¡Hola!

So, you thought I'd come back from Cuba without an aviation story? Well, think again.

Our flight to Cuba was scheduled to leave at 6:30am on Monday morning. This meant a 3:30am wake up call. Waking up at 3:30am feels very wrong to me. I'm much more used to going to sleep at 3:30am than waking up at that time. Amy and I must have gotten a total of about two hours sleep that night.

We made our way to the airport and eventually onto the Boing 737-800. We greeted the flight attendants at the door and made our way to our seats. I was quite tired at the time but I was feeling the rush of being on an airplane that is about 100 times bigger than the airplane I fly. Thankfully we managed to get a window seat, so I got to see the whole first flight during daytime throughout the window. If you ask my Amy, she'd probably tell you that I was glued to the window the whole flight, but I did manage to get about an hour of shuteye.

Anyway, before take-off one of the flight attendants came around to check of our seat belts are on, and Amy being who she is, took the first chance to tell the flight attendant that I celebrated my birthday the day before, and that I'm also an aspiring pilot taking flying lessons, and that if anything could be done for me to see the flight deck of the airplane, maybe talk to the pilots for a minute, that would be great. I didn't expect her to ask that. My mind was still blank from waking up at 3:30am. I didn't have any questions for the pilots lined up in case I did get a chance to meet them, but I figured the questions would come to mind pretty quickly. The flight attendant said that he'll see what he can do.

Later on in the flight, Amy (who's hilarious and mildly offensive blog you can find here), while in line for the washroom, spoke with the flight attendant again to make sure the flight attendant was still on the case. He asked her what my name was, and admitted to her that the head flight attendant was not as... diplomatic as she could be, and that if anything happens, it would have to be after landing. Amy came back to her seat and told me this, and we both kind of gave up on the idea and mostly forgot about it.

Around the time we began to descend, the flight attendant Amy had spoken to came to our seat and wished me a happy birthday and an enjoyable vacation. When he was on his way, Amy whispered to me: "that was a 'no'".

The airplane finally landed in Cuba. I was very enchanted by seeing Cuba from the air, and was excited to begin our vacation. The lead flight attendant then comes on the intercom to conclude the flight. Give or take a few words, here's how it went down:

Lead Flight Attendant - "Dear passengers, we have landed in Cuba. We wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for flying with Sunwing. We hope you enjoy your vacation and your stay in Cuba. We also wanted to take this opportunity to congratulate a special passenger we have with us today. At seat 11F, Lavi celebrated his birthday yesterday, AND got his pilot license. Congratulations Lavi!"

All passengers - *clap, clap, clap, clap. Look, gawk, clap clap clap*

Yes...
One of the most embarrassing experiences of my life. A plane full of people clapping for me, based on faulty information. A classic case of broken telephone? We'll never know.

For the next hour I had people coming up to me from the plane and asking me about my pilot license. I had to tell them that it was a big misunderstanding. At least I could tell them that I was taking flying lessons. I got to meet some pretty interesting people because of it though. It was a good start to the vacation.

I also took some pictures and a video of the takeoff from Varadero Airport in Cuba. I'll post it in a couple of days when I get access to it. Meanwhile, tomorrow I have another lesson. Circuits! Should be a fun one. I'll tell you all about it tomorrow.