Tough lessons Gentle Reminders

 It has been 8 months since my last blog post and this one is about travel again. But it is in a very different tone from the last.

Those that follow me on Social media would have seen my post about the Lufthansa shenanigans due to a system error.

Long story short, they refused to let me board despite me having a valid travel authorisation for Canada, claimed the Canadian government site to check validity was down, and refused to accept they were wrong because I was able to check validity online and show them that the site was up. Top it up with absolute apathy from some of the desk staff, it was not a pleasant experience at all. 

The result was an almost 8 hour layover in Frankfurt, with a flight to Toronto instead of Montreal and a connecting flight to Montreal that landed at half past twelve in the night ! The same travel documents that were not acceptable suddenly became acceptable by magic! And it doesn't end there.

I got on board the flight to Toronto and was about to slip into an exhausted sleep when a loud scream pierced the cabin! There was a woman screaming "get offa me..Get OFFA me" repeatedly and I jumped up and sat with my heart pounding. Were we being hijacked? Were we under attack? My sleep deprived brain struggled to comprehend the situation as she continued screaming. I then heard one of the cabin crew yelling "calm down . Calm DOWN!" and then "if you do not get up , I am going to restrain your legs. YOUR CHOICE" 

What I could eventually piece together was that it was a passenger and she had needed to be restrained for some reason. I spent the remaining part of the flight nervously bracing myself for her to break her restraints and come charging. We landed in Toronto and had to wait for her to be taken away by the authorities before we could deplane and I wondered if that meant I was going to miss the connection to Montreal. 

Of course all of us were rubber necking! Trying to see who it was that had caused such a commotion. I was miffed when the man behind me stood up to get a better look at what was happening and completely blocked my view! But even I draw the line at blatantly gawking at someone's misery and so I decided to grab the remnants of my dignity and pulled myself together to focus on making  the connecting flight. Which I did. 

A last minute gate change later, a delay, an aero bridge refusing to connect to the plane, here I am in Montreal Airport in the dead of the night. 

Since I was taking the train to Ottawa which I missed because of Lufthansa, I am now typing this as I wait out the 6  hours for my train.

Around me are weary travelers - and I seem to be the only one active and alert. Maybe because of the packet of chips and bar of dark chocolate that I have devoured :) Or maybe because I had been trained over the past 24 hours to expect something or the other to go wrong. So, I kept moving and stretching and doing light mobility moves.

At one point, I was sitting on a bench leaning back and doing some core exercises. And before you ask me, No I don't care what people think of a woman doing ab workouts at 2 am in the morning in a deserted airport. 

A border control agent walking past me, stopped and exclaimed "Oh my! you are strong!" I grinned at her and said "Just trying to keep myself awake" She raised her eyebrows and said "I want to stay awake I have coffee. But you are really strong" she gave me a thumbs up sign as she walked away and I felt a warmth seep into me. A compliment from a random stranger again brought back the same message I had been receiving repeatedly throughout this jinxed journey.

I thought of the staff from Air Canada in Frankfurt - one who took me to the Lufthansa desk to help and the other at the Air Canada lounge.

Jessica said "I appreciate how calm you were through out the process". She had said that just as I was about to burst into tears out of sheer frustration at the way Lufthansa staff were treating me. One minute  later and  I would have been bawling my eyes out and  that compliment probably would not have come my way. :) 

When again 5 hours of waiting later,  the Lufthansa system acted funny and the lady at the Air Canada lounge started making calls to help me out. It got sorted and I was about to burst into tears out of relief again, she reached out to hold both my hands and said "look at me , you are healthy and you are fine. You have your ticket, yes there is a delay but you are fine" In  a flash, my attack of the sniffles vanished. And almost immediately I was smiling and joking again with her. 

And now this customs agent reminding me that I was strong.

I love these incidents for one thing. We may say many things, share our approach and philosophy and they might be very good ones that have worked for us in the past. But every now and then we tend to forget our our own lessons. In these three incidents was the gentle reminder of my own note to self...remember I say "when things are going wrong, don't forget that other things are going right"

You need to have the reserve to bounce back - which I do. But I can always do with some help at the right moment.

I think it was these three women who shored up my strength. Who reminded me of my own Note to Self. 

Sometimes it is good to be reminded about what you already know.