Sridevi - Tatti-Vane-Dee!

The memoirs of Manu, a cinema-loving flight attendant, who over 30 years in the air, encountered some of the biggest, finest and funniest Bollywood stars…

On one flight from Bombay to Dubai via Trivandrum (since renamed Thiruvananthapuram ) the beautiful and vivacious Sridevi was flying with us. She was the star of a large number of Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and of course Hindi films like Chaalbaaz,  Roop Ki Rani Choron Ka Raja &  Mr.India to name a few.

Lost in Translation
The flight landed at Thuiruvananthapuram. Then it was boarding time, almost all the incoming pax were going to join or rejoin their jobs as laborers in Dubai or thereabouts and they mostly spoke no language other than Malayalam. It was terribly difficult to communicate with them as none of the crew knew the language!

The first bus-load of pax started rushing up the ladder. They nudged and pushed at each other as if it were some sort of a race that had a prize waiting for the first one into the aircraft.

All of a sudden, one pax wearing a red bush-shirt with the top three buttons open, a long gold chain around his neck and sporting disheveled hair, hurriedly entered the aircraft shouting something in his native lingo. “Tatti-Vane-Dee!” he said desperately. The crew was stunned!

I went towards the door to assist the hostess who was attempting in vain to direct the man toward his seat. “Tatti-Vane-Dee!” he said again, looking really panicky. I asked him politely what it was that he wanted. Without a flinch, the man said piercingly “Tatti-Vane-Dee!!” This term seemed totally Greek and Latin to me and my crew. We looked for an interpreter among the boarding passengers, but it was futile as none of them spoke English or Hindi. I even tried sign-language but to no avail “Tatti-Vane-Dee!” he hollered again.

Tatti-Vane-Dee!

Then, after I painstakingly broke up his words phonetically, I thought I had solved the puzzle.

I was almost convinced that he needed to visit the toilet.  Holding the man by his hand, I led him to the nearest lavatory, pushed open the collapsible door and pointing towards the potty I asked “Tatti-Ven-Dee???”

The desperate man did not budge and looked at me suspiciously. He howled again “Tatti-Vane-Dee!!”

I was totally nonplussed. Thinking he may be dying of thirst; I offered him water, fruit-juice and even a beer. But he just shook his head, refusing it all and looked at me pleadingly; “Tatti-Vane-Dee!” was all he said; now almost giving up the fight.

With all this commotion Sridevi’s beauty sleep was rudely disturbed and she looked questionably in our direction. A hostess went to the actress to explain what was going on.

To our good luck, Sridevi offered to help us with her knowledge of Malayalam. She put on her dark glasses and walked purposefully into the economy.

Sridevi’s Multi-lingual Skills

First, there was a stunned silence when the passengers registered that Sridevi had walked in. Then, all hell broke loose, passengers clamored to get closer to her, some pulled out their pens and boarding passes for an autograph. As bags fell from overhead bins and crew members become security barriers, they were all screaming ‘SRIDEVI, SRIDEVI’  Sridevi hardly flinched.

She approached the harrowed passenger who was looking around frenetically, searching like a headless chicken. When he noticed the actress beads of sweat trickled down his face. He managed a half smile and said desperately to her, “Madam, Tatti-Vane-Dee”

Sridevi burst out laughing. The crew couldn’t make sense of it. She asked the passenger something in Malayalam and he took out his boarding pass to show it to her, but not without one last utterance of  “Tatti-Vane-Dee”. Amidst peals of laughter, Sridevi passed the boarding card to me and read out the gentleman’s seat number. It read seat number 31-D !!