Moving Right Along....Ah No

It is now Tuesday afternoon here in Lovely Luton.  The skies are still dreary and it’s cold, but the good news is that I keep hearing planes take off.  When I go on the website for Luton Airport I see most planes are leaving and those that are delayed are delayed by a quarter hour.  My spirits soar.

I realized as I hurried down the path for breakfast today that I was ecstatic I was going to be able to eat 3 meals today, if I wanted to.  They are actually quite cordial at the Beefeater Lounge and Restaurant. They smile, they bring you what you want, and they actually are open when I need them. And they make a killer treacle pudding.

I continue to be more fortunate than most. British Air once again today cancelled all it’s short haul flights. The T.V reports are now scathing and calling for heads to roll. It seems that in their infinite wisdom British Air Authorities (not to be confused with British Air, although I think that’s a lie) grounded all planes on Saturday not thinking about how they would clean the runway with all the planes parked there.

So there is this horrific mess of planes with tons of frozen snow under them that they can’t move. Add to that the general disarray, lack of snow plows (they have half as many as Gatwick which only has 1 runway) and the utter incompetence of planning by any of the officials and you have one very angry mob.

The other really fascinating and maddening thing is the websites for flights out. Heathrow, in their infinite wisdom, has posted the flights out (mostly to Helsinki, Sweden and parts of the U.S.). If your flight is not “scheduled”, that means you are sol. They say contact the airlines, but that’s a joke. You can’t contact the airlines here. What I figured out is to Skype them in the U.S and wait the required hour for them to tell you that it’s tough luck and they are going to do nada (see I have a Spanish word in my vocab in case I get there) That is making people angry with a white hot rage that alone would melt the runways if they let them out there.

I am hoping my ability to give up and not press on when it looks like folly will pay off tomorrow and I will get out of here. I bailed on Heathrow yesterday and paid Dear Spencer the cabdriver $300 to get to Lovely Luton There is more snow predicted (about 4 inches) but rumor has it that it will stop by morning and my flight is out at night.

Ok I just had to post this one as well. It also reminds me of the attitude of the Government and the airlines in this situation. And I guess you could say they were caught with their pants down...oops missing.

Keep your fingers crossed. And if you’re not totally bored check in again.

Keep the faith y’all

Sittn in My La La Waitn for My Ya Ya....

Christmas in Madrid, a lovely sounding time yes? No. I vowed long ago never to fly during the Christmas season. A white Christmas means that it is either snowing, about to snow or we’re digging out.  These things in Boston may mean the airport is shut for a day or so, but in London it is a disaster.

As I boarded my flight to Heathrow on Friday, the ticket agent could not give me my seat assignment from Heathrow to Madrid. I didn’t think anything of it, ha ha! Something should have warned me that I had my seat assignments for the rest of my trip including the seats from Madrid to NYC and Boston. Never dawned on me that they were messing with me.

Arrival at the grueling hour of 6:30A was not a big deal for me. I have flown into Heathrow many times before. I knew the drill. I checked into BA got my seat assignment and settled into a good movie. Ooops it’s snowing, oh well no big deal, it was the fluffy white stuff, nothing serious. Then all hell broke loose, I got to the gate and they denied me access. Seems the airport had shut down and all I could do is wave goodbye to my flight to Madrid. And that was the end of all flying for Saturday.

If one watches British T.V, or follows the monarchy one thinks of the Brits with excellent manners. Talk about lying in the media. Things at Heathrow deteriorated very rapidly; BA ran away from their desks and hid. No one would tell us anything. Ah thank heavens for the massive display of electronics I carry with me at all times. That and credit cards which I have no problem using when hooking to my IV line of wifi. Boingo I love you! I was soon on all the major sites. Then I realized the way to solve this problem was not going to happen at the airport. Thank heavens I gave up by noon and went off to find a hotel. There were thousands stranded there last night sleeping with thermal blankets and NO TOILET PAPER in the loo! (to say nothing of no food, water or other essentials)

I got a hotel about 15 minutes on a good day from the airport.  The taxi driver relished telling me of the horrors yet to come because of the drive, the inability of the authorities to take care of the runways and generally implying that not only might I never get to Spain but that there was a good likelihood as a result of this trip I may just have to become a British citizen.

BA is picking up the tab for my staying at this dump, and Betty, it is indeed a dump replete a veritable UN of disgruntled people begging to pay the $200 to get a room. Ah the Internet. Yee Haw! I queued up to sign in and was ensconced in my room by 2ish. However I had not eaten which has continued to be a problem here in Felltham.

Quickly I figured out the way to get out of here was to Skype American Airlines in the U.S. Over here it is the inmates have taken over the entire city and there isn’t a drop of haldol in sight. After an hour I got through and got a reservation for Sunday.

