After settling down in my seat on my flight to Kolkata from Doha, I started chatting with my new friend – the flight attendant – “DJ” is how he introduced himself. Originally, he is from France. We talked about a lot of stuff – including Brexit and sooner than later, went to the topic of wine. Turns out he is somewhat of an accomplished bartender!!

As the passengers started filing in, he got busy. But eventually, he came to take our beverage orders.

“How would you like to start the evening, once we get up in the air?”, he asked. I was quite sure, he wanted me try the French wines.

“Not the way, you were probably thinking JD”, I said.

“What is your ideal start to the evening?”

“An Old Fashioned”.

He looked at me for a second and said “I will try my best”. And then went off to the other passengers.

I had almost forgotten that exchange. After we hit 31,000 feet and leveled out, he came to me, kneeled down on one his knees and asked me “How do you like it?”. “How do I like what?”, drawing a blank. Like I said, I had forgotten about our exchange.

“Your Old Fashioned”.

“Oh! With Luxardo cherries and extra bitters. But I am not that picky”.

“Ok”, he said and scooted off.

A few minutes later, he came back with this drink. How he managed to get the ingredients, I will never know.

“That was Angostura?”, I asked.

“Indeed!”, he said.

“Why do you stock bitters in a flight. That too to Kolkata?”.

He would not answer me – just gave the corporate line “We will do anything to please our customers! Enjoy!!”.

I tried a sip of the Old Fashioned.

It was a best start possible to this evening. Even at 31,000 feet up in the air floating in an aluminum tube!!