A Hitch in the Travel Pants
Wow. The plane is broken. They forced us all to get new boarding passes, go through extra security and wait in the gate area (I had to leave the nice lounge with showers and beer) now 45 minutes after the boarding time THE PLANE IS BROKEN but they will attempt to fix it AT THE GATE.
It's hard to complain when everything else has been going so well. And yet, it's hard not to complain at the moment, though it does no good, so I only complain to the ether. It will have to do. My biggest complaint only being that I was sitting in a nice airport lounge, had access to food, drink, showers, and entertainment - but was told to check in and go through extra security for this flight - where there are not even bathrooms or water (they made me dump mine out) - and only then did they discover the plane was broken and it would take at least two hours to fix it. Such a strange world - the flight was originally Malaysia Air, as a Malaysian Air flight - now it is a Sri Lankan Airlines flight - and where does that leave the passengers - most of them resignedly inshallahing. There are no Karen's here - at least not loud ones. Complicating things - I booked through Trip.com so if I have a complaint - good fucking luck.
Hilton upgraded my room to an executive king earlier - I don't even know what that means. I have a driver meeting me - but will he wait for two hours? All of these are unknowns but time will tell. Hard to even know if the airplane won't fall out of the sky. This could be the one that ends it all - and if it is, well, fuck it, I had a great time in Bali. The massages, the new friends, the calm and lonely luxury without interruptions. I suppose having a nice reward like that before an airplane crash would be pretty cool. It would make a nice story for people to tell.
I'm exhausted, actually. So tired and stinky from a long day of travel. I was going to take advantage of those showers in the lounge but then thought - I'll be getting to my hotel in a few hours, I'll just wait. Now - despite having eliminated as many unknowns as possible I am faced with even more unknowns than had I done nothing. Frustrating. And to make things more odd, I feel as if I'm on a ship and the ground has started swaying.
All will be revealed. It always is. So let's get on with it.
In the event that Flight UL 315 disappears with all aboard somewhere over the Indian Ocean, just know that I've enjoyed these past couple of weeks immensely and getting the chance to be my daughter's father has been the greatest honor and joy of my life. Likely however, they will fix the plane and it will fly without major event to Colombo, Sri Lanka - as usually happens.
1st Postscript: The girl next to me and I partnered up and told the gate agent how much inconvenience it has caused us and how they should upgrade us to business class - we decided too late and it was already full - but at least they escorted us out of the hellish security section and into the first class lounge to wait it out.