A few years ago, I was trapped on a Swiss shuttle bus.
SHOUTING men and women around me, directed at our captors in their ugly orange vests. We were being shuttled to the airport after departing the airplane. They are yelling in French, German (and perhaps a dialect of Swiss German).
I have no idea what’s going on and I don’t know why we can’t leave. I lean over to the man next to me to ask what’s wrong. His English isn’t very good, he says “someone stole a seatbelt airplane”.
“What? I don’t think I understood you correctly.”
“Seatbelt” motioning buckling a seatbelt with his hands. Then he points to the plane “airplane”.
and I thought for a moment, I didn’t even know you could steal those!
Commotion continued on the bus, I found it funny that 6 different people went up to the man in charge holding us on the bus and screamed at him, asserting how we couldn’t be kept here and how could they know it was us who stole it, maybe it was the previous carriage. One by one, they waited their turn as one passenger went up to them and began shouting, then would walk away proud that they had shouted at someone, but defeated that it did little. It’s almost like it inspired the others to do the same 5 more times with each time being the same result.
I found what was going on around me hilarious. I’m trapped on a shuttle, people are screaming around me in languages I can’t understand, and it’s because of something I didn’t even think was possible. I’ve never even heard of this problem before!
30 minutes after we had originally alighted the plane, the official stated they would begin searching everyone’s bags until they found the stolen seatbelt. While they were screening the bags of 2 elderly women, someone in the back called out in German and raised their arm with the missing seatbelt dangling in the air.
We poured out of the bus like water from a bucket, each of us racing to catch our connections. I didn’t know what he said, but I understood that was the seatbelt and that we could all leave. As I rushed down the many long hallways of the airport to catch my train, I thought about if I did understand German, what the man holding the seatbelt could have said.
“I found it! The man next to me had it down his trousers!”
“Sorry everyone, it accidentally got stuck inside my bag”
“Shoot, I thought this was the one I brought from home”
“Here it is! This old lady was trying to use it as a dog leash”
Photo is of the Swiss Alps before we landed and got into that hilarious mess.
that was hilarious I literally Laughed out loud and my husband said what is so funny, I handed my phone to him and said you’ve GOT to read this article!