“Air India?”The raised eyebrow was Roger Moore, the frown all Jeremy Paxman. “Seriously? Ha, ha. Good luck mate! My company stopped flying us with them years ago, they’re hopeless. And you actually chose them…..”

That’s how Dances With Chazzwazzers works ladies and gentlemen (for ease of use, let’s go with DWC from now on, shall we?); keeping tourism real so you can just read about it, hopefully laugh about it then make your own informed decision. So I was pumped. Ready for it. Bring it on. This half arsed approach to customer service and safety wasn’t going to flour any chapatis with me. I was going to delight you, first post up, with a withering critique of the aforementioned airline and their cackhandedness.

The truth, rather disappointingly, is nowhere as entertaining as fiction. The food was good, (well, for airline standards….), the choice of entertainment was ok, the attention to safety and security was every bit as complicit as it should be. I ended up with quite a lot more legroom than shut-eye as it happens, as my immediate co-passengers turned out to be an obliging young family with a teething newborn (those sleepless nights aren’t overrated are they brother?) and the very manifestation of a charming English rose who had come to India to get away from it all. While the complaisant, jolly stewardesses could have come straight from the second verse of a Neil Hannon song. So from expecting to damn, instead I have a modicum of praise for this seemingly embattled venerable elder statesman of the aviation world.

They were bloody late though. Or, if you go by the phenomenon that is India Time, perfectly punctual….