10-Jan-10, 8:15 AM
Heathrow Airport
London.
19 hours have gone since I stepped out of the house, and I am just half way of my destination. The trip till now has been quite eventful with new standards for high stress being set. Right from getting the tickets, booking the hotel and renting a car in US, renting a cab to get to Mumbai airport, the arrival of the cab and the condition of cab whoo the list just seems endless!!!
To describe in short the woes, my tickets arrived in my hand just the night before I left that is on the 9th Jan. Well the only advantage of waiting so long was that I got tickets for business class from Mumbai to London, lucky me!!! But they were just the tickets, no hotel booking and no rental car booking. We had planned, oh yes we as in my parents, Nabha’s parents, Nabha and meJ, to leave the house by 5:00 PM. The clock was showing 2:00 PM and no signs of any arrangement being made for me in US. Finally I decided not to wait for my dear company to take care of me and do that my self. I made weeks reservation for hotel and car, took the print out and headed back to home. Within 5 mins I got a call on my cell from the GTD saying “oh! I was about to make reservations for you” Well I wanted to ask, why so early, you could have waited till 20th Feb!!! but I knew it wasn’t the time for this. So I asked her to go ahead and make the bookings and I will cancel my reservations… So finally at around 3 PM I had everything in place.
Now it was time to check the status of cab. We called up the guy Ravi and to everyone’s surprise or rather shock, he said he had just left Dombivli, which meant he will reach Pune by 6:00 PM. We already started to see the plan going out of schedule!!! Finally after too many anxious moments the cab arrived at around 7:15 PM. We immediately loaded the entire luggage and set for the trip to Chattrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, Mumbai!!! The cab condition looked pathetic, later we realized it was not just pathetic but also dangerous. As we sped on through the express highway, the cab was all filled with some fumes which made it difficult to breathe and also caused eye irritation. Finally with all the sufferings we made it to the Mumbai airport. We reached the airport at around 11:20, so it was immediately time to say alvida.
Well that was the part which I never wanted to happen, but knew it is going to happen. My sweet sweet honey might have shed so many tears from the time she came to know about my visit. As the time for my departure came closer, the frequency went on higher. Dada waived me good bye with a “Good son, I am proud of you” expression, Aai with “Take care, I am waiting to see you back soon” expression, Pappa with “Go ahead, don’t worry about anything” expression and Mamma with “Take care, travel carefully, eat well” expression. My sonu was with please don’t go… I will miss you so much, but I know you will have to go, but please keep calling me and come back soon, why are you leaving me behind, …… expression!!! Things get pretty difficult especially while parting off.
I had suddenly become all alone, my mind wasn’t actually ready to switch over, but then I had too. I went ahead did the x-ray scanning, went and stood in the AI counter for checking in and collecting the boarding pass. The person on the counter said, oh are you traveling by business class? I said yes. He said why you don’t go to any of the business class check in counters. I asked “where is the queue for that?” He replied, there is no queue sir! Go to first 3 counters, they are meant for business class passengers, you will get a lounge pass from there. I was like uuhh ok, thank you!!! Well I always knew there was a separate queue for business class passengers, but I guess the switch over wasn’t yet complete. I made my way through the crowd to the counter. I gave my Passport, ticket print out. I confirmed whether my luggage will reach the final destination (RDU) or will I need to collect and recheck in at the Heathrow airport? She said sir you will get it at the RDU airport. That was the first comforting thing I had heard w.r.t. to my trip in last couple of days. I was so glad that I left the counter after collecting my boarding pass, without collecting my passport!!! (Or was it still the pending switch over??? Honestly I don’t know!!!). The lady at the counter shouted, Sir!!! Your passport… I said oops… I forgot. I rushed again to the counter, she completed a customs form for me (only business class passengers get this facility, economy class need to fill there own forms… anyways, this was the start of comparison in what I would have been doing and what I was doing). I then went and submitted the customs form to the customs official, moved and got through the security check, and finally settled down at the “Maharaja” lounge – for first class and business class passengers… I then made few calls, and had to take the rescue remedy as per the instruction received from top authority ;-). I was getting pretty relaxed now. Finally the boarding call for AI 131 was made. I moved to the flight and the air hostess aunty took me to my seat. The seat was amazing, I mean apart from the ample leg space, the seat was a complete machine, as in there was a outer fixed structure and a movable seat inside. The seat could be moved electronically, like with press of buttons!!! As I got settled in the seat, the pilot announced that due to technical snag in the conveyer belt all the luggage was still not in the aircraft and it would take 20 mins more for the take off. Finally the place took off at 3:00 AM IST. I was feeling a bit hungry now. The refreshments came in at around 4:00 AM IST. He offered me a non – vegetarian cuisine, when I said veg, he was like oh but there was no meal request given for this seat number, but I will get you the veg refreshment, he brought in the veg refreshment and said, I am sorry sir, but these are the economy class sandwiches, always remember to give the meal preferences while booking the tickets is all what he had to say. But I couldn’t tell him that in the email which I sent to GTD I had clearly mentioned “Indian veg” as food preference. I wonder what I will get on the American airlines flight… Anyways the economy class sandwiches were as filling as any other food. To add to it there were business class fruit dish a sweet dish (which I didn’t eat. Why??? Come on it was 4:00 AM!!!!) Finally after finishing the meal, I went to the loo came back and pressed the seat button to make it as flat as a bed and went to bed… This was the best part of being in the business class. You can actually lie down on your seat. After waking up, I had my breakfast, didn’t finish it up completely though and then finally landed at the Heathrow airport. I switched on my cell phone with the sim brother had recharged for international roaming. I gave him a missed call, got a message from him saying, cool… Then before I could call honey I received a missed call from her, to which I replied back promptly with a missed call and she re-replied with a smsJ. I tried calling father, but couldn’t connect, but I am sure he must be aware that I have reached London. Finally I cleared all the security checks, sat at a place started writing this, took a break ate two dashmis, and went to collect my boarding pass. After collecting the boarding pass, I roamed around for a while at the airport and sat down and finally completing this blog straight from Heathrow airport, London, UK
