Sheikhs on a Plane

Carrying one's cultural psychoses a little bit to far. From stuff.co.nz:

Qatar sheikh delays BA plane over seating
A Qatar sheikh held up a British Airways flight at Milan's Linate airport for nearly three hours after discovering three of his female relatives had been seated next to men they did not know.

When none of the other business class passengers agreed to swap seats, the sheikh, a member of Qatar's ruling family, went to the pilot, who had already started the engine, to complain, an airport official said.

But the pilot ordered him and his traveling companions, the three women, two men, a cook and a servant, off the plane.

The London-bound flight took off nearly three hours behind schedule on Thursday evening and around 50 of the 115 passengers missed connecting flights.

Emphasis mine -- good on the Pilot and the Flight Crew to have the cojones to stand up to this little toady. And thinking about it, with a party of six people, they could have re-arranged themselves to find a three-across. Only two across? The Sheik and one relative in one and the two other relatives in another. Or they could have been a bit more careful when booking their seats...