Air Deccan and Auction
I personally like the way Air Deccan has changed our aviation sector - making air travel affordable to the common man. But the way they hold auctions on air - that redefines the very definition of an auction. A friend (Iqbal) and I had the fortune of experiencing this first hand couple of months back. We were flying the Bangalore - Mangalore sector. 4 PM flight. Both of us tired and exhausted, looking forward to getting home. On board, we rummage thru the in flight reading material, and then stumble on this auction slip that has a list of items that would be auctioned on the flight. Great. Something to look forward to on flight. I see a Rahul Dravid autographed bag, and think it would be a good idea to lay my hands on one of those. And Iqbal sees this necklace that he could get (He had been travelling a lot, and he thought he could make up for the lost family time by gifting this neckace to his wife). Both of us fill up the auction slip quoting the floor price. Then we see all other guys on flight filling in their sheets. By now, we’d made up our minds to get the stuff we wanted - We did not want to lose the auction ‘cos someone else quoted a higher price. So after couple of corrections (jacking up our quotes to probably higher that what the stuff was worth), we hand over our sheets to the flight attendant. We wait with baited breath for the results. I’d never won a lottery or an auction in my life, but something told me that I would be a winner that day. Sure enough, the attendant comes to me and hands over the Rahul Dravid autographed bag. I feel on top of the world - it was my lucky day! The feeling soon turns to surprise (and then later horror) when I see the attendant handing over another Rahul Dravid autographed bag to the guy seated next to me! And another to the guy in front, and to the guy in the back. At the end of it, almost everyone on the flight had a bag. Needless to say, Iqbal also got his (very precious) necklace. Turns out, they gave out the items to everyone who bid. And at the prices they quoted. So probably, the guy in front got the same bag for half the price I quoted. Did Air Deccan trick us? You tell me.
And why am I writing this 2 months after the incident? Today, the strap of the bag came loose. And Rahul Darvid’s signature has been slowly disappearing. And I am mad at Air Deccan. Thats why.
humor, life, air deccan, travel, rahul dravid
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