This is again a story with Lufthansa, but not only. Praised be the right of the Germans to go on strike whenever they feel like. That’s sure a country to work in and to be part of an Union! Only few weeks ago there were some days of strike on the national railway company. I think it’s not yet a full month since I slept in Munich because of another mild strike that delayed a flight leading to me loosing my connection, which took off early. Because it’s absolutely normal , when you come back from the strike, you’re in a hurry to catch up with your work volume and do things faster than scheduled.
Well , this time they made it big. THAT BIG. Shortly , there were no Lufthansa flights taking off from Romania today . Well, I did receive an SMS on Sunday evening around 22:30 stating that my flight is cancelled due to an irregularity. Meaning , employees don’t feel like working , but more like protesting. I am not going to comment upon the reasons for protesting . I am, normally, distant from any arguments that would allow any group of employees stop working at their will , protest, cause losses and then expect that they continue to will work normally as if nothing happened , perhaps get their yearly bonuses as well. But not with the protesting employees I have a problem. I am not a German , not living in that country and I suppose they know better how to do these things since I am coming from Romania to work in their country. There’s a part of the problem with my flight being cancelled. Well , as I found out , shit happens , very often with Lufthansa . But also 90% of my flights are with them , so it’s likely that I am prone to their flaws , more than to others.
Now , in the next very morning , I have called their service center for a re-book. After 37 minutes of waiting on the line , they offered me an option for a German Wings flight landing around 15:30 Dusseldorf . I opted better for an connection with Austrian – German Wings , landing at 11:00 in Dusseldorf in exchange for my flight landing at 9:00 (9:30 in practice). They were nice enough to book me at that flight, that was basically way more convenient than my initial flight ( from the laving time POV) , but also way more expansive, reason why I didn’t book that in the first place. As it’s hard to tell a customer that he has to pay more for your flight , so that you can arrive later.
In Bucharest , the winter started right on time this year and it’s shitty, as it should be in December. I was early at the airport checked in and boarded on time , but when about to leave , there was an issue with some smoke sensor that kept us on land for 1 extra hour , plus some 20 minutes to remove the ice from the plane. There it gone my connection flight from Vienna , boarding at 9:00. I landed at 9:30. Noticed there’s a flight at 10:30 to DUS, so I ran my brains out looking for a service center. Police couldn’t have caught me if they wanted. I have posted myself in front of the service desk at 10:00. There was one person ahead of me, also going at DUS. Wow, that guy was really fast getting there, or he took a shortcut. Or he didn’t loop like me twice same places because nobody could tell me where’s a bloody service center in that airport.
And now you really have to see the movie Interstellar , that I watched last night, to understand how time passes differently depending on where you are and , basically, how fast are you moving. In a limit situation I was literally aging , in front of the service desk , while the lady there , spinning near the horizon limit of a black hole was sloooooowly pressing one key and then the other.
It took five bloody minutes ( in my world) , to book the guy before me to another flight. And who knows since when was he there. He did look kind of old. Don’t know if he aged there , or landed that way in Vienna. He went away and then it was my turn. She asked me for my ID and I quickly shove it into her face so she can “do the needful ” ( needs quotation due to Indian copyright on the expression ) . The whole world had to spin once more till she took that ID from my hand . I was actually afraid to touch the ID in the same time with her , as I was afraid that being that close to her world, the time would pass differently inside different parts of my body and I may scramble myself. So I dropped the ID on the desk. Accelerated by the gravity excess it fell down immediately with a sharp noise on the table. Wrong move on me , cause it took her about a minute to pick it up , look at it , then look at me and then say: “Ok , let’s see if I can book you for the flight leaving at 14:50… a reverberation of “IF I can book you” and “14:50″ passed through my head 20 times in the millisecond before I reacted with : ” How about the flight leaving at 10:30? “.
-That is already gone, she said. “Goooooone” reflected through the drums of my both ears…
-But is 10 minutes past 10, ONLY!
-As I said , already gone ! And the silence fell hard on me .
Holly shit! Ok , I accepted the curse of time and I took the ticket. She insisted in giving me a 6 EUR voucher to compensate for my delay , of 1 fucking work day (Thank You, Lufthansa! Me, nonstop me,… being delayed on your flights, motherfuckers! ) . That took another 5 minutes and I wanted to strangle her right there and put an end to the time speed variance in that airport. Then I walked for 1 half hour , 1 passport control and 1 security check to get to terminal C. Where I found out that there’s no “Star Alliance” lounge and should I want to get a free whatever things that you get in these lounges , I have to loose another hour and pass twice through security check . Meaning , back to the gates F and afterwards returning to gates C . I am not that fuckin’ cheap, you know ? I rather write this shit and pay for my lunch. Somewhere deep in my pockets , I have forgotten the talisman of misfortune. Need to dig it out.
Still in the airport , hoping that I get on time to DUS.
HAHAHAHA 🙂 Necromancy + 15%