Indians and airport wheelchairs

In My Humble Opinion
21

Agreed. If nothing else, the boarding process is usually followed by an hour or more of mostly having to sit still in a seatbelt in an uncomfortably cramped airplane seat. Just sitting there in one place can be a painful and exhausting ordeal to elderly people with leg and/or hip problems, especially if it’s a several-hour flight.

It may seem absurd to us (temporarily) younger and healthier folks that anyone needs to conserve their energy and stamina in preparation for a long bout of sitting still, but that’s the lived reality of some elderly people.

My own late mother pretty much gave up flying after she had her hip replacements. She could still walk around just fine most of the time, and even push her shopping cart to the grocery store a mile away and back again, but sitting on the plane was a very unappealing prospect. Standing in long lines before getting on the plane would just have made it worse. Slowly walking to the exit after finally being able to get out of that damn airplane seat, on the other hand, would have been a comparative relief.

22

After my father’s back surgeries, we had to take a long flight overseas, so we sprung for a business-class seat for him so he could lie flat for the length of the flight.

23

Yeah, if I’d been able to persuade Mom to take any long trips with me I would definitely have insisted on her flying other than coach. Which is probably another reason that she found plane travel unappealing, as that would have outraged her sense of thrift.

24

So, not scamming the rules, then.

25

Is think that the generous view would be that these folks are trying to do their best to ensure that their elderly relatives are well cared for and not left in uncomfortable physical situations or in situations the find confusing or difficult to handle.

On a cultural level, people in America might have a different conclusion regarding “what is really disabled and ‘deserving’ of additional assistance” than a person of Indian origin. But it’s not necessarily because someone is trying to scam the system.

In the other hand, I’ve been around a lot of Indians from India (as opposed to Indian-Americans) in my life and there is to some degree a cultural cache in appearing clever and crafty and bypassing rules. So I wouldn’t be surprised if there was some of this going on. I’ve been in some situations in which as an Indian-American I meticulously follow the law while my Indian-Indian relatives talk big about people they know who games the system successfully.

26

An old-time Western featuring whooping Indians in airport wheelchairs circling a group of covered wagons (but ultimately defeated by rough terrain and a lack of WD-40) would be…different.

27

That’s me. I can walk a couple hundred feet, but cannot stand for more than a couple minutes without hurting. So I ask for a wheelchair. MY wife can walk the whole distance but not at the speed the wheelchair pusher does, so we ask for one for her too. We are both around 85 incidentally. Getting through security/customs more quickly is nice, but not the main reason. What is also nice is being the first onto the plane (not in wheelchairs) and getting to the overhead space first. We are among the last to get off the plane.

28

I live in a place with a large Indian population, and I don’t remember seeing any Indian people in wheelchairs. Certainly not a large number. But I usually fly Southwest, so if this happens on international flights I wouldn’t see it.

29

India did not iradcate polio until 2014, and in 2009, 60% of the world’s cases were in India.

So, there could be a lot of people who are elderly, Indian, and polio survivors. While polio did leave some people in iron lungs, and killed others, it actually left more people with a short leg, a misshapen hip, or some other mild problem that got worse as they aged, and, generally, everything got worse.

India really could have a much higher percentage of elderly, or even middle aged, people who find it uncomfortable to stand for long periods of time. There’s also a wierd sort of reverse Catch-22, where, if you stand in the regular line, you stand forever, but if you declare yourself disabled, you both go through a faster line, AND do so in a wheelchair.

Also, while I don’t know that this always comes into play, it probably does in a few cases.

I know from someone this happened to (had very mild CP, but balancing while walking carrying heavy baggage was hard), that when you ask for any assistance for a physical disability at all, they show up with a wheelchair, and want you to use it, for liability. If all you want is not to walk long distances, and travel by that golf cart instead for the long trek to the terminal, you may have to accept sitting in the wheelchair as part of the deal. So there may be lots of people with sprained ankles or sciatica in wheelchairs because the airline insisted.

30

Indeed, there are probably millions.

If incidence was anywhere near that in the '50s and '60s, and it was probably higher, then there would have to be at least several million Indian polio survivors over 60.

31

Thanks for reaserching that.

Some people seem to recover from polio with no residua; however, residua can appear decades after recovery: it’s known as Post-polio Syndrome. People with it are vulnerable to, among other things, both falls, and osteroporosis. A bad combination. If I had a parent who had recovered from polio, and there were even a hint of PPS, I would want them not taking chances in stressful, accident near-occasions, like airports. Also, maybe things like county fairs and Jack-the-Ripper tours, but I guess the OP doesn’t frequent those.

Also, in addition to PPS, some people recovered from polio with very slight disabilities that didn’t slow them down much at first, but these problems have magnified with the effects of aging, and a life of tolerating them.