Cannot Airways!

This latest posting, I apologise to all quiz entrants, is not the second part of the results, but an article on the latest developments. I am now sitting in seat 10F of an MD-11 (that’s a plane) that just left out of Dar Es Salaam on its way to Amsterdam. Nothing strange about that, you would think. Well, think again! My ticket says Maputo-Nairobi with Kenya Airways followed by Nairobi-Amsterdam with KLM. So what am I doing in an Amsterdam bound flight out of Tanzania? Let’s go back in time… (fuzzy image, fade out)

The days started fine. The alarm clock (well, actually the automated hotel wake up call that goes something like “good mooning! theez eez yo wakup col’ followed by music even an elevator would not dare to play) went at the planned time of 07:00 hrs. As my mini-break started the night before with some 12/M’s (the beer’s called 2/M, but I think I had six or so) I wasn’t entirely fresh but hey! It’s a holiday! After taking a shower I dropped some of my clothes in a colleagues room as I don’t want to go back and forth with all this stuff I don’t need in Holland anyway. I went down for breakfast and took my time. Some nice sunny-side-up fried eggs followed by a fresh fruits salad. I was feeling better already! The hotel-airport transfer was arranged for 09:20 and was very much on time. In Maputo the protocol is to be at the airport 2 hours before departure and the hotel adds another 30 minutes to that. They say it’s to be on the safe side, even though the biggest traffic jam I’ve seen in these three months was the line of 7 cars waiting on the Macaneta ferry (see one of the first articles on this blog).

Before checking in, the suitcase is scanned and some dude takes it out of the scanner and rolls your suitcase to the check-in line some 3 meters further away. This amazing piece of service sets you back a few Meticais, but… what the h! I’m in a good mood. Checking in went smoothly and then comes the long wait for my first flight. During this entire wait you ask yourself: why again did I show up this early? Luckily, the KQ (that is how every African calls Kenya Airways) flight arrived on time and we boarded. Then the first delay started. Some passenger was late. We wait and wait and finally a rasta dude shows up accompanied by two very official looking Brits. Official as in security officials. Later I hear this guy went to England, was refused entrance there and was escorted back to Mozambique by British immigration officials. Now he was back in a plane to return to England once again (via Nairobi) as Mozambique refused him too, as it was not possible to establish his nationality. When asked he would answer ‘I’m a citizen of the world!”.

So finally we departed out of Maputo with about an hours delay. No problem! I had more than 4 hours wait at Nairobi anyway so what could go wrong? The flight to Nairobi made one stop at Harare. That is in Zimbabwe, which as you might know is ruled by president Mugabe. This is the president that a few years back repossessed all farms from white farmers which was quite a bloody mess. One of his latest ploys is to not allow companies with majority foreign ownership So yes, foreign investors are running. Logical result: the economy of Zim (as everybody around here calls it) is collapsing.

So we’re there in Harare and looking out the window, I see a fuel truck next to the plane and 6 guys (!) involved. I remember wondering why you needed 6 guys to fuel a plane. A few minutes later I found out what was really going on. The 6 guys were there discussing the amount of fuel. It turns out that due to the collapse of the local economy there are fuel shortages and Mugabe had decided to ration fuel distribution. Even for regular scheduled flights! Like a plane is supposed to cover the same distance with less fuel! Not his problem!

So the KQ captain came up with a new plan. He had enough fuel to fly to Dar Es Salaam. There we would refuel and continue our journey to Nairobi. Total additional time? Less than an hour. I was still looking good. Still two hours to switch planes in Kenya. Should be enough, even for my suitcase.

