Meet Your New Air Hostess

4 minutes

Here is a little update about my life and what’s been keeping me busy. You might already know I’ve been following training for the past 2 months. I can now reveal that I was training to be a cabin crew member with Brussels Airlines and I successfully earned my wings on June 30th and started flying on July 1st. It was a long and intense journey with such stringent requirements; they really did put us through the wringer for this one, much to my surprise.

I decided to take a break from corporate finance for a while, to see if there’s anything else I might enjoy doing and feel more passionate about. More so since my stay in Belgium is temporary, it seemed like a good time to experiment without too severe consequences. So when the job was advertised back in February, I figured I was here for a good part of this year, so why not try it and see how much I enjoy it? The interview elimination process was ruthless in that they only selected a handful from hundreds of applicants.

I initially set out to temporarily do something more relaxing and less stressful than finance and accounting. Boy oh boy was I wrong! Nothing has been relaxing about training and so far nothing has been relaxing about my initial flights.

First and foremost, I had to learn to actually swim, as opposed to just floating and playing in the water, I had to actually swim about 6 lengths of a huge pool, jump from a raft, and get back in it from the water; it felt like there was a plot to drown me! Along with my 13 classmates, I survived the wet drill, the fire drill, and the evacuation drill, and all this with painted nails and perfectly lined lipstick. In the end, I felt like someone should sign me up for that ‘Survivor’ TV series or I should join the military or something!

We survived daily tests on safety and security (who knew there was a difference!) where 79% was a failing grade that would possibly result in dismissal. Any late arrival or full-on absence, whether it be due to illness or otherwise, would also result in instant dismissal from the programme. As would dozing off in class. Or chewing gum. At one point it felt like sneezing would get you thrown off the programme! We’ve been through the wringer for this one and we all made it and passed the finals; I am so very proud of all my classmates for surviving along with me.

We also had fun times with scheduled grooming sessions, makeup classes, manicure classes, hairstyling sessions, they have truly made ladies out of us -Lol!

When cabin crew comes to mind, everyone thinks ‘serving coffee or tea’ right away. So you can imagine my surprise when I found myself in the aircraft aisle, required to fulfill an order for coffee, and it suddenly hit me that no one had taught us how to do that! I remember panickedly thinking, Oh brother, I’ve been had! But it was quite easy, all we had to do was pour; the cups come pre-filled with the coffee/tea/chocolate content and all we had to do was pull the tab to release the contents and pour the water in from a kettle. I’m an expert now, piece of cake 🙂

I intended to improve my people skills and my confidence level as I am naturally a quiet introverted person. Believe me when I say I’m getting enough practice and I look and feel quite like a pro chatting up passengers on our flights. So far I’ve been to Alicante, Malaga, Barcelona, Seville (all in Spain), Berlin Germany, Porto Portugal, London England, and Venice Italy. For the remainder of this month, I still have Burgas Bulgaria, Lyon France, Catania Italy, and Tel Aviv Israel.

So much for my ‘easy-going’ career break 🙂 Still, I’m enjoying it while it lasts!