How flight attendants see themselves and their job

1. Not all of us are so glamorous

Contrary to the popular belief, not every flight attendant is a 6 feet tall Venus with blond hair and perfect proportions. Flight attendant should look beautiful, well mannered and decent, but they don’t have to be supermodels. What makes a flight attendant a flight attendant is not so much the look but the ability to cope with different situations (at times both stressful and dangerous) and to communicate with people with different characters, with different backgrounds and education.

2. We are not snobbish, we just do our job

Many people think that flight attendants are snobbish and hard to talk to except of the work-related talk while helping them on the plane. That is not correct. Almost every flight attendant has great communication skills, but it is hard to talk about everything with everybody on the plane. Imagine if a person having a “normal” job talks to that many people every day! They would probably go insane. Plus, people often mistake the politeness of the flight attendants because of which they get hit on constantly.

3. We don`t have that much time to visit a city when we go for work there

The flight attendants life is a travelers life, which doesn`t mean that we are tourist. Flight attendants do travel to countless destinations every day, but hardly ever get the chance to see anything more than the runway and the airport. And when we do get a chance to stay in a city for the night, we usually sleep.

4. We are not flying bartenders

It is not that we are just some waiters in the plane. We are well versed and more than clever, and our primary job is to take care of the security of the plane and not of your needs and wining. The next time you yell at a flight attendant as if she/he is a bartender, have in mind that she/he is probably more educated than you are and is not your personal butler for the day.

5. Being flight attendants can be hard

The flight attendants job is as stressful as any other job, if not more. This is because the flight attendants job, in comparison to other people’s jobs is not an ordinary 9 to 5 job, but consists of an ever changing schedule of flights, which sometimes can be very stressful. Also, contrary to any other job, a flight attendants job is in a plane, and includes hours of being on your feet, passing long distances in short time periods and dealing with people that simply said don`t make the job easier. Sometimes even though they are ready to do their job following the schedule given to them, it is not always possible. The flights can be delayed, sometimes even canceled because of a myriad of different reasons, most commonly the extreme weather, security reasons, late arrivals etc. Imagine if your daughter had her first school play and you are stuck some couple of thousand miles away because of the rain. Not so glamorous.

6. Our job is more than just smiling to passengers and pouring Diet Coke

Contrary to what many people think, the flight attendants job doesn`t start with the take off and surely doesn`t finish with the last passenger exiting the plane. Before the take off flight attendants must check the plane for any anomaly regarding the safety equipment. Also they have to keep an eye on any suspicious behavior in the plane.Simply said they are in the plane for one very basic purpose, and that’s your safety. Only after safety comes the service and providing comfort for all of the passengers. And they are not being paid for doing the service but instead for knowing all the necessary procedures which may save your ass in something goes wrong.

7. We don`t get paid as much as you would think

The biggest misconception about flight attendants is that they are paid lots of money. No, they are not. At least they are not paid well enough for the effort they put in their job and the time they spend on their working place.

8. Outside of the airport we are just ordinary persons

Flight attendant outside of the plane and the airport are just normal people, with normal lives and normal families. The only difference is that they have to cope with crazy schedules and plan every minute in their life in order to spend some quality time with their loved ones.

9. The job we do can be really dangerous

Even though the flight attendants job doesn`t exactly look like something that can be included in a spy movie script, flight attendants are starting to resemble action movie characters due to the constant threat of terrorism. And let’s not forget the severe weather conditions faced by planes on a daily basis. Also there is the problem of staying healthy and functional all the time while working long hours and breathing everybody’s germs in the plane.