Flight back to USA

My happiness knew no bounds when I was back in India for a 17 day trip after 21 months and 18 days. Those 17 days flew like 17 seconds and now the story begins describing my return to USA. It was as if all forces were trying to stop me fly back.

I reached the airport with my mom and dad. The flight from Hyderabad according to my itinerary should leave by 9:30 PM but when I reached the airport at 6:30 PM, I see that the flight is scheduled to take off at 8:30 PM. Luckily, I was at the airport before time and managed to escape the unexpected. Now, the security check up never ends. I see only 5 people ahead of me but it took me 45 minutes to clear up and by the time I cleared the security, it was 8:10 PM. I had to rush to the terminal. After doing all these gymnastics, I learned that the flight was delayed and finally the flight took off at 10:30 PM. This flight was destined to reach Mumbai.

Chapter 2 begins.....The connecting flight in Mumbai is at 12:50 AM and we reached Mumbai at 12:20 AM. The irony of life is that, each plane was allocated only one bus and I was unable to make it into the first bus. So, the bus took the first set of people to the airport and then came back for us. It took about 15 minutes for the bus to come back but almost looked like an hour (anxious moments). By hook or crook, we all managed to catch the plane in Mumbai. I hoped that all goes well here. Luckily, I had the two empty seats beside me such that I can happily sleep.

Chapter 3 begins.....Soon after the flight took off, the captain announced that the flight is going to land back in Mumbai as it is facing some technical glitch. The flight which flew at 12:50 AM landed back in Mumbai at 2:30 AM. Let's not forget that I am in India which is rich for its culture. The reason I am mentioning culture is because older people and their families get a free pass in the queues. Hold on, the next set of people who get free passes are families and friends of parents with babies (< 5 years). I can see that I cross about 100 people by running towards the queues and finally when I look back I see less than 10 people behind me. You might have guessed it, it is because of the free passes. I had to stand in the queue from 2:30 to 6:30 in the morning to get the keys for my hotel. The breakfast was supposed to be served at 8:00 AM so I could not sleep in the hotel room. I ate a delicious South Indian breakfast and came upstairs at 8:45 AM to have nap. I was awakened at 10:00 AM saying that the flight is ready to take off. Hoping that things would get better, I made a move to the airport in a bus which was radiating the heat of a typical sunny day in Mumbai.

Chapter 4 begins.....The flight was supposed to take off at 12:30 AM. Again all the security clearances and blah blah blah...so my life is back to queues. After all the mess, the cabin crew for the flight reaches the airport at 12:40 AM. Now, they got to clean the plane, board the passengers and then take off. Passengers with me started loosing patience and welcomed the crew by chanting phrases such as "ALL SHAMELESS PEOPLE ARE COMING" and at the same time clapping. The embarrassed Air India management then gave an apology letter along with some music CDs as a token of their apology. Finally, I boarded the flight at 2:30 PM and yuppie all set to reach New Jersey.

Chapter 5 begins.....I reached NJ at 12 AM. After all the security check ups, immigration clearances, baggage claims (please don't forget the long queues for each of it). Let's divert and I will tell you a funny story here. I was observing an old man in the flight who keeps pacing across the alley's even when the seat belt sign glows, when the flight is about to take off etc. I was dumbstruck when I saw him in a wheelchair after he got out of the plane. So, he got a super free pass. Remember he is old so he already possesses a free pass. Now back to the looooooong story, I know it is boring but bear with me as I went through this trauma. At 2:15 AM I was able to reach an Air India official who is allocating us to different connecting flights as we all missed our flights. I did not get a flight until 5:30 PM on that day. So, he assigned me a hotel and asked me to take a cab ready to pick me up and transfer me to the hotel. Alas! I had to wait till 4:30 AM in the morning to get the bus that would transfer me to the hotel. At 5:15 AM, I was told that I need to check out by 12 noon as the last bus for the airport is only at that time. I went to my room and browsed online to see if I could visit any places nearby but as I did not find anything interesting closeby, I went to sleep and checked out the hotel at 12 Noon.

Chapter 6....I reached the airport and went to the continental airlines counter to check in my baggage and take ticket. The person there saw my air ticket given by the Air India official and says that she could not find any reservation on that ticket. Huh!!! there is no end to my problems, with all the luggage I took a transit and traveled to the terminal where Air India offices were present and then was shocked to see no one in the office. Every airline had atleast 30 to 40 officials but none in Air India. I did not know if I had to laugh or cry? Where the hell should I go now....I kept loitering around the airport and stopping by the offices of continental airlines. One fine lady checked my air ticket and said that there is no reservation with them and took me to the offices of Air India (a second visit to their empty offices) and then told me that the top level has an Air India office but most of them do not know about it. Therefore ask for it but if anybody says that Air India does not have an office in this level, ignore them and keep trying. Luckily, the third person I stopped by showed me the office which is actually like a store room. I was mad with rage and was planning to sue Air India at this time and then I spoke loudly to a lady there and she started calling the continental airlines. After one hour we were able to make contact and she said I was good to go. Hoping that things will be better atleast now, I made a march to the domestic terminal of continental airlines and then checked my baggage and collected my air ticket. Please don't think that the story is over....it is just beginning to end :P

Chapter 7......I had 2 hours time to spend before I take the flight....so I opened my lappy (laptop) and started playing some stupid games. After an hour, I see that my flight was delayed. it kept on getting delayed till 7:30 PM. Depressed and desolated, I was playing games until 5:15 when I heard some announcement which had my flight number. I closed my lappy and looked at the status and was shocked to see the status as 5:30 PM. Now, I have 15 minutes to clear the security check and board the flight. I was 99% sure that I am going to miss the flight but I made a run for it. I went through the security check up and goddamn it, I wore my left shoe to the right leg and vice versa after removing my shoes for the check up. I did not bother to change but kept running. The flight terminal was approximately 1.5 miles away from the security check up. Imagine me running with wrong shoes for 1.5 miles. Believe me, the flight was still waiting at 5:28 PM. Thinking that I am lucky, I boarded the flight and I hit the seat as if it was a comfortable king size bed with extra cushioning and got up only after I reached Austin.

Final Chapter.....I took the airport shuttle to reach a closer destination and called for a cab. Its 10:30 PM in Austin and the cab service was not lifting the phone. I was able to make contact at 10:50 PM and asked for a cab. I was on the road in the midst of the night holding that infinite luggage. I waited till 11:15 PM and the cab did not arrive. So I called up the service again and asked for the cab again and the cab arrives at 11:35 PM. Huh!!! I reached my apartment at 11:45 PM.

There were some more stories which I skipped in this article....Though, I had the patience to travel through these never ending problems, writing this looong article. I do not have the patience to describe the events entirely. (For example, the story of the funny Bihari guy who traveled with me and stayed with me in the Mumbai hotel etc.).

The events in this story took 70 hours in real time and I would claim them to be the most horrible hours of my life till date. I know only few will make it to the end of this story and I would applaud them for their patience too :P

I understood that I was gifted with lots of patience as I never lost it throughout these 70 hours.

Note: Please ignore the grammatical mistakes as I lost patience to read it again and edit it.


Signing off
Siva