My wife, daughter,
and parents traveled to London. For all
but my wife, it was our first time there.
While there is much to see and do, for the moment I will share a few of
the different moments.
My plan was to fly
to Detroit and go with my parents from there to London. My wife and daughter had work and school and
couldn’t leave early enough to take the same flight with us and would travel on
a nonstop. I awoke very early since my
parents needed to take a very early flight from South Bend to Detroit. In all, we would be in Detroit about 9 hours.
Why would we stay
there so long? Since I work for an
airline, when I use my travel privileges we fly when there are open seats. In this case, I preferred to be in Detroit
early since the flights were open.
I arrived at the
airport parking lot very early. Due to
the government shutdown, people who work security at the airport weren’t being
paid and some were not showing up to work.
Consequently, security queues were reported as being quite long. In my case, the lines were short and I had a
lot of time to get to my departure gate.
When I walked up to the gate about 30 minutes prior to departure, I saw
a different destination on the sign. I
was horrified to learn the gate changed from D31 to A3. For those who know the Atlanta Airport, you
know that meant I had to travel about a mile to get to the new gate.
I started walking
quickly to my new gate. When I reached
the train that moved between concourses, I was aghast to see it wasn’t
operating. That meant I had to go the
rest of the way on foot. At that point I
wish I had checked my suitcase. It would
have been much easier to run with just my backpack.
While traversing
the airport, I pictured not getting to Detroit to meet my parents. Then I imagined not getting to London at
all. I began to despair how the tide had
turned. I went from having an abundance
of time to MAYBE getting to the gate in time.
I imagined arriving at the gate, covered in sweat and panting heavily,
only to see the plane backing away from the gate. Perhaps worse, having the gate agents tell me
I was too late.
Ultimately, I happily
boarded the flight and took my seat.
Then the sweat started pouring out.
I recalled people I’d seen before in such circumstances. I pledged to wish speed to each of them in
the future. Also, I hope for
compassionate gate agents if they are late.
The saddest part of
this whole episode is the coffee I bought prior to going to the gate. I had taken only a few sips but knew I couldn’t
run with it in my hand. Sadly, it went
in the first trash can I saw.
While I enjoyed the
sights and history of London, and the family we visited, the highlight of the
trip was looking at the itinerary of my family traveling to Rome the day we
returned home. While they were starting
to log into the website to check in for their flight, I looked over the
trip. Flying on Vueling, I saw three
names booked. They were as follows:
Doe/Jane
Gentleman, White
Doe/Jessica
You need to know
these family members are from Colombia and speak Spanish and English. I chided them for calling one a white
gentleman. I couldn’t imagine why they
were give that name. For international air
travel, reservations must be made in the name as it appears on the passport. My mind continued to boggle at how this mistake
could have happened. The laptop being
used belonged to Jane’s daughter. She
came to assist with the online check-in and she was advised to the issue of the
White Gentleman traveling to Rome. After
several more minutes Jane’s daughter commented it must be due to settings on
the computer. Since it is her work
computer, it is set to automatically translate web pages.
Slowly this bit of
information seeped into our minds and we all realized what happened. I began laughing boisterously. Of course, now it made sense. For those who don’t speak Spanish, here is a
short lesson for you:
Jane’s mom is named
Blanca Caballero. In English, that
translates to white gentleman.
It was a short trip
to London and we filled it to the brim.
As with many places I’ve visited, I hope to return someday.
