The expression, "I gambled and lost," always makes me laugh because it reminds me of a story of an AmeriCorps teammate who gambled and lost when he bet against his GI tract. It is one of the funnier stories I've heard in my day, but since this is intended for a family audience, I am going to have to spare you the details. And not to be exclusive, but for those of you that know what story I'm talking about, let's take a moment...hilar. But I digress (already? I just started). The alternative title for this entry has nothing to do with gastrointestinal activity.
Let me tell you about my day:
Alarm went off a little after 5 AM. When I looked outside, there didn't seem to be too much more snow on the ground from the night before. I crawled out of bed, opened my laptop, went to the United Airlines homepage, checked flight status, and...delayed! Great. Already over an hour delay which would mean I'd miss my connection to Tokyo. The votes came in and we decided to go to the airport early to see what could be done. On the drive in, I checked other flights going out to SFO (I <3 the iPhone). There was one scheduled to leave around the same time as my original flight on Alaska Airlines. The magnificent Robby Fulton accompanied me to the terminal and kept me grounded (airline pun intended) while I negotiated the situation. I had 10 minutes to decide whether or not to purchase the Alaska Airlines ticket, but it would take me more than 10 minutes to get through the United line to find out what my options were. So I bought the ticket (which turned out to be refundable) while Robby waited in the United line. Win win. The woman at the United desk seemed personally offended that I had booked another ticket. She told me that they had rebooked me on a later flight to Tokyo and a later flight to Bangkok, which would actually get me into Thailand at the same time as my travel companion, Laura. So now I was in possession of 2 boarding passes to SFO, and I had to decide whether or not to get on the earlier flight and try to make my first connection (but if I missed it, possibly jeopardizing the alternative itinerary). See? Here comes the gamble. I should add that the Alaska Airlines flight was also delayed.
I said goodbye to Robby and went through security with the intention of getting on Alaska Airlines flight 2507. After discussing it with my chief advisor (my mother) on an official phone call, we decided that it might be a better bet to stick with United so they couldn't screw me over later (she would advise me not to use that word) by telling me that they couldn't help me since I had gone on another flight. They had told me this wouldn't happen, but for some reason I wasn't completely confident in that piece of information. Alaska or United? Option B, please. Seemed like a safe bet.
Got to the gate, boarded, buckled, ready to go. More delay. Mechanical problem. I dozed off for a little bit with the sounds of the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack in my ears (great movie! Track 5 is my fav so far). Woke up. Still on the ground. It was a little after 10 now. I still had time. No problem. That'd leave me an hour at SFO. Enough time to eat, charge up my iPhone a little bit, maybe even meet up with Laura before she boarded her flight via Korea to Bangkok. Pilot came back on. More delay. While we were sitting waiting for the mechanical problem to be fixed, the wings decided to have a little more fun in the snow, so needed to be deiced once again. Finally we pulled away from the gate and after a lot more waiting, we took off. By the time I was allowed to recline my seat back and turn on my electronic devices, it was about 11:16 AM. Now we were cutting it close. Estimated arrival time? 12:45. Connection departure? 12:56. Actual arrival time? 12:51. Along with almost everyone else on the plane, I darted over to the departures board where my flight to Tokyo/Narita was nowhere to be found. Under N? No. Under T? No. Don't know how else to spell Tokyo or Narita. I went to ask a friendly looking United employee who told me that flight 853 was boarding right then at gate 98 and if I hurried then I might be able to make it. Well, I was at gate 90, that must be close. Wrong again! I had to book it down to the international terminal. I am not the spry young tennis player I was in high school. I've become more of a "walk to brunch" kind of athlete these days. Well, now I had to step up my game and be a "run with your pack and small carry-on in your light hikers" kind of girl. And I stepped it up! But it was the one or two walk breaks I took that really did me in, I think.
I arrived at gate 98. Door was still open. Yes! The friendly looking lady behind the podium gestured for my boarding pass. I informed her while catching my breath that I didn't, in fact, have one, since I'd been bumped to this flight.
"Well, you'll need to talk to them." She pointed to three frantic looking airline employees shuffling papers and jabbering away at each other. I stood there and tried to get their attention.
"Hi. I need my boarding pass. I got bumped..."
"No. Sorry. Plane's closed. Door's closed. You can't board." No eye contact. Still catching my breath.
"No, the door's open. The plane's right there. I can see it. I have to get on this plane."
"No. Sorry. Door's closed." Yeah, got that, except it's open. Oh...annnd...now it's closed. In my face. They weren't even pretending to provide good customer service. Keep in mind that there were not hoards of other angry passengers trying to get on this flight. Just. Me. Then they even opened the door to let someone off. Still not sure why, but they still couldn't seem to work it out logistically to get me on the plane, much less make eye contact with me. Then the three of them were gone behind the closed door. I was so flustered at this point, they might as well have walked through the door. I didn't know which end was up. They seemed to just disappear, invisible cape style. I turned back to the boarding pass woman.
"Can you help me?"
"No. They're in charge."
What!? And so I cried. I didn't cry to try to get them to let me on the plane, though that would have been nice. But that wasn't going to work anyway since they hadn't really acknowledged my presence.
I eventually worked my way out past security to the United ticket counter where they informed me that I was booked on the 10:50 AM flight the next morning (my original flight, only a day later). I insisted that they pay for accomodations since it was because of a mechanical problem and not a weather delay. Stefanie behind the counter said that would be taken care of, and she handed me a pink sheet of paper with the name of a hotel and told me where to pick up the shuttle. Fast forward to the check in counter a the DoubleTree.
Friendly Employee #1: "Do you have the voucher?"
Me: "That is the voucher."
FE #1: "No, this isn't a voucher. You need one of those." She points to the piece of paper the woman checking in next to me is handing to Friendly Employee #2. The last time I had seen this woman, besides on the shuttle, was at the United ticket counter, because she was on my flight from Portland and missed her connection, too. So, obviously, if she's entitled to a voucher, then I am entitled to a voucher. And I don't usually walk around feeling very entitled.
FE #1 again: "Sorry, you're going to have to pay out of pocket, but you can call this number and they'll help you out." Friendly Employee #2 gave me 2 cookies instead of just the 1 you usually get at check in.
I call the 1-800 number from room 280 and get someone on the phone. I picture the scenes from Slumdog Millionaire where Jamal, the chai wallah, works his way through rows of phone bankers. I know it's not the fault of the man on the other end of the line, possibly in India, but I'm still upset. At the end of our conversation (which mostly consisted of me being on hold), he told me he couldn't help me but I could send my receipt at the end of my travels.
"Who would I call to file a complaint?"
Phone man: "You would file that with me." Awesome. That's like having a problem with the head of the department. So I complained. He "understood" that I thought it was "unacceptable," and gave me a reference number so that the next time I called about this, I wouldn't have to repeat my bitching. The words "unacceptable" and "You ruined Christmas," would appear in my file. (Ok, I didn't really tell him he ruined my Christmas, but when you spend Christmas Eve eating room service and watching Oprah, it sure ain't good). More tears.
There haven't been many more tears since then, except while I was watching "Obama Revealed" on CNN and it was as if he won all over again for me. Still awesome! I considered getting back on the shuttle to the airport to find Stefanie and berate her, but once again consulting my chief advisor, we agreed that in the Christmas spirit, I would let it go. As John Lennon would say, "And so this is Christmas..."
Merry Christmas!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment