China Airlines Passenger Yells At Flight Attendants For Not Speaking Japanese
These days, air travel is well on track to returning to pre-pandemic levels.
While this means many of us are back to flying as usual, the resurgence has also brought controversies from both airline staff and passengers.
The most recent incident comes from aboard a China Airlines flight, where a passenger, alleged to be Japanese, was seen yelling at flight attendants for not speaking her native tongue.
Source: Twitter
Aside from the attendants, she also got into a spat with fellow passengers.
The dispute resulted in a near 40-minute delay for the Fukuoka-Taoyuan flight. Security also had to escort the woman off the plane before it finally took off.
Passenger said flight attendants must speak Japanese as they are in Japan
TVBS News reported that the China Airlines passenger flew into a rage as the flight attendants only spoke Chinese.
According to a video posted by the news outlet, the woman had angrily stated that the attendants should speak Japanese since they were in Japan.
During the 4 June flight, one flight attendant was seen trying to defuse the situation by greeting the passenger politely.
The passenger fired back by yelling, “Not nice to meet you”, followed by “very bad review” and “very bad experience”.
Source: YouTube
Despite that, the attendant politely requested that she return to her seat, to which the latter refused.
The woman then began pointing at her fellow passengers and yelling angrily, though her words were unintelligible.
Later in the clip, she read off a piece of paper in Japanese, which supposedly stated that the flight attendants’ behaviour was not permissible by international law.
Fellow China Airlines passengers tried to intervene
The woman’s behaviour did not sit well with her fellow passengers, who tried to step in at various points.
In an interview with TVBS News, one revealed that another passenger had tried to speak to her.
Additionally, yet another passenger made clear to the flight attendant that he did not want to be on the same plane as her.
In a separate video posted on PhoenixTV News’ Twitter, a passenger appeared to have gotten up and told the woman to be quiet as they were flying off soon.
#Japan #China #Society #Harassment
🗣️ “This is Japan, we need to use Japanese.”
📹 [REPLAY] 🇯🇵 A Japanese passenger @Marizmful erupted at a flight attendant on a China Airlines flight for not speaking Japanese because she was allegedly “ignored” when asking for water. https://t.co/kNFsExBzPR pic.twitter.com/uIPavNqcnJ
— 鳳凰資訊 PhoenixTV News (@PhoenixTV_News) June 7, 2023
This only angered the woman further, as she reprimanded the passenger by retorting: “What about you? What are you?”
A flight attendant later asked the other passenger if she was with the woman.
She said she was not. However, she decided to talk to her as she could not stomach the way the woman was talking to them.
China Airlines passenger claimed she was only asking for water
A day after the incident went viral, a Twitter user named Marizmful came forward as the woman in the videos.
In her tweet, she claimed she was a “real” Japanese and had been trying to ask for water.
Source: Twitter
However, she was allegedly ignored by the flight attendant and supposedly apologised to everyone onboard in the end.
She also appeared to express her frustration at not being issued a refund or insurance payout as she was escorted off the flight before takeoff.
A few days later, she retweeted the PhoenixNews TV video and again apologised for yelling.
Source: Twitter
At the same time, she asked why the attendants continued to ignore her to the extent that she had to scream when all she wanted was water.
In response to the incident, TVBS News reported that the airline company had issued a statement.
China Airlines confirmed that a passenger was behaving unreasonably by insulting the flight attendants and yelling at other passengers.
As communication and warnings had been ineffective, it had to ask the passenger to leave the flight as it was in the best interest of the flight’s safety and passengers.
She was eventually handed over to the local airport police.
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Featured image adapted from Twitter.
