Place your seat in the upright position

"Ladies and gentlemen we are ready for take off , we kindly ask you to place your seat in the upright position and put it in the overhead compartment" announced Manuel , our maître de cabin.
We looked at each other rather puzzled as to how we should achieve this .It must be new. Well of course our full sympathy was with Manuel who had just had to deal with a rather difficult lady in seat 1a. Of course as there was no seat in front of her where she could stow away her bag, Manuel had taken it to put in the aforesaid overhead compartment . No , difficult lady had no intention of parting with her bag and , of course stood up, retreived her bag and placed it on her lap.This was not really what Manuel wanted and in his attempt to assert his authority he swept the bag from her and again placed it overhead. Unbelievable how this elderly lady behaved .I don't think she can have been English , I hope not anyway, I would feel so ashamed of her .
For us two rows behind, of course, it was let's say, entertaining ! Most of all when the poor Swiss guy told her off and said he didn't like her any more and he was very cross with her . Well he won't have to wait long before customer services hauls him in for a slap on the wrist about how he dealt with her and also confused all the passengers with his flustered instructions .
Working with passengers can be wonderful , especially if they know who they are and are comfortable with themselves. Unfortunately too many passengers, normally respectful citizens, become monsters the moment they set foot in the terminal buildings. Training instructors will tell us that this is due to fear.Especially if they belong to the group of people labelled green in motivation theory.These are supposed to be emotional and we are supposed to understand this and help them overcome their anxiety . Well I don't know about this. How about
"Ladies and gentlemen , we are ready for take off. If you are sitting next to an obnoxious passenger, please, for your own safety place him or her in the overhead compartment "
Enjoy your next flight !