The FA experience MBS recounts reminds me of
many KIX-GUM flights, when UA ran that route
until a couple of years ago.

The FAs they used were usually LAX domiciled, and were usually the prison-matron types who had bid the long haul. UA had them stay an extra day in KIX to do the once a day KIX-GUM run.

You could always tell how thrilled they were
to be doing it, herding a 744 full of Japanese tourists down and back.

Of course, except for the minimum number of FA with Japanese language skills, none of them spoke Japanese. Even though I was usually in F or C, you could hear the FA in the back getting louder and louder, as if that was going to make a Japanese understand English all of a sudden.