Made it to Саикт-Петербург!

Finally!

After a hellacious two days of flying, I have arrived in St. Petersburg. Well actually I arrived two nights ago, but I'm only now writing about it.

I wish to tell you a story. And hopefully you may learn the lessons I have learned and will not repeat my mistakes. I hope that I too can learn from these mistakes for I have made one of them before.

Thursday afternoon, I arrived at Washington National Airport to fly to St. Petersburg. I arrived wicked early because a) I wasn't doing anything at work and b) my ride had an engagement that required him to leave pretty early.

So I plopped myself down at the airport bar. After a few beers I was feeling pretty good, so I strolled over to the gate. I noticed that my flight was delayed. Knowing that I had an international connection I was a little worried about catching it. The ticket agent told me not to worry, "If we're delayed, they're delayed."

This was lie number 1.

So, I sat down and waited. We finally took off at 19:05. Many of us were concerned about making our flight -- there were approximately 10 people on the plane in this situation, I should later discover -- so they told us that there would be a bus waiting for those trying to catch the 104 to London at our International Airport, namely JFK.

This was lie number 2.

Slightly appeased, yet still apprehensive, I stepped onto the plane. The flight was uneventful, speedy even. The pilot had made a great effort to put the pedal to the metal and got us there in under a half hour. The trip supposedly takes 44 minutes, so I was impressed. In hindsight, I don't know if I am still impressed or whether this was lie number 3.

As we began to taxi, the flight attendant made an announcement -- Terry, if you read my blog, he was a cute Asian man who for some reason he struck me as your type -- "Ladies and gentlemen connecting on flight 104 to London Heathrow, there is a bus awaiting us at the gate. It will take you to your plane. There will be an agent to direct you to the bus.

Lie number 4 and 5.

As we deplaned, the was no agent. There was no bus. We -- at this point some of us had grouped together through conversations on the plane -- found an agent and asked her about the bus and flight 104. She said that she did not know what we were talking about. She said that 104 has taken off. We asked her to rebook us and she blew us off and told us to go to the gate.

So we started on our way to the gate. As we did, I glanced at the flight board. I saw it then: "Flight 104... Final Boarding."

"Final boarding! We can make it! I said to one of the women."

We all took off in that familiar airport run. The problem is, we arrived on a national flight. We now needed to make our way into the international terminal. This meant leaving one secure area and entering another. This meant taking shoes off, placing laptops in a bin, removing change from one's pockets, etc. Most importantly it meant time. Time which we did not have.

We struggled with our desires to make the plane as all we could do was wait. We waited on a line that was thankfully short, but not short enough.

We took off once again in the airport run, but as we arrived at our gate it was obvious we were too late. The next flight to Santo Domingo had already replaced our flight on the monitor. We missed our plane.

Soon the posse of travelers gathered and sulked. The airport was a zoo, and we needed to talk to someone about catching the next flight. However all the agents were busy dealing with the Santo Domingo flight, which already seemed like an angry mob.

appalled by the already growing list of lies, the group gathered. I met Fred, Paula, and Trish. Fred was with his friend who I had not caught her name. Also in the group were Robert and his wife. Robert and his wife were members of the airline's frequent flyer club so they were in a better situation than we were. There were others in the flight 104 situation, but I never did get a chance to speak to them.

As we gathered, the anger swelled. We all told stories of how we were lied to both in DC and also on the ground there at JFK.

We finally tried to talk to one of the agents as the Santo Domingo flight finally boarded. We told her our story and she tried to help out but did not try very hard. Finally I asked Kelly at Gate 10, Terminal 8, at JFK to call for a manager.

I had slowly become the leader of the group and I was going to calmly explain our situation and demand that we be treated properly.

I finally spoke to Jose Lopez. One of the supervisors for this fine airline that I love so much.

I explained to Mr. Lopez how we had been repeatedly lied to and moreover treated like inferior objects. I asked him to make sure that we were high priority for the next available flight out.

Well it seemed that he wanted to help us. He was very friendly and responsive. He told Kelly to make sure that these folks were high on some acronymed list that made us sound more important, when in fact this list was a tertiary list of sorts.

So we waited for what was supposed to be the 21:10 flight. At 23:15 we were still waiting to hear whether we were even on the wait list for this flight. As we were speaking to agent after agent about what our options were we had different answers from many.

Florence Z. had put in the greatest effort to make sure we all got to where we wanted to go. Though she was unsuccessful, she certainly gets our thanks for her effort.

To tell you the truth it really wasn't any of the agents faults we had all these problems, it was the business model and customer service policies of the airline that caused all our problems.

Had the fact that our flight from DC's late arrival had been relayed properly to the folks at JFK maybe we would have made our original flight via a bus of some kind. The truth is throughout the evening, night, morning, and into the next day, we were told nothing but appeasing lies.

Finally as 00:00 rolled around, it was obvious to them that we were not going to make standby on flight 132, the 09:10 that was just now boarding.

The manager, Jose, pulled us away and had one of the agents see what she could do about getting us to our destinations.

The agent made many efforts to try and get me to St. Petersburg as soon as possible. Yet, to her (seemingly) honest dismay, she could find nothing to get me to St. Petersburg the next day.

