I was on China Southern Airlines travelling from Brisbane to Kathmandu, with a layover in Guangzhao. The first leg was smooth. The flight was over eight hours long and we were served good food twice. About 85 percent of the passengers were Chinese, and the accented English spoken by the crew made it difficult for non-Chinese speakers to communicate with them. The other passengers consisted of Nepali, Australian and European tourists. 

The second leg of the journey from Guangzhao to Kathmandu was scheduled for the same evening. Except for the crew, only a few passengers were Chinese. There were also a few Nepali passengers. But a large number of passengers were tourists, mainly from European countries. The plane, an A319, was relatively small. With hardly any legroom and narrow passages, the plane was designed to accommodate a large number of passengers for short distance flights. 

Change of course

The plane left a little behind the scheduled time, but I was confident that we would reach Kathmandu before midnight. The flight was smooth. I could not sleep because of my excitement; I was going home after almost half a year in Australia. However, most of the passengers seemed to have no problem and slept soundly. The plane started its last descent smoothly. The captain announced the descent for landing and I heard the sound of the landing wheels being lowered. But all of a sudden, the plane started to ascend with a swing. There was no announcement and we were kept in the dark for quite a while. After about half an hour, the captain announced that the plane could not land due to sudden bad weather. This created quite a stir in the plane, and we were kept in suspense as to the next course of action. After a further half hour, we were told that a request was being made for landing permission at a nearby airport in India. Another half an hour later, it was finally announced that landing permission was given at Lucknow International Airport.  

We landed at the Lucknow Airport without any trouble. However, the unfortunate circumstances we were under became evident as time progressed. First of all, it became clear that we could not disembark from the plane—nobody explained, but I have a hunch that India does not have warm relations with China after the border war in the early 1960s. This was the beginning of the ordeal. We could not get fresh food from outside either. The food stock in the plane was exhausted, and we had to manage without food until we landed in Kathmandu. 

There was also a communication problem. The cabin crew had a limited command of English. They could neither fully understand our questions nor respond adequately. Furthermore, they themselves did not know what was going to happen next. A few cold drinks that were left were consumed before dawn. We were each given a small wafer in the name of solid food. The foreign tourists missed their hotel bookings and some Nepali passengers missed connecting domestic flights to their respective destinations inside Nepal. Some Nepali passengers missed their scheduled meetings in Kathmandu. Everyone had reasons to worry.

Tragic rejoice

I found it almost impossible to sleep. I could not talk to the Nepali passengers who were seated in the front or rear rows. A young couple on my left were trying to sleep, with little success. But some interesting features helped me along in my state of sleeplessness. My seat was towards the middle of the aircraft and there was a good amount of space in the passage in front of my seat. This space became a theatre for entertainment and a platform for meeting. All the tourists sitting in front of my seat were fluent in English and they tried to elicit information from the crew about our future schedule. They failed in their mission because the crew were in the dark themselves. Then started an endless discussion without an agenda. This discussion proved to be entertaining and informative; it was a soothing antidote to fight the otherwise boring vigil.

One of the events in the little passage ahead of me was the display of yogic postures by a young woman. That kept many of us enthralled. I did not ask her, but I think she was a yoga guru somewhere. The next feature was the use of the passage as a venue for discussing current social, religious, political and educational issues. Donald Trump and the Dalai Lama were discussed—in different contexts, of course. The weather in different parts of the world was not left out of the discussion either. An interesting piece of information was provided by a woman from Norway; she said that in Scandinavia, the sun never sets for six months and darkness is artificially created for people to sleep. In contrast, the sun never rises during the next six months and artificial light is created for doing work. 

There was one good aspect in the whole episode: there was constant power supply, so the air conditioning did not stop. The announcement at 10:30AM that we were finally flying again brought some cheer to our fatigued faces. There was spontaneous clapping when the aircraft touched ground midday at the Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu. I had never before seen such jubilation at an arrival. Who can forget such a tragic rejoice? 

- Sharma is a political analyst