I was born in 1975 in the village of Gulmazor (translated as Flower Village from my native language, Tajik), in Tajikistan. I want to tell you about one interesting day of my life:

After graduating from university, I went through interviews to become a flight attendant. I took special courses for more than two months, passed all tests, and was ready for flight.

On September 8, 1998, I was assigned to flight #632 from Dushanbe, Tajikistan, to Moscow, Russia, as well as the return. My first day as a flight attendant with Tajikistan Airlines was the day when I started a new period of my life.

Flight attendants usually come to the airport two hours before a flight, but that day I came almost four hours before the flight. When I went into the big airplane, I thought I was the happiest person in the world. It was my first job, first flight, and first experience taking care of passengers. My instructor, Galina Azizova, showed me the location of all emergency and kitchen equipment and how to use it, how to welcome passengers, and how to prepare and serve a meal.

On the return flight, one hour after departure, the passenger call button on the 18th row lit up. I went there to ask what had happened. I went through a crowd of passengers who surrounded a row of seats. I saw a pregnant woman who was lying on the seats and giving birth. In shock, I ran to call my instructor. She made an announcement on the PA asking if there was a doctor on board the plane, but there were no doctors. We informed the captain about our situation. The captain said that the nearest airport where we could land was an hour away. That meant we had to help the woman give birth by ourselves.

Galina assigned us tasks. I had to prepare hot water and clean towels. We asked passengers to move away and not bother the mother. It all happened very quickly. None of the passengers got in the way, everyone silently followed our directions, and everyone understood that it was an emergency situation. Galina began to help the pregnant woman, asking her to breathe evenly. I was very scared for the mother, but she said that this was her third baby, and she knew what to do.

After some minutes, I saw the baby’s head coming out. It was the moment when I thought I would lose consciousness. The baby was so small and defenseless that I wanted to cry, but at that moment we heard the baby’s voice. He cried like a small cat, and all the passengers began to clap and congratulate each other. The passengers collected money for a gift for the baby. We helped the woman give birth to a healthy boy! The hardest part was cutting the umbilical cord, because we didn’t have special tools, even scissors. We tied the umbilical cord from two sides with a bandage, left a piece in the middle, heated a knife from the kitchen on a lighter, sanitized the knife with alcohol that was in the mini bar, and then Galina cut the umbilical cord in the middle.

Everything we could do was done. We had 155 passengers boarding from Moscow, but when we arrived in my country there were 156 passengers. When we arrived, the ambulance was waiting for our newborn baby and his mother. The doctor praised us, saying we did everything perfectly.

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Laylo Abdulkhamidova writes, “I am from Tajikistan, a country with beautiful nature and the beautiful Pamir mountains. I am a single mom, with a 13-year-old daughter, Tomiriz. She is in the seventh grade, a very good student, and I am proud of her. The happiest day of my life was the day my beautiful daughter was born.” Laylo Abdulkhamidova studies English with Charles Perkins at CUNY’s City Tech.