Just before landing in Tanzania, the purser starts collecting all the head phones. I ask him why, as we still had the last leg to Nairobi ahead of us. His answer: “the captain wants us to”. This is where I started getting a little bit suspicious. We landed (actually bounced) in Tanzania, taxied to the gate and then it became very quiet. Looking out the window, no fuel truck. Also no announcements by the captain. Everybody just looking at each other with question marks on their foreheads. Finally the captain gets on the mic and starts his sentence with ‘Unfortunately…”. Noooooooooooooo, I had heard that word so often already on this flight! Unfortunately the crew was out of their hours, meaning they had flown up to the allowed legal limit and where therefore not allowed to fly us to Nairobi.

Of course, there’s no crew readily available in Dar Es Salaam. They have to be flown in from Nairobi. And it was expected that they would arrive in 3 to 4 hours time. Bye bye KLM connection in Nairobi! At that moment I knew I would spend 5 hours waiting on the airport in Tanzania, go to Nairobi, get into an airport hotel booked by the airline and pray they can rebook me on the morning KQ flight or on the next KLM flight (which would be 24 hours later).

Of course the captain apologised and promised we would be well fed and telephone services would be made available to contact my loved ones (that’s all of you of course). So after 30 minutes waiting in the plane, we were led to a closed section of the airport restaurant where a buffet was looking eager to be eaten. One problem: there was absolutely no one from the airline or even from the airport available. The transfer desk people probably expected to be bombarded with questions and fled. The KQ people obviously thought that attending to their stranded customers was not a priority. And the phones? Yeah right!

After a few minutes of looking around I noticed a departures screen which said that there would be a KLM flight from Kilimanjaro, passing by Dar Es Salaam on its way to Amsterdam. This is when the big search started. Forget searching for Easter eggs, finding your ideal job or even the love of your life. Finding a KLM, KQ or Transfer Desk staff member on Dar Es Salaam airport is the real challenge! There we were, me and 3 girls who were also booked on my flights, running from left to right, stopping every person wearing a uniform to ask if they were or knew anyone from those companies. Everybody was very sympathetic. When we asked them if they could contact someone to come and talk to us they all answered ‘Yes, we understand. Yes’ and went on with their whatever-they-were-doing.

So we decided to risk it and enter the country, meaning, we passed immigration to try to find the KLM check-in counter. That could potentially mean, filling in forms, paying for a visa and be subject to airport tax again. One of the girls charmed the immigration officer to let us through without all that hassle. You should’ve seen the dude. He was eating out of her hand. Okay, she was cute, but still… He took our passports hostage and we were on our way to the desk. There our hope quickly vanished. The desk head didn’t look eager to help us and stated repeatedly that they were overbooked and we should not expect anything. We went back, got our passports again from the love puppy and were ready to surrender.

That is when Mister Karanja appeared! I call him Mister with a capital M, because he is THE MAN! There was still not a single KQ guy attending to the passenger, but Mister K, actually working for KLM, decided to attend to these poor people. And he didn’t have to, as it was a KQ problem. After patiently having talked to everyone it was our turn. We explained the situation and how we would really like to be transferred to this KLM flight from the Nairobi one, if he had seats available of course. He said ‘Yes, I understand. Yes’ and went on. For a few minutes we sank back in our chairs not expecting much from it, but no. Is it a bird? A plane? No! It’s Mister K! And he wanted my luggage tag! That was not yet the same as receiving a boarding pass, but very close to it!

The sad part (well, to be honest, not for me), he only asked for my luggage tag. And yes, an hour later he returned once again with a boarding pass for me, but not for the girls, as he had only one available seat. Being the total gentleman that I am, I properly said my goodbyes and rushed off for the gate! Vamos emborra! So, after yet again an eventful set of flights, I was finally on board a plane going to Amsterdam and the arrival time was only 90 minutes later than my original flight from Nairobi.

(This last part is written while on the Schiphol train to Utrecht)

Needless to say, my suitcase did not make it yet again. I guess it is in Nairobi. Either my suitcase really loves Nairobi or KQ can just not say goodbye to it. I have now flown KQ twice and both times I arrived without my precious box of - now dirty - clothes. Oh well, I guess KLM will just have to drop it at my doorstep somewhere in the next few days.