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A woman has detailed her nightmare travel experience after sitting in between a couple on a flight.
In a viral video shared earlier this week, TikTok user Malia Makaila (@maliamakaila) showed herself sitting in between a couple, who had booked an aisle seat and a window seat, during a recent United flight.
“I’m on a flight sitting in an economy plus middle seat in between husband and wife who purchased the aisle and window seat,” Makaila wrote over the clip, which has been viewed more than 140,000 times. “They’re just passing chips and drinks over me having a full conversation, meanwhile the guy in front of me pushed his seat so far back I can’t open my laptop and the WiFi doesn’t work.”
Makaila also shared footage of the passenger next to her, who was passing a blue plastic cup to his partner sitting on the opposite side. The woman then passed the blue cup back to her husband, reaching over Makaila’s seat once again.
“Now they’re talking about the weather,” she added over the clip. “I’m wondering if there is such a thing as plane etiquette because I don’t think they learned it.”
In the comments section, fellow TikTok users were “livid” over the couple’s lack of airplane seat etiquette during the flight. Many people agreed that the couple should’ve offered up one of their seats so that they could sit together and Makaila wouldn’t have needed to sit in the middle.
“I would’ve asked them again if they wanted to sit together or stop passing/conversing over me,” one TikTok user commented.
When another viewer asked whether she had suggested to let one of them sit in her seat, Makaila revealed that the couple gave her a “hard decline.”
Others were outraged that the passengers decided to pass drinks back and forth over Makaila’s seat, where she had her laptop open and sitting on the tray table.
“Passing anything that could damage that laptop, I’d be livid,” one TikToker wrote, while another said: “And what if a drink spilled on your laptop? Absolutely not.”
Some users also shared how they would’ve handled the situation in Makaila’s place, like one TikToker who commented: “I would’ve asked: ‘I’m sorry, did you guys want to sit next to each other?’ If not, then I would tell them it’s ridiculous to be interacting that much and being in my space. Heck no.”
“I’m a wife that buys a window seat for me and an aisle for my husband,” another person shared. “If the middle seat is bought I never make the person sit between us. I always offer the window seat to them.”
This isn’t the first time a TikTok video has sparked a debate about airplane etiquette. In May, user Alex Bennett (@justalexbennett) went viral when she recalled the “insane plane behavior” she witnessed on a recent flight. In the video, Bennett said she witnessed a father ask a fellow plane passenger to swap seats with him so that he could sit with his two children. However, the father wasn’t entirely honest about what seat he’d be swapping the man for.
“I witnessed the most insane plane behavior on the way here,” Bennett began the TikTok. She explained that she was sitting behind a man in the aisle seat when a father walked up to the man with his two children and asked if he could take his seat.
“He’s like: ‘Hey man, my kids have [the] middle and window [seats] and I’ve got this aisle across. Do you mind swapping me aisle to aisle?’” Bennett recalled.
When the man asked the father if he would be switching his purchased aisle seat for another aisle seat across from them, the TikToker claimed that the father hesitated before giving an answer.
“The dad pauses and he said: ‘Middle or aisle? Yeah, aisle,” she shared.
The man – who she noted was “a bigger, older man” – ended up swapping aisle seats with the father so he could sit next to his children, before another woman walked up to the man and informed him that he was now sitting in her seat. “She’s like: ‘Hey, I’m the aisle seat here.’ And he’s like: ‘Oh, I traded with that guy. He said he was the aisle seat,’” Bennett explained.
At that point, however, the father who had asked to swap seats refused to look up from his phone during the debacle. “The dad had the middle seat, and I think he knew it,” Bennett said. Nevertheless, the man “could not have been nicer” and got up from his seat once again to switch to the middle seat in the row.
“I totally understand a dad wanting to sit with his kids, no question. But I think you gotta tell the guy: ‘I’m middle. I need a solid here because I need to sit with my kids.’ But you can’t say you’re the aisle and then the girl’s addressing it,” Bennett chimed in.
She wrote over the viral clip, “Airplane etiquette trading seats,” and captioned the post: “Airplane etiquette is crazy.”
