The taxi driver didn’t know where the Tiger Terminal was which was more a reflection on him as it’s right next to the taxi holding area in which he would have presumably spent countless hours. As he had to key Melbourne Airport into his GPS system that presumption may have been unfounded. After seeing his actual driving skills once we were under way, it was also indeed overly presumptuous to contend that he had ever driven before. Let’s put it this way – he didn’t observe such fundamentals of driving as using in a lane or using the instruments at his disposal. He had to be woken up … and I mean woken up to take the turn to the terminal. I was running late other wise I would have tucked him in before I left.

As it turned out I wasn’t running late or anything like running late. We could have rolled the car in a ditch on the side of the road and both had a nap.

It’s never a good sign to see only one person in the check in queue particularly if that person is in tears. The check in girl called me up and into the midst of this poor woman’s hysteria to ask what flight I was on.

“Adelaide.”

“That’s been cancelled. You should have been notified.”

“So is this me being notified?”

“Looks that way? You will be on the 7 o’clock flight.”

“That would be the one that leaves in 5 and half hours?”

“That would be the one.”

As I left the distraught woman continued her histrionics. I’d seen people that upset about going to Adelaide, but never for being denied.

Tiger airways are cheap. Very cheap! Like ‘just more than my near death experience taxi fare’ cheap but you don’t have to wake the pilot up to land. He sets an alarm. When you drink cheap wine you get hangover; when you opt for a discount hooker you get itchy and when you fly Tiger airways they leave whenever they fuck they want.

I spent the 5 hours spending the money I had saved by flying Tiger. The departure lounge looked, felt and smelt like a year 12 common room with its own tuckshop. This theme was assisted by the age of the staff. The terminal looked like it had been taken over by the cast of The OC. Even the baggage handlers looked like they still possibly slept in bunks. I kept expecting to see the pilot get dropped off by his mum. Apologizing to everyone that the cancelled flight was his fault because he was on a detention.

They finally called the flight and we walked several kilometres to the plane through a graveyard of broken airport stuff that included a number mobile aircraft stairs leading to what I presume to be more cancelled flights.

The flight attendants were the old school quite hot type but where Virgin pride themselves on a sense of fun, Tiger go for the ‘jaded, surly rather be somewhere else’ look. Even the safety demonstration seemed to convey the message… ‘don’t bother looking cos if we crash you’re fucked.”

I had few complaints after that. Mind you after being trapped in a giant school canteen for half a day, there wouldn’t want to be too much more go wrong. Sure the plane landed in Adelaide, but that was my choice.