However, things went south pretty much right when we got to the Wichita airport. Lots of people checking in, short staffed at the ticket counter, and a kiosk that kept kicking us off, led to a fiasco. Couldn't get help with the kiosk for about half an hour, due to the three actual people behind the counter being totally overwhelmed. Finally got someone to help, which opened a pandora's box of questions about my visa - which took time to convince them that I could apply for that at the Phnom Penh airport. By the time we got that straightened out - it was so late that they wouldn't let me board anymore. So they rerouted us through a later Denver connection (was to leave ICT at 8:30pm, but was delayed nearly 30 minutes) to try to catch the LA flight.
Running through the Denver terminal (with my heart pounding) we caught that leg, and arrived LA by 11:30pm. Didn't help that we were in the back seat of the plane, spent excess time on the tarmac waiting for the parking slot to open up, and had less than a half an hour to run to the international terminal to board our next flight. Luckily we had our friends try to hold the flight long as they could. We ran, we caught a bus, we kept texting our friends to plead, we got off the bus to try to exceed the bus's average velocity, even hailed down a taxi (to no avail)... Got to the airline counter of Airline Company 2 by 12:35am - too late. It was just one guy at the counter, one very upset daughter, and me. With the aid of tears, my daughter told that guy that our family is up there on that flight - You're tearing our family apart! - became our mantra. So this guy, of Airline Company 2, tried to see what he could do, but then told us to go back and be tough and get a solution from Airline Company 1, who put us in this predicament.
We drug ourselves down the dreaded long journey back to the desk of Airline Company 1. Again, not even a taxi would take us. There were 2 attendants left at the desk trying to close up. I was ready to be tough, as advised. After all, it was about 1am, and I was already pushed beyond the brink. The two attendants were not too pleasant, and ended up bringing out their supervisor, who was a mean lady that was tougher than a bat, and was NOT going to assume any responsibility for this fiasco, and told me to take it up with Airline Company 2. You're kidding, right? They provided me with a 1-800 number for Airline Company 2, and a hotel room for the night. Not to give up too soon, I called this number right in front of them, knowing that Company 2 would just point their finger back at Company 1. However, I only got a recording, saying that the offices were closed until 5am. Got no sympathy from these people that were wanting to close up for the night. So we caught a bus to the hotel and checked in by 2am. I set the alarm for 5am, realizing that I probably needed these 3 hours sleep to be ready to do battle in the morning. But at 4am my frantic daughter woke me to let me know she had been doing internet searches and found tickets that we could buy to get us the heck over that ocean and where we should be. I tried to convince her that we will get justice from the airline, but she woke me up again at 4:30am with more internet solutions. By the time my alarm went off at 5:00am, she was sound asleep - all the better for me to do uninterrupted battle on the phone.
By 5:02am I was on the phone with Company 2. Through the holds, and various transfers, the answer was repeatable. It was the other Company's fault. Without missing a beat, by 5:30 I was on the phone to Company 1. That half hour led to returned finger pointing at Company 2. Ok, it was 6:00am, so I called AAA, who made the reservations for me in the first place. By that time it was 8am in Wichita and they were open. They called Company2, and Company 1, went through the finger pointing, then finally found me a flight path though Company 1. They asked if I could go right over the Company 1's ticket desk at the airport. I got my daughter up and we were out of the room in 5 minutes and checked out by 6:45am.
By 7:00am we were back at Company 1's desk where the mean woman was at only hours before. We looked around nervously to be sure she wasn't there. There was an opening at the counter where they checked in odd sized 'packages' such as cute little stowaway dogs. He motioned us to come to his counter. So we told the whole story, and provided him a flight number of the first flight that the AAA person gave me over the phone. He looked endlessly and said there were just no seats. But the AAA person saw seats! That's why we were here! I got the AAA person on the phone again, and had her speak to this man. The more we spoke to this man, the more apparent it was that we were clearly in the wrong line with 'Inspector Clouseau'. The AAA person, bless her heart, stayed on the phone with us for almost 2 hours during Clouseau's endless search for seats. She could see them, he could not. She finally got very frustrated and called a United Executive on the other line. We WERE going to get a solution. The mean woman appeared behind the counter assisting other counter personnel. My frail morning attempt at renewed positive attitude was quickly diminishing. My daughter and I tried looking very non conspicuous. It was difficult in the odd package size line.
By 9:00am, with a line of people with their dogs behind us, we got seats. Not what AAA had found for us, but we had seats. By 11:05am we were on our way again (flying Company 1).
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| Santa visited while in LA boarding for Tokyo |
Instead of going into Seoul, then Phnom Penh, Clouseau rerouted us on a flight to the Tokyo Narita Airport. It was a cramped 12 hour flight, with no legroom because both our carry-ons were stuffed under our seat, so my daughter laid her legs in my lap, but at least we were back on our way. Arriving Tokyo at 4:45pm, we then had to find and pay for a bus to take us on a 1 hr 15 min trip over to the Tokyo Haneda Airport, to continue on to Hong Kong (via All Nippon Airways), and finally Phnom Penh (via Dragon Air Airways) - just in time to catch our Phnom Penh flight to Pho Quoc, Vietnam (via Vietman Airlines) with our friends, maybe....
