So you have seen the amazing race, and you know what I’m talking about!
I bought my flights to Taiwan at the end of February and stupidly I made a big mistake and booked a flight that included a 12-hour stop over in Washington DC. Start counting in Syracuse (airport) makes the total trip time to about 54 hours! I tried calling to get my flights changed once, but it was going to cost too much. I was prepared to sleep over at the Washington Dulles Airport. Then, I had a brilliant idea! I decided to try standing by the flights. Now your should realize that it’s not a direct flight that I’m flying. In fact, this is how my trip looks like:
Kingston -> Syracuse (car)
Syracuse (5PM day 1) -> DC (8AM day 2) -> San Fran (5PM day 2) -> Taoyuan airport (7AM day 3)
Taoyuan -> home (car)
I figured that if i can go on to an earlier flight (like 12 hours earlier) from Syracuse to DC, then at least I can stop over in DC for 24 hours instead of 12, which will make the hotel and rental car all the more worthwhile. But deep inside, I was hoping that I can take the flights that I have taken last year, which would allow me to get to Taiwan 24 hours earlier!
4:00AM EST
At the Syracuse airport, I met the most helpful UA agent in my life! He was very patient to help me with my crazy request to basically change my entire itinerary and two luggages that were supposed to somehow follow me. He was able to switch me to an itinerary that allows me to fly Syracuse -> DC -> Orlando -> Tokyo -> Taoyuan all for 26.5 hours! Although there’s one more stop, I thought it’s still much better than 54 hours. He then went the extra mile to put me on wait list for the DC -> San Fran -> Taoyuan flights that would allow me to go to taiwan all for 23 hours! But the flight from DC -> San Fran was completely checked in and I was one of the 30 people on the wait list. In other words, it’s highly unlikely that i get to do that….. Because it took him a long time to fix my flights, the line up for checking in was building up and caused a series of minor delay (check in and at the gate). I really appreciated his help and i can see why some travellers might get pissed off as a result of it. My flight from Syracuse to DC was rather smooth, and i had a great feeling about the trip! I’m writing a compliment letter regarding to his service to UA today.
8:10AM EST
I got to Washington DC, I had about 20min to catch the wait listed plane, which was, of course, in a different terminal. I had to take a shuttle bus and luckily it came as i ran to the stop. The shuttle ride was very short, at most 5 minutes, and then I ran to the gate. I spoke to the agent there and she told me I have to wait until everyone’s on-board, and then she’ll go to the wait list. It’s pretty cool that they have the wait list on the monitor and I’m No. 2 on the wait list (of 21 people), and I suppose it’s because of my Air Canada Elite status, that’s pretty sweet. The flight was scheduled to leave DC at 830AM, and by 825AM, she started calling No.1 on the wait list who didn’t show up (YA!!!). So I got in! At the gate, i asked to get my boarding pass for San Fran to Taipei (now that she took my DC-> Tokyo one which obviously confused her), but she said there’s no time for her to do that for me but she’ll work on it during my flight. Wow, UA’s got great service! I’m not sure why people complain about them!!
2:30PM EST
Now I’m in San Fran, I got off the plane and realizes that I had to go to another terminal again, but this time with a bit more breeze room as the flight to Taiwan was delayed. It looked like the only way for me to go to the international terminal was to get out of security and then go through security again. I was worried how long it might take! After speaking to another UA agent, I was told there’s a secret shuttle bus that i can take to by-pass the security, but to take the bus they needed a boarding pass that I did not have. But they let me on anyway, see, I told you UA agents were nice!
4:00PM EST
Everything’s so smooth that something must go wrong. I waited impatiently for the UA gate agents to show up, and when they finally did, I explained my situation and asked if I could get a boarding pass. The process of printing my boarding pass was about 10 minutes, but for them to give that boarding pass to me without charging me 200USD was about 1 hour. The agent called several people, and then another customer service director had to come and explain to me that I wasn’t supposed to change my flights at all, and they needed to charge me 500USD but since I’m already at the gate, they’d charge me 200USD. But they really should have charged me in Syracuse and not in San Fran. Long story short, they gave me the boarding pass for free (one time deal), but they had to complain about the agent in Syracuse, I felt really bad about it, and I hope my complimant letter will counter the effect of the complaint they made in San Fran!!
5:20PM EST
Finally, boarding time!! I was almost going to get on to the airplane and….. I got stopped at the Gate. I was supposed to have a paper copy of the ticket with my boarding pass. what?!?! I totally thought I’m going to find a hotel in San Fran now… but somehow, I made it.
7:20AM EST (day 2)
I’m in Taiwan!!! 24 earlier than scheduled arrival time! I got here in one piece and even my luggages shows up!! What a wonderful trip, and I think i’ve just won the amazing race!
Well….. almost… I got home and was informed that my wallet was missing!! So today I’ll have to go to the airport before 5:30pm to claim my wallet, which, as a result, means I’ll be at the Taoyuan airport exaxctly the same time as I am supposed to if I had just went with my original schedule, but from the the other side of the custom!
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