Started from home at 1am. We were on an Etihad flight. Service was just about OK for the self-touted "World's Leading airline". We were going via Abu dhabi, which turned out to be pretty small an airport for an oil rich state. Seating was extremely limited and people can be found lying down in the passages leading to the different gates when there are a large number of flights arriving or leaving at the same time.
On the plane to Cairo, the guy sitting next to me murmured Salam maleikum while he was taking his seat, at the time I thought he was addressing some friend of his across the aisle. Turned out that he'd directed his greeting at me. Started speaking with Mohammed (that was his name) and he told me he was working for an American oil firm in Pakistan as an engineer. Apparently he was on his way to meet his family in Cairo. He was an electrical engineer and we were soon power talking about M.H. Rashid's "Power electronics" (pity IGBTs, drives and choppers were the topics I made conversation on with a person from half the world away on the very next day that my exams were over), besides all about the places to see and how to greet people in Egypt and what not. Very friendly (and might I mention good looking) guy, he even offered to help us contact our driver if he didn't arrive at the airport in time to pick us up.
