The Chinese Lady

(A completely true incident that occurred in December 2000)
The heat was rising in waves off the concrete apron of Adelaide’s’ airport as we boarded the turboprop driven Lockheed Metro for the flight to Coober Pede – the famous opal mining town in the Australian desert, a couple of hundred kilometers south of Alice Springs. Twenty–five assorted travelers climbed the two or three steps into the hot little cabin of the commuter plane and took their places in one of the two rows of twelve single seats that ran on either side of the narrow aisle. The twenty–fifth seat was placed in the aisle against the rear bulkhead, making the last row into a threesome. In the first pair of seats behind the curtained off flight deck were a middle aged Italian couple – urbane and well dressed, he in tasseled loafers and well–cut jacket, she in a semi transparent cotton dress. They had talked incessantly at each other at the tops of their voices all the way out to the aircraft, and continued to do so inside the cabin, their hands contributing as much to the conversation as their voices. Disappointedly, I took the second row seat behind the man. As a private pilot, I wanted to watch the takeoff over the pilot’s shoulder, but the Italians had made sure they got to the front row first, as it afforded slightly more legroom. We Brits are never very good as pushing our way to the front! My wife took the place behind the Italian woman and we strapped ourselves into the small seats, rather inappropriately covered in sheepskin. Behind us sat a rather mismatched couple that had caught my eye as we walked out to the plane. He looked as though he might be eastern European, in his forties and rather shabbily dressed with over–long unkempt hair thinning on top. His partner was a Chinese lady of a similar age, well fed rather than overweight and dressed in brightly patterned silk trousers, tightly fitted around her hips. He took the seat behind me, and the woman sat across the aisle behind my wife. The other passengers took their places, including a young man apparently traveling on his own, who took the twenty–fifth seat in the rear of the cabin. The plane took off and headed north toward the salt lakes that must have seemed hell on earth for the first men to traverse this wilderness. My wife watched the passing scenery for a while and then drifted off to sleep, lulled by the incessant drone of the engines. I too drifted off and awoke about an hour into the flight, to the sound of a rather agitated conversation behind me. I glanced over my right shoulder at the Chinese lady. She was sitting quite upright in her seat with an unmistakably recognizable statement on her face. Although she had slightly raised her left leg to conceal the fact, I could clearly see that her right hand was clamped firmly between her thighs. Without a shadow of a doubt, she was desperate for a pee. I had woken just in time to hear her partner reply in a tetchy voice, “You’ll just have to wait!” as he half turned away in his seat and buried himself deeper in the news. The Chinese lady squeezed her thighs tightly together and chewed her bottom lip. For the next few minutes, I surreptitiously continued to enjoy the spectacle, until she caught my eye. I must have looked as though I might be sympathetic to her plight, for she leaned forward across the aisle and touched my shoulder. “What can I do” she asked, “I have to go to the bathroom!” My pulse galloped with the delectable thought that (a) the plane didn’t have a toilet, and (b) we still had fifty minutes to run to our destination. My mind span with the image of her desperately holding herself, knowing that it was only a matter of time before she cold hold it no longer, whereupon she would flood the sheepskin covered seat and probably the aisle as well. I was sympathetic but unhelpful. “There’s not much you can do, I’m afraid” I said, trying not to reveal my suppressed excitement, “Can you hold on for another fifty minutes?” My voice almost choked with delicious anticipation. The Chinese lady couldn’t conceal her desperation as she squirmed in her seat, thighs squeezing her hand as tightly as they would go. “I’ve got to go – now! Oh! What can I do?” She was almost crying with pain and desperation. Then she said, “I’m going to speak to the Captain!”
With that, she undid her seatbelt and stooping under the low cabin roof, pulled aside the curtain that divided the cabin from the flight deck. I could see that the first officer was rather surprised to find a lady tapping him on the shoulder. I, on the other hand, could see her muscles tensing beneath the tight silk of her trousers, as she strove to contain herself while she made him aware of her plight. Sadly, the noise of the engines made it impossible for me to overhear the conversation, but after a moment or two, the first officer squeezed himself out of his seat and came back into the cabin with the Chinese lady in tow. As they passed my seat, she spoke into my ear, “He thinks he’s got a container in the back” she said quickly. A few moments later, the single man who had occupied the twenty–fifth seat came forward and took the Chinese lady’s place, closely followed by the first officer on his way back to the cockpit. As soon as he was out of the way, the Italian couple – who I guess must have grasped what was happening – stopped talking and peered round over their shoulders. This was obviously a general signal for the whole plane, and I turned to see twenty–one other pairs of eyes trained on the rear of the cabin (my wife had just woken up and had no idea what was going on and Chinese lady’s partner stared resolutely into his paper!). There was the Chinese lady, whose desperation had clearly overcome all thoughts or considerations of modesty. She was squatting, in full view of the spectators, silk trousers around her ankles and black lace knickers around her knees, pissing into a large plastic container that was balanced precariously on the middle seat. Regrettably, the engine noise drowned out what must have sounded like a veritable pressure hose! Eventually she finished, and like voyeurs caught illicitly peeping, each of the passengers quickly returned to their books and papers (or, in the case of the Italians, their animated conversation). The Chinese lady spent the remainder of the flight at the rear of the cabin, and I never spoke to her again. As we disembarked, I tried to detect any signs of dampness in the silk trousers, but alas they appeared to be quite dry. As with all such incidents, there are the inevitable ‘if onlys’:
— If only I had brought my digital camera into the cabin! – If only I had been allocated a seat at the rear of the plane! – If only the first officer hadn’t had that damn plastic container!
I wonder how many times a month he has to use it?
Geoff