The Fascist Major Domo at the restaurant refused to give me anything to eat because it wasn’t time yet. Thank heavens I was carrying contraband cheddar cheese for my daughter, which I swiftly broke into. My stomach howled until 6:30P when they opened for dinner. Along with other stragglers I made my way to the restaurant only to be asked if I had a reservation. Are you kidding? I was just here 4 hours ago and you said to come back at 6:30P, no mention of a reservation. However some very nice Finnish people with their baby (who had come in from Uganda) asked me to sit at their table while I watched their daughter Annabelle play with a wind up butterfly and slurp plain pasta. Yes it is an Italian restaurant, but they were out of almost everything.

I rose early this morning since I did have a confirmed reservation to Madrid. Ahhhh, no. Airport was totally shut. That’s how I met Christie  (from North Dakota) husband Andy (from Spain) and the mother in law who was suffering from advanced stages of Alzheimer’s. They were stuck here and mom was having a hard time and kept wandering the halls asking people if they had seen her dog. Christie and Andy were worried that it was so hard on her and I flipped back that even if it was she wouldn’t remember. Her dog died 15 years ago. They had come in from Texas and were totally bent out of shape. Seems they had gone to the airport and were flagged away. They weren’t letting anyone in or out of the airport. OMG it’s getting to be like a Hitchcock movie.

She couldn’t figure out how to get on the internet (that’s because if you didn’t buy it at the airport you couldn’t sign on here. )Too much of an overload. Of course, somewhere I remember dialup Internet don’t I????

So the fam tramped up to my room and used Skype. Continental basically told them to fart in the wind. They then tried BA but they weren’t answering their phones here or stateside.  Iberia had gone into hiding and only Alitalia, which was of no use, even answered the phone. So I called American for them but after an hour on hold they said whatever Continental said they agreed. They left my room. They were supposed to pick me up for dinner (to avoid the Fascist downstairs another night) but I haven’t seen them since.

Not having learned my lesson, (though I did make a reservation) I ambled down to the restaurant where Mussolini was ignoring everyone in line. Finally I told him I’d do take away and he then reviewed all the things they didn’t have. However there was a guy trying to get to Helsinki who had an IPad and said there was a Chinese place across the street that he had eaten at last night. So I booked it across the street to the nastiest Chinese takeout place I’ve ever seen. Makes my local dive look like a palace.  It was run by a Chinese Brit but it bore no resemblance to Chinese food I have eaten before. What I’m eating Chinese take out in a suburb of London while praying that tomorrow I can get the 6P plane to Barcelona, stay over night there and take the bullet train to Madrid on Tuesday.

At least from my window I can now hear a plane taking off. Although the Chinese Brit did relish telling me that when it happened here last Feb. people were stuck for a week.

  

Yes Virginia

Hopefully most of you know about the little girl who wrote to a newspaper asking if Santa was real. I believe it was the New York Times. She did receive a beautiful letter back saying "Yes Virginia there is a Santa Claus".

I am returning home to Kenya in 6 weeks. Monica and I finally got to talk. It’s always a challenge and today was no different. We wanted to Skype, and we did try, but her connection just didn’t work. However technology being what it is, I was able to Skype to her mobile phone. You really have to be patient, creative and try many things before something works. It took us 3 days to connect. That’s hard for people here to wrap their heads around. However it has made me a much more mellow old lady.

Much to my delight the reports from 2 of our schools were fantastic. The villagers are so serious about the micro-finance that they hired a debt collector to get money from those who don’t pay back in time. Seems the Iron Lady of Malanga has her hands full managing 129 different groups and said she would not track people down. So the villagers took matters into their own hands and hired some muscle. You can’t imagine how amazing that is. I feel like Sally Fields, they get it they really get it.

I sent the board the good news about the schools, the proposed new school. I do believe I have told you that I have the greatest Board of Directors ever, right? Keep reading to understand the insertion of this paragraph.

The not so fun part of this job is the very difficult decisions I have to make. We dropped a school because it just wasn’t performing, and I know those kids will go hungry. But we are adamant that people learn to fish, not just eat them.

We use something called Mission Air Packs which are sponsored by the drug companies. It allows non-profits like ours to bring much needed supplies over to third world countries. I had my list out while Monica and I were talking. We were trying to decide which they needed more. Hmmm-prenatal vitamins or children’s antibiotics? Stethoscopes or suture kits? Anti-fungal or anti-diarrheals? And the otoscopes were simply out of the question. I told Monica to send me a wish list and I would see what we could do about the extra supplies.

Ok ready? While I’m suffering over this list I get an email from our chairman for fundraising. She writes me and tells me that the gentleman at the next desk just wrote out a check for $500! Well gang that covers everything. So for once no hard medical decisions and my Christmas Miracle was made.

What I know is that opportunity happens in the now. And God really does listen. And sometimes when you’re about to loose it, just what you needed comes through. It is faith, dear readers, and I strongly recommend you aim in that direction. You never know what opportunity or miracle is waiting for you.