Who would have thought the key to the forbidden city is a Starbucks card?

I love the concept of forbidden cities. Places that you are not allowed, so, therefore, they must be so much better than they are. I mean let’s take Lhasa.

It was forbidden to enter without the special permission of the emperor. Must be some pretty cool stuff in there, right? Or what about anyone who doesn’t use ALL Apple products and devices?

Yeah, try to mix and match a PC or Android and you are definitely locked out from Apple-ites all the most wonderful on (and off) earth. Or just ask George Constanza, when he used that photo of an attractive girl to get into hidden nightclubs with models.

So with all of that going thru my mind, Nancy and I are traveling to Hawaii for spring break and it’s a long flight. This time we are going with some friends, and we decided to spend a few days In San Diego first. I remember being there in the early 90s when I was dating Nancy. Lots of stuff to do, especially when you are young. I remember it as being a pretty cool beach town with endless southern-Californian activities and I was amazed to see how much it has changed over the last 30 years.

Anyway, so it’s a 5-to-6-hour flight to the island of Kauai, and Nancy starts going on with our traveling companions about a trick to get really great service, Apparently what you need to do is buy a $5 Starbucks gift card for every flight attendant. There are normally 4 in total. She tells us how you give them to any one of them and say thank you for your service, and please pass them out to the others.

Somehow this simple act of kindness and low monetary value will reap all kinds of benefits that would only be found in some magical Forbidden City in the sky. They supposedly treat you like first class. Suddenly all your food is free. Suddenly all your drinks are free. Suddenly they smile at you and say thank you and are really really nice to you for the entire flight. Yeah. Right.

Now she does have close friends and family who are flight attendants who told her this. And I heard tell she has used this method on prior flights where I was not present. So obviously, I gave a skeptical vote of confidence to our traveling companions. Who is trying to decide if 20 bucks would be well spent, or go buy scratch tickets?

so as we go on to the flight, She has her four $5 gift cards in the cute little envelopes All neatly folded up and all set to go during the safety briefing she hands a little bundle of joy to one of the waitresses gifted the big thank you says please share And that was it. no secret handshake. No wink of the eye. No uncomfortable hand on the shoulder and subtle nod. I smile to myself smugly and put another chalk mark in the win column.

Then all of the other stewards of the air dropped by and thanked us as we were taking off. And for the rest of the flight gave her a little nod and smile every time they passed. Hmmmmm. I might be in trouble. When the pre-ordered food came, they passed it to us and didn’t ask for payment. Well, okay, just got the twenty bucks back. All is good. Let’s call it a tie.

Then came the beverage service. Nancy asked for a mimosa, and guess what? They give her a double. No payment is ever mentioned. When the second beverage service came along, Nancy is now enjoying a little wine. They throw her another double.

Now the only worse part of not drinking on a plane (just my thing – I have a fear of crashing while in an airplane bathroom) and being able to take advantage of this, is admitting I’m wrong. Her little act of kindness not only paid back 300% financially, but I have NEVER had a flight attendant be so nice to me. Another bonus was no one was in the third seat in our row, so it was a poor’s man’s first-class (possibly more comfortable).

Naturally, I had to text my friend several rows up that I was wrong. And they had made a big mistake not listening to Nancy. Huge.

Oh, and to suck it since we were living so well. Had to get at least a partial win out of this.

But it’s time for some reality here. Nancy just had a good time and a good flight. Even with me included. Total win across the board.

So, if you ever find yourself locked outside of the forbidden city and want to get a glimpse inside, think of Starbucks gift cards. If they can part the social-economic doors of class structure at 35,0000 feet, just think what they can do in your world. If the US dollar collapsed tomorrow and all financial structures as we know them disappeared, I would NOT be surprised to see that little green mermaid as the new world currency.