I will not bore you with the details of my very ordinary day up until 4 pm. It was lovely, my grandparents were adorable, the food was great and life was easy.
What happened after that moment will now forever be imprinted in my memory as #AlitaliaMeltdown and/or #Doomsday.
It started out quite innocently with slight delays all round, the subway, the airport shuttle bus, the check in desk officer. It then continued with my flight being delayed a full 1 hour with the additional 10 minutes of boarding and departing. My connection was leaving from Rome an hour and 15 minutes after I was supposed to arrive, on time that is and not 1 hour 10 minutes late.
I kept insisting that they inform ground as soon as we land that there are passengers that need to catch the connection, that we are to disembark in the order of our necessity since tgere were several other passengers in my situation, that they should at least inform us how we should proceed before landing. My, I believe logical and reasonable, demands were utterly ignored.
We landed, went through luggage control (as though one could acquire a mass distruction weapon midair and use it against the grand, the enviable, the majestic Fiumicino International Airport; all of this neatly tucked in a pint sized hand luggage next to the spare underwear and the vacation postcards), went through passport control (again, as though one could have a full makeover midair....hmmm that could be selling point Alitalia - I can see the billboard "Fly with Alitalia, you will land a different person thanks to our onboard makeover offer!") and finally wait for the blissful bus ride I mentioned on the first post about the #TheGreatRomanianAdventure that now felt like the ride from hell times 2.
Needless to say, I lost my connection.
Now, at this point, one would think my day had been bad enough and that I would finally get a break.
No.
That didn't happen. Instead what did happen was I asked for my luggage to be delivered at arrivals, had confirmation this will happen within 45 minutes, waited 1 hour and 5 minutes for it while having a meltdown on Twitter, only to discover some imbecile, moron, no good Alitalia something had already, unbeknownst to me, booked me on today's first flight to my destination, blocking my luggage as a consequence.
Believe me, I can get angry and I can calm, I have unfortunately had to weather terrible situation and have therefore acquired a sort of calm yet malicious attitude that can get me through rough times. This isn't what happened yesterday evening. I was beyond myself, I I was ready to chomp somebody's head off, precisely the head of the aforementioned moron if only graciously pointed in his/her direction. I had been idling around Fiumicino for about 2 hours before they finally informed me there was nothing they could do for me until tomorrow and that I best proceed to the Ticket Office where they could help me with my ticket and maybe a hotel. Maybe?!?!!
I think the "I'm ready to strangle someone with my bare hands" face ensured I "only" had to wait an extra 35 minutes before receiving a hotel reservation, a thousand unnecessary and unwanted apologies and reassurance everything will be fine the day after.
It took an extra 45 minutes to get to the hotel, the Hilton Garden Inn thank goodness, time I spent chitchating with the bus driver, a true Roman that had a husky voice and a very opinionated mind.
"We're making perfect fools of ourselves and showing the world the worst of Rome. I truly am sorry you had such an awful time here." Ha, the voice of reason resonates where you'd least expect it. I appreciated his apology far more than the fake, rehearsed, disinterested Alitalia one.
I managed to go to bed at 1:30. A full 4 hours and 15 minutes after landing.
Things I could done in that time?
- drove to my house. slowly.
- drove to my house and had dinner and a shower
- caught a bus and gone to my mothers, had dinner
- learnt how to fly a freakin' plane and flown myself home?
- had dinner at hotel and slept more
- killed an Alitalia someone and been arrested
- caught my connection and be now blogging about how efficient Alitalia was
I am now sitting at the gate of my stupid, late, unwanted flight, hoping my hijacked luggage will follow me and that this day, the last #TheGreatRomanianAdventure day will finally be over.
Kiss and Peace
Miss Sinister