Here we are at Tokyo Haneda for the evening. It was our favorite airport of the whole trip actually. Beautifully decorated, very friendly people, great local restaurants. Since our flight didn't leave until 1:30am, we had time to stroll around, browse through stores, and grab a bite of great local, non airliner, food. Until now we have only had a breakfast and a dry sandwich served on Company 1's airline. So sitting down for real food was definitely a big plus. And also, for some reason, our boarding pass said we had an invitation to All Nippon's lounge. Well, we had to go check that out. Very nice, electrical outlets everywhere, free WiFi, food and drinks, even showers. We stayed there until midnight. At this point we have been traveling for 38 hours, from the originally scheduled 6:10pm Wichita departure time.
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| Tokyo Haneda |
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| Tokyo Haneda |
We went through airport security at every airport, and got different things removed from every one. One most interesting though was at Tokyo Haneda. I had a little ziplock bag with 3 regulation travel size bottles of shampoo, and soaps. It had passed through Wichita and LA so far. But apparently in this airport it was questionable. The security guy was very polite, and tried to kindly explain to me (in very sketchy english) that he thought these bottles might possibly be just a little bit over regulation. He indicated that he wasn't sure, but there might be that chance. So he had me walk with him back through security, and leave my daughter there with the rest of our carry on stuff. He kept reassuring me it was ok to leave her there, as she looked on while I walked away with this guy. He walked me up to a ticket counter and gave my ziplock bag with the 3 little bottles to the woman behind the counter, and they had quite a conversation I couldn't understand. It resulted in her putting the contents in a little paper shopping bag, stapling a baggage ticket on the outside of this little shopping bag, and placing the little bag on the baggage conveyor belt. As I watched this little open topped bag travel on the conveyor belt, in the midst of other huge suitcases, the nice woman bowed, handed me the baggage claim ticket, and said something that I could only assume meant 'there you go', and smiled.
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| Little luggage bag for my questionable soaps. |
We boarded the plane for Hong Kong, to leave at 8:20am. We found that boarding flights in Asia involved getting on a crowded bus which takes you to the airplane, for you to climb the steps to enter the planes. At this airport, the bus was so crowded that they transferred us to another bus, and of course my daughter and I were the very last 2 seats on the plane, but we were on our way.
At 10:30am we arrived in Phnom Penh, one day late, 52 and a half hours from Wichita, but in time to catch our originally scheduled flight that afternoon to Vietnam at 2:00pm. Going through immigration at Phnom Penh elevated my blood pressure just a bit. We filled out our requests for visas, and had our pictures, passports, and money ready. There was a mass of people, and no clear defined lines. We handed in our paperwork, and waited to be called. Finally we heard our name. There was a stern looking man that came back my way and only said one word - "Adopted?" I assumed he meant my daughter, who was born in Phnom Penh - though she has a US passport, which just at the time was also no longer clutched in my hands. I said yes, and then we were moved over to another desk and filled out an arrival card. Eventually we were handed back our passports (yes hers, too), then sent on our way through final Immigration authorities. These men had a smile on their face when speaking to us, in very good english. They reconfirmed that my daughter was adopted from here, and then welcomed her and congratulated her on getting a permanent visa to Cambodia. My daughter beamed at her pretty new sticker in her passport. We have arrived.
Now, on to finding out about our luggage. Who knows where it is? Did it miss the LAX connection to Seoul? Did it get sent the next flight out? So far we've lost my daughter's dance jacket somewhere when we were running to catch the Seoul flight in LA, we've lost my little bottles of shampoo, we've lost nail clippers, sun screen, and just hope we haven't lost luggage, too. We headed to Baggage Services at Phnom Penh, just around the corner from Immigration. There were 2 men; one younger who spoke some english, one older (not so much). We told them of our luggage that we hoped would have come from LA and beat us here. They let us look, but no luggage. So the 2 men wanted all flight information, including boarding passes. We tried to explain that the luggage wasn't expected to come the route of the boarding passes. They still wanted those passes. Luckily I could find them all. Then we tried to explain that we were going on to Vietnam this afternoon, and this put confusion on everyone's faces. So it was resolved that we will be back to Phnom Penh by Dec 26th, and could pick the luggage up then. We asked it we could have the luggage delivered to the Hotel we were staying at, or actually will stay at when we get back, in Phnom Penh. The young man called the hotel for me so I could talk to the desk, and they were happy to oblige. When I got off the phone, the young man, in perfect english, said not to worry, this is what they do. Then the older man, came around the counter up to us, smiled and said "Not to worry. It will happen like magic". I want to believe.
