whilst I held their meals. We didn’t have time to eat, we didn’t have time to pee. It was probably the hardest I’ve worked in First Class in the last 2 years.

After the flight had finally ended, all I wanted to do was just lie in bed with the duvet over my head and emerge only for the wake up. But then I thought, at the very least, I should shop for groceries , so I went to the nearest supermarket. On the way back I saw some bicycles parked outside the hotel available for hire, thought ‘I may as well’ then went for a bike ride around Copenhagen. I was so pleased afterwards that I did, the fresh air really lifted my mood. I took a few photos, nearly crashed the bike a few times, but you’ll have to excuse me for the lack of photos and detailed labelling as I was still recovering from that spirit-defeating flight.

Church of Our Savior - Love the spiral on top.

Christiansborg Palace



Central Train Station


Entrace to the Tivoli Gardens.


Copenhagen Town Hall & Square. At the time there was a fashion show being held inside as it was Fashion Week.


Kunstmuseum


Later on in the evening when I was on my way back to the hotel on the hire bike I saw a massive gathering of people along the Kalvebod Brygge - What seemed like almost 1000 people donned their roller blades and roller skates, and with boomboxes in hand went for a sunset skate. Very cool.

Labels: Airline Stuff, Galley Gossip, Layovers, Work

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