Underneath this insane seventies promo video for Aeroflot on youtube, is the wry comment questioning why the airline with the monopoly over the Soviet Union at the time, felt the need to advertise. This incomprehensible advertising decision (one of many) just deepens my love affair with Aeroflot. I find retro Russian aviation culture baffling and fascinating beyond belief. There's something of the Grimm fairytale about it all. It's both glamourous and dark. And I frikkin love those outfits. This isn't the only promo vid I found. But all of them seem to feature the same subservient faux-aryan (check the gloriously dark bushy brows) all-singing, all-dancing stews, who like putting their hands on their hips and kicking their legs, ever so slightly off the beat. Wonderful. It's like the underground silver-screen. 50s Hollywood as Tim Burton would have had it.
I am still enthralled (though less so. But only like 5%. Or say, three chocolate fingers fewer) with post-Soviet era 'Flot ('92 onwards). In order to try and pick apart some of the hear'say regarding the airline's safety (so I don't find myself fibbing in later posts - and also sate my un-ending appetite for all things Slavic) I recently read through 26 customer reviews of recent flights. They oscillated from very good to dreadful to an 'experience.' The biggest gripe is the food, but isn't it always vapid slop with crusty blob-munch, whatever the wing-brand?
On the whole, Flotbags is a pretty good standard these days. It sort of has to be internationally, as there are rules and regs to adhere to if you want to land in foreign airports. The major thing that got most folk down, were the endless and often unexplained delays. And the fact customer service is a recent phenomenon and is deployed much like say, my rusty GCSE French when in Rome. In other words, it's not always spot on. And not always even there at all. But it's not for want of trying. I recently read that Russians have a 'different attitude to smile.' In other words, they don't. Smiling at strangers in Russian culture, is just not done. You don't do it. Stop. Put the smirk away. Fold those corners down. But looking serious is apparently a sign of intelligence. So, perhaps be thrilled when flying Aeroflot, that the stewards may glare at you on arrival. They probably do CPR better.
What I am most intrigued by though are Russia's internal flights. Deliciously, they don't have to conform to international standards. Some are still wobbly Tupelovs, with history for wings, bobbly curtains and a highly skilled Beluga-infused pilot at the helm. This is likely wildly incorrect, but it's what the romantic, dark and tundra-filled wilderness that is my imagination hopes for regardless.
I am going to bore you about this a lot. But for now, Scastlivovo puti. And feast your eyes on this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c88f3Q32hJ8 - Airplaneski, one of the best documentaries on fabulous Russian flying machines I've ever watched. I tried to embed it here, but it failed. It's possible I might have been smiling too much...
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