jmorris

Please give me your opinions on window shade etiquette.

I recently flew in F from NRT to ORD. The flight departs early evening in NRT and arrives late afternoon in ORD. I wanted to get back on ORD time and be able to sleep the night of my arrival. My method for this is to think "destination time" as soon as I'm on the plane, or even a day before, and use sunlight during the flight to help reset my body clock. Towards this end, I select window seats on long flights so as to be close to a natural light source, as well as to have enough light to work--the overhead lights have too much glare and do not provide enough light.

After the meal service (now night time over the western Pacific), a senior FA came through F and lowered all the window shades. When she came to my seat, I explained 1) it was morning in ORD 2) I would be working for most of the flight 3) I wanted light when the sun rose for work and to help adjust my body clock. She said that other passengers would be trying to sleep and would not want the cabin to get light in the morning. Then she lowered one of the three window shades adjacent to my seat. I apologized to her, restated my reasons for wanting the shade open, and suggested that passengers disturbed by the light could use the eyeshades that were in their amenity kits. She became upset with me, said that I should apologize to the rest of the cabin and not to her, and stormed off.

This was not a transitory situation or sunlight in someone's eyes or directly on their video screen, where I think that common courtesy clearly says to lower one's shade until the light changes. I was trying to reset my body clock by 12 hours so I could function at work, as well as spare my eyesight for several hours at the end of the flight.

Please share your honest opinions about what I should have done.