Anju, vavas and my parents were supposed to go to India on the 26th May. After a lot of going back and forth whether to go, Anju decided to take the vavas to India ---even after my repeated attempts to stop them.. I was depressed to the core, days before their travel date and Krishna Menon and Suja decided to take me with them on their weekend Bend( Eastern Oregon) trip - they are always so kind and considerate, thanks guys for being such wonderful friends and I sincerely appreciate what you are doing.
I had reserved my tickets to drop them off at San Francisco, and after the tedious process of getting the boarding pass and the security screening with all the baby food - yes we had to open all our cabin bags to show the baby food, but as the security person who inspected us was a lady, she passed us through without much of a problem as they were twins and the travel being international. We were near the gate and achan and I had some lunch and bought something back for Anju and amma, while they were feeding and taking care of the babies. Suddenly the united flight showed that it was delayed and then canceled. They pulled our plane, which was underbooked with just 75 passengers and swapped with a Chicago plane which had technical problems. Yep, thats the perfection of airline industry, they do whatever they want based on their profits with no consideration of the elderly or the infants...SUCKS....But there is something called Karma, as after the Chicago passengers boarded "our" plane, it had technical problems too.
So after hours of running behind United officials we got re-booked and re routed through Washington DC on United for the 27th. I was fuming and told them that I was not interested in this and I wanted Emirates reservation. Couple of months back when I was doing the reservation, United was around $1000 compared to $2500 for Emirates and I booked Emirates due to Achans health and comfort for the babies as they will get Bassinet and more than anything it was a shorter flight close to 24-26 hours from Portland to Trivandrum. Called up Emirates with my frustration and they were of no help.. So I told Anju to hold on her travel plans, for which she agreed and then wanted to go as she was more concerned about her parents....
27 May
t Krishnan came at 4am to pick us up. He was of such a great help in the last 3 days, helping us take care of all the luggage, due to my back pain, and dropping off parents at the airport. We reached the airport at 445 am, as we had to pick the baggage from the claim area and had to re checkin on the new flight. The baggage attendant said that our baggage was gone to X Ray screening, and she assured that she will take care of it, and we dont need to do anything..that was a great relief, eventhough we were not sure..There were all sorts of problems at the checkin area, due to the confusion on attaching the babies.. Finally she resolved all the issues and printed us tickets after an hour wait. I went to the security area and told the agent that I am not travelling, bt was trying to help my family and she was fine with that, bt she wont let me enter the security area..she told me to get a special access pass by asking United. So I ran back to the United counter and requested our same agent bypassing all the queue..She verified my drivers license and gave me special access---wow I never knew that you could get something like this in US, but this really helped, as I could help with the security check and then with the seat assignments at the gate... I was in tears when they were about to board the plane, as I already started missing my babies....I sincerely wish that this is the last time I am going to stay away from my family..Its depressing...
They all reached DC on time, bt when the boarded the plane to Dubai, there were thunderstorms and the plane was delayed by 2 hours..I almost knew that they were going to miss the plane from Dubai to Trivandrum as it was only a 2hour gap there..As expected they missed the plane and they had to run around the gates to finally get a ticket for the 330am flight...
Finally, after one of the worst journeys to remember they all reached safely in India, after 48 hours of travel....
The above photos are of the First plane my babies traveled - From Portland to Washington DC.
