MH731

Air travel is a complex system dependent on many complex things that go wrong. People, schedules, planes, and weather, just to name a few. Technical problems are the scariest of all. When your car breaks down, you just stop it by the side of the road. When your breaks down, you might have 38,000 feet before you hit the ground or sea! Not very good chances at all. Thankfully, my flight back to KL from Bandar Seri Begawan (MH731) encountered technical problems before the flight. It arrived on time, but they announced a delay for our boarding. After one hour had passed, the delay turned into an outright cancellation. Wah, never encountered that before!

The ground staff announced that we would be sent to a hotel and provided with meals. As if on cue, a senior flight attendant pushed a cart of in-flight meals to the gate. One guy with a constipated face (Mr. Sembelit) immediately rushed to the counter and protested.

"I don't want your hotel and I don't want your food. I wanna go home!"

Basically, details were sketchy. They told us to meekly check in to the hotel and await further updates. No details at all. Many of the passengers joined the protest because they had connecting flights to catch. One other guy (Mr. Speedy) just immediately walked off to purchase a ticket on the next code share flight operated by Royal Brunei. After much chaos, it seems that they were actually putting people on the next code share flight (while most Bruneians went home to wait). My colleague and I quickly joined the queue as there were limited seats and limited time.

Have to thank our lucky stars that we manged to change our flight and not waste a day in Brunei. Because of the last minute change, we delayed the Royal Brunei flight by about half an hour. When I boarded, I spied Mr. Speedy sitting in business class. Orang kaya, no wonder. But anyway, he could still get reimbursement from MAS.

I got a seat at the last row, which was also a first for me. The pilot seemed to be stepping on it because we made it back in KL in just under 2 hours. It was bumpy the whole way but never once was the seat belt sign switched on. Haha.

We were already tired from the ordeal, and still MAS wasn't done with us-- our luggage didn't arrive. WTF. Mr. Sembelit got his, but Mr. Speedy didn't. Another first for me making a report at baggage claim. My silly colleague also didn't get his bag. The guy at baggage claim laughed at him for not carrying his 3.7 KG duffel bag into the cabin. That earned him a Property Irregularity Report for no good reason. By the time I got home, it was already midnight. Boy, what a day!