Road to Rome – Our Adventures So Far

Oh boy. I’ve heard so much about the difficulties of traveling during this time. So I knew that we had to tackle this with much persistence. We really want to spend the New Years in a new place. And, our road to this new place has been nothing short of adventurous. I felt that all my discipline, resourcefulness, and whatever absurd travel preparations I exhaust myself with over the years of traveling prepared me for this ordeal, and I’m damn proud of it.

Day after Christmas, I saw a travel alert from US Airways, saying that our flight, among about 1500 flights in the East Coast have some travel advisory. See, it didn’t say cancelled yet. They were just saying to be advised because they have an advise. I’d much rather that we learned then that our flight was going to be cancelled. But no. they said everything was still fine. We got to SFO ready to depart for our PHL flight. This was delayed for 30 minutes. All other flights to Philadelphia before our plane was already cancelled. So, I felt lucky then. I can handle 30 minutes. Five hours later, when we were about 40 miles from PHL, the captain said that we are circling over the airport, waiting for our turn to land because there were only 2 runways open – one for departing and one for landing. At this point, our flight to Rome (FCO) was scheduled to depart an hour and a half later. We felt there was hope. If we’re delayed, they may be delayed too. There was more glimmer of hope when the captain said we were number 2 in line to land. Number 1 in line plane apparently landed but they deemed the runway too
slippery. So, our plane was diverted to Harrisburg International (MDT), which was 20 minutes away by plane. There, we were to wait for instructions from US Airways. Here, Chef’s PR began, and here, I realized my own elevated levels of communication skills (LOL), more than that I have been commended for at work. Chef, who speaks Italian, approached a couple who were heard earlier were on the same flight to FCO with us. They’re from Albania, but they also spoke Italian. While Chef was busy finding other passengers who were in the same boat as us, I pulled out my inner Amazing Race
contestant. On my phone, I kept checking the status of the FCO flight. The whole time we were in MDT, the FCO flight was awaiting take-off. This to me meant that it will leave, and perhaps it was just waiting for passengers, passengers who were coming from different connecting flights but never landed in PHL. At the same time, I was on the phone with Expedia, telling them what’s going on, relentlessly asking them to find a flight for us. After about 30 minutes at MDT, our plane was cleared to leave for PHL. We got there 20 minutes later. At that point we learned that the whole airport had been shut down. After us landing, no one else goes in, and no one else lands. As soon as I got internet connection, I checked the FCO flight, it was cancelled. The landing was the scariest I’ve experienced. We could see the snow outside, could we really land? I held my breath throughout the whole descent. Landed safely. Everyone clapped and cheered for the good job the pilot had done. When we landed, everyone ran for the nearest US Airways service desk. I thought, hmmm, this was the domestic terminal. Maybe we should go to the international terminal instead. Chef remained in line with our Albanian acquaintances as they needed him to translate. I probably ran/walked about a mile and a half to get to the other end of the airport. There was another long line on the service desk in the international terminal. I was last. Great.

My luck has not ran out yet. A US Airways employee came up to me, saying a new desk had just been opened. Woohoo. I ran to it, I was number seven. I called Chef to come, as I was definitely in a shorter line. With the Albanian couple, a blond girl from Belarus was trailing with them. She spoke very little English, but spoke Italian, aside from her native Russian. Ok. So they cut in line behind me. Oh well right. I felt my luck finally ran out when we were unfortunate enough to get this Russian attendant who was a complete ass. First, he called blondie, spoke to her in Russian, and told her to move aside. To me/Chef, he was saying that the earliest flight is Wednesday. There’s a flight from Charlotte, but he can’t get us to Charlotte. We said, hang on, let us think. He kept saying no, take it or leave it because you have no choice. So he said, he booked us to the one leaving on Tuesday from PHL. For our Albanian friends, they need to leave on Wednesday. Then, he said he’s done with us. He took blondie. Effing a-hole spent an hour and a half finding a flight for her to get her to her destination on Monday. Then, he closed his station, they left together. Freaking slut.

Meanwhile, while it was annoying the heck out of everyone that he was helping blondie, I called Expedia. I felt I still had other resources. That’s when we learned that the effing a-hole actually rebooked us to the flight from Charlotte to
Rome, but did not give us a flight from PHL to Charlotte! Ugh!!! I was pissed. While I was on the phone with Expedia, who was talking to US Airways, I decided to use Chef’s phone to call US Airways myself, in my mind, anything to increase our chances of getting through, right? At the same time, Chef went to another employee, demanded for a supervisor, because effing a-hole is a slut and we want to receive the same service blondie got, exhausting all of the airlines’ resources, without having to do whatever the hell effing a-hole asked blondie in exchange. Thankfully, luck was on our side again. The US Airways employee was able to rebook us from Rome to FCO on Tuesday. At the same time, Chef was able to get us on the
waitlist to leave on Monday.

Now all we needed was a hotel. Every hotel in the area was booked. Except for the Hilton. A double queen. Perfect. It’s good that we’re fine sharing the room with total strangers. The way I see it, they were destined to find us. We might as well help them through and through. For as long as I can remember, I always carry extra clothes in my carry-on, for the ”just in case” situation that up until now never happened. I was so glad I was prepared. Not only did I have clean underwear, I also
had everything I needed for my daily and nightly regimen in little containers, you know, just in case. So, after a long long long day, I got a good shower. Chef showered too. But let’s just say he had to be resourceful in a different way, if you know what I mean.

This morning, after a good night’s rest, we made our way back to the airport to take our chances with our standby ticket. We were in line to push to get final seats. Randomly, I tried to call US Airways again. It was a blessing. The lady got us seats. And, I was able to get seats for our Albanian friends too. I said to the lady on the phone I’m sending her good vibes all day as she was truly an angel. Thankfully, with the probably 5 hours of customer service I had to deal with (US Airways and Expedia), all our communications went relatively well. Now, we got seats. We are waiting to board. Relatively, all has been well. We are safe. No one has had a meltdown. We loved seeing some snow. But, Chef and I said that our next trip should be quite different, perhaps some Greek holidays to Santorini or a trip to the Caribbean. Just not to deal with the weather being so bad that airports are shut down. It truly is an experience. But, right now, I am just hoping this plane leaves.