You know what irks me? Chocolate cake that fancies itself a brownie. It‘s close enough to the deceit of chocolate chips that turn out to be raisins. Other than the fake brownies there isn’t a lot wrong with the KLM lounge though.

They say money can’t buy happiness but I have to say right now I feel pretty good sitting in Crown Lounge 25 at Schiphol airport with my mug of all-you-can drink coke and cheese pastry. There is free bubbly too but that feels a bit pedestrian.

At this point KLM should pay me to do promotional content to be honest – and I could because I‘m walking around with a bag full of not one, not two, not three but four KLM cheese sandwiches. You don’t ask, you don’t get – and I asked. Cheese sandwiches of the royal tier are my reward. But I‘m getting sidetracked. I shall not dwell on how the angel moonlighting as a flight attendant who gifted me the bag of cheesy heaven said to put them in the oven for a minute.

Is the KLM lounge worth the £40 you pay when you don’t naturally live the lifestyle of the rich and famous? (to be honest most people in this lounge are probably quite normal). I don’t know – all I know is that the glass wall between me and the real world is keeping me from indulging in my airport-specific shopping addiction and ultimately that probably saved me some money.

There was a moment as I walked in that I felt like a lost peasant. The lady at the counter scanned my boarding pass, looked at me over the rim of her glasses, pursed her brightly red painted lips and said: “I see an economy class ticket. How can I help you?“. “But I … I paid for the lounge,” I stuttered and my stupidly excited smile vanished. “Can I see prove of payment, please?“ she replied with raised eyebrows. I didn’t have any and I wasn’t about to tell her that my mum had paid for the luxury I had been excited about for weeks. The gatekeeper of the showers and hot buffet found my reservation eventually and let me pass. The less-than feeling wasn’t completely dulled by the selection of mini-sandwiches, if I‘m honest. Maybe that’s a bit sensitive of me.

That said, rich people apparently also take full advantage of free food – which we all know tastes better – and rich people‘s kids also do a little happy dance when the food is nice. Maybe I‘m not as out of place as I want to pretend. Would I do it again? Probably not but it’s absolutely worth the blog post of course.