Monday, August 20, 2007

8/11 LAX


I was fortunate enough to be able to get caught up in one of the worst computer glitches in LAX history. It must have been my lucky day. The customs and immigrations system failed and thousands were stranded trying to get into the United States.


People were being kept on the runway for several hours because they couldn't be processed into the country. Because of that, no one was able to take off. Flights were delayed for hours. The airlines were giving out food vouchers so that people could at least eat. The problem with that is when there are thousands who are stranded, obviously those restaurants are going to run out of food. Some nice lady gave me her french fries that she hadn't touched. She came back with a full bottle of water for me too. It was so nice of her. I normally wouldn't accept food from a stranger, but I was so hungry!


My flight was supposed to take off at 11 pm, but we didn't actually depart until 4 am. This experience was beyond frustrating. I like to think that I'm a patient person, but I hate to say that I was one of those frustrated angry travellers. No one was giving us any information, and at one point I was told that it could be another 12 hours until we could possibly get out. Also, I've never seen flight crews waiting. They were caught up in the mess along with the rest of us.


Miraculously I made my flight to Kathmandu. The good news is that I didn't have to deal with a 5 hour layover in Bangkok. I made it onto the airplane 10 minutes before we departed. The moral of this story is to make Lisa extremely tired and frustrated to get her to fly. I didn't have it in me to get anxious and scared for the flights ahead.

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