Defeat set in. I finally accepted defeat, unable to think even what day it was at that point (it was 01:00 in the morning Christmas Eve and I'd been up since 04:30 the previous day) I accepted the best deal on the table:

Flight 100 at 18:30 on Friday, Christmas Eve to London and a British Airway flight arriving on Sunday afternoon 16:10. I was defeated. I would be two whole days late. Megan would spend Christmas day without me. And I would spend it without her, alone in London.

I accepted the deal with the potential of going standby on an 08:30 the next morning. The agent tried to convince me to not even try to standby because it would mean staying two days in London. At that point, defeat and the days length had set in and I was tired. They offered me a hotel and several meal vouchers.

I called Megan finally to tell her the complete story. I had already let her know that there were some issues and I would not make my original flight into St. Petersburg. As the phone rang, the sadness of the situation hit me and as Megan answered the phone, I was already in tears. I told her the story in between sobs and it was so hazy in my mind that I had to return to the counter to confirm that I would be there on Sunday.

All set now to go to the hotel and get a shower and a bed, I sat by the desk waiting for the rest of the group to get taken care of. Problem is that it took the agents several hours to get this accomplished.

At 03:15, we finally made our way towards the exit. A corollary to the rebooking on a flight the next day was that we were told that our bags needed to be claimed and then rechecked the next day! After all this, they're going to make us go through check-in again!

Kevin, another manager, had told Trish that we would have to go to baggage claim and claim our bags. So on our way out to the "bus that would take us to the hotel" -- lie number six or seven at this point, there were too many -- we went to baggage claim. As this story has gone so far, I'm sure you can gather whether our bags were there or not.

We had the agent who was escorting us look up our bags. She could not, and it was obvious that she was trying to blow us off and have someone else handle us.

So, almost 03:30 in the morning, with no bags, it made little sense to go to a hotel, especially if I was going to try to get onto the 08:30 flight. I would get maybe twenty minutes in the room before I had to turn around and head to the airport so I could look for my bag, check back in, go back through security, and TRY to get onto the 08:30 flight 142.

So I slept in the airport for an hour along side Trish who had a definite confirmation on the flight. Her story, though mine is bad, was worse. If she did not make it to England that day, the airline was jeopardizing her chance to get her marriage license with her fiance. It involved some bureaucracy involving seven consecutive days in the country which she would not be able to do had she missed the 08:30 flight as well.

We slept fitfully for less than an hour. Between the TV talking about Festivus, the numbers of folk around us stirring, and the uncomfortable chairs, there was no real sleeping.

We awoke to see that the line for the airline's check in was ungodly. We were not going to wait in that line since, we 1) did not really need to check in (we had boarding passes) and 2) had no bags to check in. We went straight to someone who looked like a manager.

Tim McGuire was very receptive to us. We explained calmly our situation and he said he would try to take care of us. He told us to come back later and go have a cup of coffee.

Later, at about 06:00 we finally spoke to him again. He had this to report: Nothing. They did not know where our bags were. They expected that they have gone ahead of us and that it is best that we should continue on our flights and try to catch up to them. Bottom-line, he said, is that they will turn up.

So we made our way through security (relatively easily) and waited for flight 142. Trish, Fred and his friend got on the plane as they had confirmed seats and I waited for the standby list, if any were, to be called.

I began to doubt it as folks trickled in to what seemed like a full flight. At 09:05, I heard a magical voice. "Mr. Trivedi, please come to the ticket counter."

I made my way up, and there she was standing magnificently with her head surrounded by an aura of divinity. Her hand swooped up as she handed me a fantastic 11x4 cardboard card with the number 24, letter F, and the words "boarding pass" on it.

Moving forward, I arrived in London. Step one: leave JFK - complete.

Arriving late at night on Christmas Eve it was obvious that I wasn't going to get a flight to St. Petersburg that night.

I sought a ticket agent, but only found a baggage claim agent. Having only been in Heathrow for 45 minutes I already felt like I was in a civilized section of the world. It was galaxies apart from the incompetence of JFK.

The baggage agent was able to tell me that my bags were still in NY and that they should be placed on the next flight. They should catch up to you by tomorrow. He also provided me with another set of vouchers, tickets for the bus and proper directions to get onto the bus.

The next morning, having finally showered and slept, though only for four hours, I arrived at Heathrow to speak with a ticket agent about my flight situation.

He was immediately able to find me a flight that day to St Petersburg. He was also able to tell me that because I did not get on to the 18:30 flight 100, the rest of my itinerary (i.e. return trip) was dropped. I yelled out an expletive about the people at JFK. He agreed.

He was able to rebook me on my return flight. He also told me that unfortunately, because I did not get on to that flight, it's possible that my bags may not have either.

The next eight hours went as they should, and at 17:55 SPb time I shed a tear of joy as the plane's wheels touched down at LED - St Petersburg Airport.

I still have no bags.

Lessons Learned

1) Never fly the piece of shit airline called American Airlines. Or try these links.

2) Never fly into or out of JFK. I don't know how the other airlines handle customer support, but American Airlines can suck my dick.

3) Never fly on the day before a major holiday: Wednesday before Thanksgiving is bad. Day before Christmas Eve is probably worse or comparable.

More on the actual trip to come...