[b said:
Quote[/b] (Mad Cyril @ Oct. 08 2004,12:34)]Don't turn into one of those gap year bores....
If I had to interview students I would actively discriminate against anyone who had been 'travelling' if they had made a big song and dance about it on their CV.
Unlike Princes William and Harry don't try and pretend it is anything other than a great big holiday.
Yeah, but it's fuggin' great.
I'll not apologise for taking a gap year. I worked for the first 7 months of it on building sites, earnt a fair bit of money, and then went travelling.
And, as 19 year-olds' experiences go, I'd say travelling overland from Madras to the UK is quite adventurous.
So ner.
As for the thread...
Worst flying experience was not actually in a plane, but it was the utter ****-up that resulted in a flight being late.
As anyone who has ever tried to travel to India at Christmas time will testify, the world and its wife wants to visit relatives in Mumbai over the Festive season. As a result, most flights to India for the Christmas period are booked up by the previous June.
We were organised, though. My Dad was working for a Dutch company, so the KLM flights were duly booked that summer. All was well, and all was straightforward. 6.50 a.m. flight to Schiphol, lands 9 am local time, then a 10.30 a.m. flight to Mumbai.
We got to Heathrow... "flight delayed by one and a half hours". Now I'm concerned - that's precisely the amount of time we have to change planes. So I ask the Heathrow ground-staff. "Oh, don't worry sir - Schiphol is snow-bound. If our little plane is delayed in landing, then the Mumbai flight won't be able to take off."
So, we board at 8.20 a.m. in Heathrow. At 10.00 a.m., as we break through the cloud cover over Amsterdam... not a single feckin' flake of snow on the ground. To this day, I don't know why we were lied to by Heathrow ground staff. But there's no question, it was a lie. It wasn't as if the snow had cleared, or had melted. They said "snow-bound" and, quite simply, there was no snow.
Of course, the Mumbai flight had gone. So, how do we get to India now? We queued at the transfer centre. After almost 2 hours, they said "we've found you flights: Amsterdam - Rome - Cairo - Bombay".
Not ideal, but in that situation we had no choice. I noted with some concern that there was only 50 minutes' transfer time in Rome, but we figured that, so long as we took off on time, we'd be OK.
Waiting for the Rome flight... up popped the sign, "Delayed 1 hour." Now, I'm really ****ed off. So I go over, barely containing my anger, to the chap in charge of the Rome flight. "We can't make our connecting flights in Rome now", I informed him.
In that very laid-back Dutch way, with a jovial lilt in his voice, he replied "Yeah, dere seems to be havin' a liddle problem here..."
I snapped. I smashed my fist against his counter and hissed "It's a f**king disaster. Get it f**king sorted
NOW!" This drew the required response... he went scuttling off, and one of those motorised airport vehicles was commandeered to whisk us back to the transfer desk. The KLM lady driving tried to calm me... "It's OK, we'll sort it out." My sister replied on my behalf: "Listen, I wouldn't try to speak to him... He's way too f**ked off to talk right now." As usual, my sister wasn't wrong...
Eventually, after another two hours, they found us flights. Leaving at 1.00 p.m. the next day. Flying to Bombay... via Osaka. Yes, the one in Japan.
The airline did put us up in a hotel in Amsterdam - although of course we were dressed for India... flip flops, light trousers, no coats. It was minus 4 in Amsterdam. We did not go out.
The next day, when preparing for the flight to Osaka, we asked them about the airport, for the purposes of the transfer. "Is it a big airport?", I inquired. "Oh no, it's quite small really..."
As the flight to Japan progressed, I realised that the minutes between flights were ebbing away. I was beginning to fret, I didn't sleep a wink. We should have had 4 hours lay-over in Osaka. But we left 3 hours late... and the flight was slow. Suddenly, we only had 30 minutes to transfer between flights... but it was OK, Amsterdam ground-staff had told me that Osaka was a small airport.
Another fib. Thanks KLM. As we taxi towards the terminal, we see a plane at Gate 3. "That's our plane", said my sister. "You don't know that..." I replied. However, as usual... she wasn't wrong. Gate 3 it was. We pulled in at... Gate 91.
We sprinted through the airport and were the last on the plane. Luckily they only had seats in Business Class left - one of the few times I've been bumped up.
We made it on the flight to Bombay. However, after waiting for 40 minutes by an empty carousel in Bombay airport, it was clear that our bags - with all our clothes, Christmas presents, my revision for my course - had not made it.
We did get the bags back eventually... 10 days later. Thanks again, KLM.
So there you have it... that's definitely my worst ever airline experience.
My best flying experience? Probably climbing on a flight to Singapore, en route to Melbourne, absolutely exhausted after a really long day at work. A bit of dinner, a glass of beer, head down... and I slept for 11 hours. Bliss. Only one hour to go to Singapore. I then slept again for 5 hours on the flight to Melbourne... and was over my jet-lag within 2 days of getting to Oz - perfect.
Matt
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