So off we went, exiting the back of the airport, walking around to enter the front of the airport to go to Vietnam. We found a Costa by the entrance for a sandwich, and marveled at how new and updated this airport was since I was last here in 2000. We found the Vietnam Airlines check in line and as we were standing there, here comes our friends behind us; one of my best friends in grade school, and her two daughters also born in Cambodia. They caught the LAX flight that we were supposed to be on, and had spent the night here before catching today's flight to Phu Quoc, Vietnam. Boy it was sure great to see them!
Didn't take long and we were back through the familiar security routine, and on board for Ho Chi Minh, switch planes, then to Phu Quoc Island. In Ho Chi Minh, a man named Mike from the Travel agency met us to help us go through Vietnamese Immigration. We had our Visa requests, pictures, and passports ready. As Mike was collecting everyone's luggage, he asked where ours were. We told the story of missed flights, and he took us to baggage claim services. We told him it was ok, that the bags would be held in Phnom Penh, but he wouldn't give up. The english language was not a strong suit here. He and the baggage claims man were persistent in asking for our baggage claim tickets. They were determined to help us. In the end they kept our baggage claim tickets, and handed us a pink slip with our baggage claim information and reference number on it. Well, it looks like we'll either get that luggage in Phu Quoc, or never see it again. But the baggage claim tickets were now gone. We continued on through immigration and security, and another young man named Tam helped us load up our luggage again, and get to the next terminal to check in to the next flight to Phu Quoc, Vietnam.
At 10:30am we arrived in Phnom Penh, one day late, 52 and a half hours from Wichita, but in time to catch our originally scheduled flight that afternoon to Vietnam at 2:00pm. Going through immigration at Phnom Penh elevated my blood pressure just a bit. We filled out our requests for visas, and had our pictures, passports, and money ready. There was a mass of people, and no clear defined lines. We handed in our paperwork, and waited to be called. Finally we heard our name. There was a stern looking man that came back my way and only said one word - "Adopted?" I assumed he meant my daughter, who was born in Phnom Penh - though she has a US passport, which just at the time was also no longer clutched in my hands. I said yes, and then we were moved over to another desk and filled out an arrival card. Eventually we were handed back our passports (yes hers, too), then sent on our way through final Immigration authorities. These men had a smile on their face when speaking to us, in very good english. They reconfirmed that my daughter was adopted from here, and then welcomed her and congratulated her on getting a permanent visa to Cambodia. My daughter beamed at her pretty new sticker in her passport. We have arrived.
Now, on to finding out about our luggage. Who knows where it is? Did it miss the LAX connection to Seoul? Did it get sent the next flight out? So far we've lost my daughter's dance jacket somewhere when we were running to catch the Seoul flight in LA, we've lost my little bottles of shampoo, we've lost nail clippers, sun screen, and just hope we haven't lost luggage, too. We headed to Baggage Services at Phnom Penh, just around the corner from Immigration. There were 2 men; one younger who spoke some english, one older (not so much). We told them of our luggage that we hoped would have come from LA and beat us here. They let us look, but no luggage. So the 2 men wanted all flight information, including boarding passes. We tried to explain that the luggage wasn't expected to come the route of the boarding passes. They still wanted those passes. Luckily I could find them all. Then we tried to explain that we were going on to Vietnam this afternoon, and this put confusion on everyone's faces. So it was resolved that we will be back to Phnom Penh by Dec 26th, and could pick the luggage up then. We asked it we could have the luggage delivered to the Hotel we were staying at, or actually will stay at when we get back, in Phnom Penh. The young man called the hotel for me so I could talk to the desk, and they were happy to oblige. When I got off the phone, the young man, in perfect english, said not to worry, this is what they do. Then the older man, came around the counter up to us, smiled and said "Not to worry. It will happen like magic". I want to believe.
So off we went, exiting the back of the airport, walking around to enter the front of the airport to go to Vietnam. We found a Costa by the entrance for a sandwich, and marveled at how new and updated this airport was since I was last here in 2000. We found the Vietnam Airlines check in line and as we were standing there, here comes our friends behind us; one of my best friends in grade school, and her two daughters also born in Cambodia. They caught the LAX flight that we were supposed to be on, and had spent the night here before catching today's flight to Phu Quoc, Vietnam. Boy it was sure great to see them!
Didn't take long and we were back through the familiar security routine, and on board for Ho Chi Minh, switch planes, then to Phu Quoc Island. In Ho Chi Minh, a man named Mike from the Travel agency met us to help us go through Vietnamese Immigration. We had our Visa requests, pictures, and passports ready. As Mike was collecting everyone's luggage, he asked where ours were. We told the story of missed flights, and he took us to baggage claim services. We told him it was ok, that the bags would be held in Phnom Penh, but he wouldn't give up. The english language was not a strong suit here. He and the baggage claims man were persistent in asking for our baggage claim tickets. They were determined to help us. In the end they kept our baggage claim tickets, and handed us a pink slip with our baggage claim information and reference number on it. Well, it looks like we'll either get that luggage in Phu Quoc, or never see it again. But the baggage claim tickets were now gone. We continued on through immigration and security, and another young man named Tam helped us load up our luggage again, and get to the next terminal to check in to the next flight to Phu Quoc, Vietnam.
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