July 4th, 2018
July 5th, 2018-đźYou canât always get what you wantđź
But if you try sometimes…..YOU GET WHAT YOU NEEEEEEEED!
It is 8:50 am and I am currently sitting in the breakfast room waiting for the girls to rise. Iâve been wide awake since 6:35am. Iâm impressed with that sleep-in to be honest, I was expecting a 3am awakening, but I guess when you are up until 1:30 am, your body just takes control of the mind. First off, Rachael is well, so that is great news, she has a gigantic egg on her forehead and some scrapes, but is still just as beautiful as ever!
The (mis)adventure saga of 2018 continues when merely on a whim, I approach the gate crew at 7:20 pm yesterday before boarding (finally) our flight to Phuket to have them check to MAKE absolutely SURE our bags are on the plane! When we checked in at 10am, they 100% no doubt assured me that hong kong express airline (I write that down so I NEVER forget) would get our bags from the âbasementâ and transfer them to our flight with the same baggage claim numbers etc in tact. I felt skeptical, and was quite nervous about this. Not wanting to leave that counter until I laid eyes on them. We were so tired of the same clothes and no toiletries at this point. I felt leaving without a confirmed sighting was risky. As it turns out my rabbit intuition was spot on, bcz low and behold, when the young man who was clearly in charge on the boarding process was stuck on the phone trying to track down two bags from some other airline (also news to us that Hong Kong airlines and hong kong express (that they booked us on) are two different companies. We had been told this multiple times today as we moved around the airport trying to gain access to a lounge to rest in. He sets the phone way from his ear and says to me âare you the people who go to hospital?â I say âyesâ. I guess I forgot to tell you yesterday that we are now referred to as âThe Ambulance Caseâ. That was what the customer service agent at Hong Kong airlines said I was to say when we were asking for help going forward, it was written on our meal vouchers (should have taken a pic of that!) and at every juncture of this journey we have heard the people behind the counter say at some point to each other. Anyways, the young man looks at me and Iâm sure he is not paid nearly enough to be the deliverer of news like this. âIâm sorry, there has been a miscommunication. Your bags are still in the basement.â Well if this was a Saturday night live skit, this is where the voice over would have said â And then she LOST IT!â But knowing full well it wasnât this kidâs fault, I still kind of âlost itâ. There was a group of four Americans talking to another gate agent beside me and they even looked uncomfortable watching this nice Canadian girl go off. Given that flight was scheduled to depart in 35 minutes, there was apparently no way they could get my two bags to the plane. â I am so sorry Mam, it canât work that wayâ. I did share my opinion that they had indeed had 10 hours to move my bags, so not really my problem they left it to the last half hour. He assured me there was nothing to be done, but visit the lost baggage desk in Phuket and start a claim. They would have my bags on that same flight the next day, and oh yes of course âMam your bags will be driven directly to your hotel after they arrive in Phuket at 11pm tomorrow.â That elicited another string of non profanities from me. (Not a public curser). I dejectedly go back to the fam and share the news. Pretty sure Rachael didnât abstain from foul language at that point. đłAll our patience is shot now…..
Just get me to Thailand and everything will be ok I keep telling myself and the girls. Flight is uneventful and we arrive, sail through customs, and possibly I see a âwelcome homeâ wink from the immigration officer! Or did I imagine that?? I go straight to the baggage issue counter and start to tell my tale to the relaxed chap lounging behind the desk. He leaps up and I see the first sight of light at the end of this tunnel. The Hong Kong staff have indeed been in contact with this office, they have all the paperwork filled out and all I have to do is write down my phone number hotel address and sign. And he even tells me thy are putting my bags on another airline to get them delivered âmid dayâ instead of midnight! He had full bag descriptions and everything (which brings peace of mind that they actually HAVE my bags in their line of sight). I guess the young gate agent understood my frustrations in Hong Kong???
Last possible hurdle is that I wonder if I still have hotel reservations in Phuket since we never showed up to the first night of our four night stay. I had found an email contact earlier in the day and had sent off a request that they hold our rooms. Once we got our taxi to Kata beach secured and I could log on to email. I see a response that we are all good, they have our rooms waiting! So now I relax, and enjoy the ride. Rooms are great, the girls have a pool access room, which means their balcony opens to private pool access, we are across the walkway from them with a pool front room to a different pool. They have four pools here. Quite a big place.Â
So please pray for us that our bags come âmid dayâ. If not then maybe midnight should be the worse case scenario. But at least Iâm somewhere that I understand how to get what we need, and we have lovely accommodations while we wait!
