An experience with Delta

I was flying back from States on Saturday (7/2) and was booked on Air France flight from Newark airport. The flight from Newark to Paris, was for reason cancelled and I was re-booked on Delta, which is code-share partner of Air France.

I was travelling with a check in bag, a carry-on bag and a laptop backpack. I had the same stuff on my inbound trip.

When I reached the check-in counter, the lady at the counter told me that my carry on bag would not be allowed on board, and needs to be checked in, to which I was really surprised. I told her that, I was carrying the same carry-on on my inbound flight and it was allowed. The lady at the check-in counter very rudely told me “Yes, maybe, but this is America”. To this, I almost lost my cool and wanted to tell her that I very well know that this is America, and I have been multiple times here before. Nonetheless, I did not do any such thing and kept my cool. I told her that I have been using the same carry on bag on my earlier travels, and I was never told that the bag does not meet the guidelines.

She: Also, you’re carrying two carry-on items (indicating my laptop backpack)

I: But, I guess we’re allowed a carry-on item and a personal item, which clearly includes laptop bag

She: Yes, laptop bag is allowed, but yours is a backpack!

I: What? This is a laptop backpack and not a backpack! If you wish to check the bag, please do so

She: I do not want to see what’s in the bag, but I would not consider this as a laptop bag

I was really getting frustrated by this time with the continued rude behavior of this lady. I wanted to tell her that laptop bag does not only mean messenger bags. Laptop backpacks also exists in this world! Nevertheless, I knew that anything I tell her is going to be in vain, and I would be getting nothing, but will loose my cool. I also knew that, eventually I have to board this flight to get home, and it would not matter if I call the shift manager, as I don’t trust how much he/she would help me after going against one of their own employees, even thought the employee was being rude.

I: This is the first time, someone is telling me that this is not a laptop bag.

She: (has a smirk on face)

I: Ok, let me check in my carry on bag then.

She: There you go.

I check in my carry on bag and then take out my camera bag out of the carry on to carry as personal item.

She: Here is your passport, boarding pass (hands over to me). You’re all set.

I: Thanks.

I noticed that she did not take the I-94, which is supposed to be taken at the check-in counters.

I: You forgot to take this, which is supposed to be taken by check-in counter staff!

She: Yes!

I was very surprised and somewhat taken back, that this lady did not even say “Thanks” as a gesture. She is not being attentive on her duty and she is still being rude.

But, in situations like this, there’s very little you can do or control. You have to obey the rules, does not matter, how weird they can be, how illogical they can be, how irritating they can be.

After checking in, and getting past the security gates, I went to the gate where from I was supposed to board the flight. After some time, I noticed that there are some fellow passengers, who are carrying carry-on bags almost of the same size, I had!

Well, nothing could be done now. While I was not allowed to carry my bag, there are passengers who are carrying bags which have similar dimensions (difference of an inch can be there, which is not visible to the naked eye in a casual look).

When the boarding started, I encountered the same lady at the scan point for boarding pass. This time, I handed over my boarding pass to her, she quickly scanned it and handed it back to me. I moved on, and she called from behind. Apparently, she did not scanned it properly.

She: Sir, I need to scan it again.

I: What happened?

She: Seems that you’re having a lot of problems today (says with a smile)

I: I have a bad day but It’s not me. It’s Delta which is having problems and harassing me.

She: No, don’t say it’s bad day

I: Yeah, coz first you forget to take my I-94 then you do not scan it properly and still I have a bad day. I am not gonna fly Delta again, that’s for sure

And I move on disgruntled, irritated and somewhat harassed.

Also, their flight sucked.

Imagine a trans-Atlantic flight, not having TV screens on every seat! What the hell was that? This was another first for me!

After this experience, I know that I am never gonna fly on Delta again. If this is an example of their ground staff, who are rude, who make mistakes and even then think that the customer is having a bad day, and if they don’t have a TV screen on every seat for an 8 hour flight then I would prefer to choose a different airline.

Public Service Message in Movie

I watched Super 8 at AMC in GSP, Paramus today, which is a good movie. I am not going to talk about the movie here, but about a public service message which was embedded beautifully in the movie.

