Nothing good ever comes out of an act of kindness, or so it seems. Here I am, all buckled up in an aisle seat with a copy of the Wall Street Journal, waiting for the plane to take off for Denver when this guy asks me if I could do him a favor and switch seats. He gives me his story: The girl seated next to me is his wife. They are a newly married couple on their way to Portland for honeymoon. Their original flight had mechanical problems so they got rerouted on this plane. They were allotted the last two seats in the plane, and one of them is in Business Class! No problem, I will switch seats.
I am the kinda guy who likes to do favors for strangers. And, of course, they serve lunch in Business Class. The guy seated next to me is an American who has settled in Philippines for good. He is a white guy in his sixties. Tells me he has traveled extensively in Asia. He has actually been to my hometown in India. �That part of the world is booming, you know. China has a growth rate of over 8 percent. Now, isn�t that impressive? I was there just last month, in Shanghai. I tell you, the number of skyscrapers there is mind-boggling. India is not making that kind of progress, you know. Why is that?�
Hell if I know. All I know is that they serve lunch in Business Class.
When the flight attendant brought my tray I had to try hard to control my grin and keep a straight face. 
And when I was half way through my lunch, this guy, the American Filipino, sneezed so hard that it felt like a lightening had hit the plane or something. It scared the bejesus out of me, but I recovered and continued eating. The plane touched down at Denver on time and I shook hands with him and bid him goodbye, and that was it � or so I thought.
I woke up in a state of shock that night. I knew my wife wouldn�t be able to handle it so I called my brother in Chicago. He is a levelheaded, practical guy. He has a head for numbers, so he did the math and told me that the chances of that happening were one in a few millions. That�s all fine, but what are the chances that a guy seated in 38 D, going to Denver, would be asked to switch seats with a newly married guy going to Portland on his honeymoon, and then get to sit next to an American Filipino who had traveled to China only the previous month. Man, I tell you, there is no comfort to be drawn from all of that probability theory bullshit. I knew the American Filipino had given it to me when he sneezed. I could feel it coming.
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome � SARS � the very name made me gasp and choke. I imagined all kinds of things in the hotel that night. 
My palms started to sweat and I felt like my nose was starting to run. I didn�t go to work the following morning there at Denver. I went to the doctor, instead. I told him the whole thing; spilled my guts out. He reassured me with the same logic that my brother had used the previous night: The chances of me having SARS were one in a few millions. Then he excused himself and left the room. When he returned he had surgical gloves on and a mask over his mouth. �Just as a precaution,� he said. I am told I fainted at that point.
They put me in a special bed at the hospital and quarantined the whole area. It was not all that bad in there. I caught up on the past issues of New Yorker and read the article by Woody Allen that I had always wanted to read. I watched over a dozen movies. Take it from me, the movie Chicago is really that bad. Man, it was terrible! In fact, it was so bad that when I got back home from the trip, I placed that movie on hold against my card at the local library just so others wouldn�t watch it.
They tested my blood and everything came out negative. As soon as I was discharged I ran to the airport and booked myself on the next flight home. The lady at the counter informed me that I had the middle seat and offered to switch my seats if I so wished.
�Hell no!�
Are you ready for this? Guess who was sitting next to me on either side? The lady whose husband had made me switch seats with him on the onward journey was at the window to my right and the American Filipino was in the aisle seat to my left. �No way, right?� That�s exactly what my brother said, too. Didn�t I tell you? That probability theory is all a bunch of hogwash. Apparently the Portland couples were rerouted again and the American Filipino didn�t qualify for an upgrade because he had used up all his frequent flier miles. When everyone was seated, the flight attendant asked me if I would switch seats with the lady�s husband � he was in the Business Class.
�No problem, I will switch seats,� I said.
I am the kinda guy who likes to do favors for strangers and they serve lunch only in business class, you see. Did I tell you about this guy seated next to me on the return flight? Never mind, it�s big story; I will tell you some other time.
Mukund Narasimhan
May 2003