In one of the scenes towards the end, Joe, one the boys from lead cast, is driving someone else’s car, who is stoned and so can’t drive. As they were reaching home, they see that military has started an attack in the town on nothing in particular, but the guns are firing, tanks are throwing shells. Joe parks the car at his home, and all his friends get out to run away to some place safe. They try to wake up the guy, who was stoned, but he is not waking up. At this point, one of the boy says “Drugs are so bad”

I was impressed by the beauty with which the message was embedded in the plot. It was subtle. The sequence had attention of everyone, as it was towards the climax of the movie.

Appreciate the movie for that!

A (really) quick trip

It was Friday, 1:30 PM. I was devouring Sub of the day in the office cafeteria (which was Chicken Tikka Sub) at lunch with friends, when I got the call about my visa status.

2 hours later, the manager who had called, came to my cubicle and told me that I need to travel on Saturday for a short business trip to attend to some meetings at client location. This IS my shortest notice travel plan so far.

The next day was almost a nightmare for me in terms of work which needed to be done. I kept running here and there the entire day till 07:00 PM, when I actually started packing. It was at 8:31, that I finally relaxed after loading my luggage in the cab! Phew!

I was travelling on Air France this time, with a hop at Charles De Gaulle, Paris. Checking in at T3, IGI was easy and so was passing the immigration and security. As you all know, the new terminal is really great and of global standards. I noticed that there’s no longer free wi-fi at the airport. The service provider has changed from Airtel to Aircel and only 30 minutes demo is free. That was sufficient for me to tweet, psot FB updates, check Gmail and official mails. The rate for hourly surfing was just INR 60 per hour, which is not really costly.

Nevertheless, there had to be a let down and thanks to the food court near B gates, I found my let down. There were around 8 vendors, and even though they were having a range of offerings, from which you could have chose from, almost all of them were serving just one or two items out of the big lists. Every vendor was supposedly selling 500 ml and 1 l bottle of water, but none of them had the 1 l bottle! Anyways that’s that.

Air France flights are good when it comes to comfortable seating and leg space – things which matter on long haul flights. The food was let down though. Nonetheless, the leg space made for it (at least for me).

Best part of the flight was supposed to be the time spent at transit airport in Paris – Charles De Gaulle airport. It looked to me that the entire area of the airport is quite huge, as I noticed it took us considerable time from landing to reaching the skybridge dock. CDG airport from the inside is quite awesome starting from the interiors to the shops to even the carpets! I could not take any picture but will definitely take some on my way back home. The stores lined up all around the terminals are the best upscale brands, which you so much want to shop in – Ralph Lauren, Yves Saint Laurent, Coco, and a lot more similar companies. The perfume shops, seemed to to be selling the best brands only!

On reaching JFK, it was like coming to second home! Yeah, it feels like that at times. What made the tiring journey worthwhile was an opportunity to drive 🙂

I am tired but don’t want to sleep and screw my body block. Trying to keep awake by watching tv and wishing that the clock shows me 10 PM ASAP, so that I can hit the bed.

That’s all from my end guys. Keep tuned and maybe I’ll try to give a daily update of the stuff here.

Au Revoir

Missing Indian food

One thing I love about being close to New York is that whenever I want to eat Indian food at a restaurant, I get many choices. I am in New Jersey and the central jersey (actually all of the Jersey) is filled with Indians and all things which are Indian. There are a lot of Indian restaurants around here which are frequented by non-Indians as well.

The second week of this stay of mine, I had a strong urge to eat Samosas. In my quest to satiate my tongue (and also my inner self) I ordered Samosas at Kailash (Ridgewood). Seeing it on the menu and then ordering the same, I was just waiting to devour the servings. To my dismay, the Samosas were not as they were intended. I mean a Samosa is supposed to be a dumpling of flour stuffed with mashed potatoes and some other stuff. The major ingredient has to be a spicy and lightly sautéed mashed potatoes. So, back to what I ordered. The Samosas I got, were stuffed with nothing but lettuce leaves and some seasoning! You can understand how heartbreaking it can be, especially in the moments where a strong sense of having something you were waiting for so long, is getting built-up inside you. Half hearted, I ate half of one piece and then left the rest for the wastebasket.

Still waiting to have good, authentic Samosas 😦