Scams and Pseudo Flights

**continued from my flight yesterday**

So remember how I said that I had to transfer to Gatwick? Well, my connecting plane to Pristina departs at 10:10am. We were supposed to land in Heathrow at 5:45am. Here’s what basically happened:

We land at 8:00am, we deboard at 8:30am. We conveniently landed at the furthest gate from customs. Several casualties ensued in the massive desperate stampede through the airport.  We reach a crossroads: connecting flights to the left, arrivals the right. I glance at my watch. 8:45am. Do I try to make the transfer with the hour long 80 pound taxi ride? Maybe I can sprint through security at Gatwick…

I make a split-sec decision and decide instead to go to the British Airways desk in Terminal 3 instead. Oh guess what? The only flight to Pristina departs on Monday (two days later). And you know what’s even better news? This flight was a separate ticket, so they can’t get me a new one. The woman looked at me and suggested running and praying for a delay.

9:00am. One hour til departure. 150 people ahead of me in the customs line. 9:30am. The customs agent laughed when he saw my ticket. ‘Enjoy London,’ he said. 9:45am I arrive at the exit of Heathrow. Depressingly, I glance at the sky, bemoaning my fate.

Thus begins the epic search for a new ticket, departing today. An Expedia search showed one result. For $948. Strange stares from passerby accompanied my wail of despair. All my other go-to cheap flight sites wouldn't sell tickets for non-US related flights.  British sites ranged in the 500 pound price range. Stupid exchange rate.

Finally I found a Spanish site selling a flight for 267 euros. I peruse the site and it seems pretty legit. I snag the ticket and receive a confirmation email in the mail saying that they’ll send the ticket number once the credit card is confirmed.  Relieved, I head back to Terminal 1 in Heathrow to chill in a coffee shop and await my new flight at 8pm.

Four hours later, I begin panicking. I still haven’t received my confirmation email. It’s four hours til my plane departs. I send panicked emails to my parents asking if they can call the company (as I don’t have a phone). Three hours to go. I really start panicking. I send emails to the company and they ask me to resend my credit card info.  Oh yeah. Right. Not. I Google the company. On the second page, I find a random blogpost saying “DON'T BUY FROM THIS COMPANY.” Uh ohhhh.

I then furiously Facebook Chat my brother, and together with my dad, and with much confusion, we manage to finally get the charges cancelled off my card. Refusing to be scammed again, I go directly to the Swiss Air website (which was the only airline operating a flight that arrived earlier than Monday) and purchase a new one.

Random fact: a one-way ticket, connecting in Zurich, costs $832. A round trip ticket, also connecting in Zurich, costs $425. So on that note, if anyone is going to be in Pristina and wants to head to either Zurich or London on Friday, June 24th….bidding starts at one bottle of shampoo.

So whew. Finally. 2 hours before departure, I successfully purchase a new ticket. All is well with the world.

The flight to Zurich is uneventful. I sleep through dinner. THIS IS DEVASTING. There is nothing sadder than waking up mid-flight and seeing everyone else with the remnants of food on their tray table. Sure it was probably some really bad mini-sandwich, but that was supposed to be MY really bad mini-sandwich. And I hadn’t eaten since New York =(. I get irrationally bummed and stare out the window.

Upon arriving in Zurich around midnight, I follow the crowds looking for a place to camp out for the night, since my flight to Pristina doesn’t leave til 7am. I see nothing. I arrive at customs. Uh oh. A midnight jaunt around Switzerland might not be the best idea at the moment.

A sign for connecting flights points straight ahead so I head that direction. Everyone stares at me. I staunchly ignore them, pretending I know what I’m doing. No one else is heading my direction. There are no corners for me to hide behind. I keep walking, conscious of the stares on my back. I get to the end of the hall and the doors are locked. Ah shit. Now what.

Unable to turn around and face my stupidity, I turn left instead and go downstairs to the inner terminal transportation train. Which aren’t running, of course. Laugh what you will, but it has never occurred to me that airports shut down for the night. Because I’m weak, I hide behind a pillar to avoid embarrassment, waiting until the customs line dies down to rejoin everyone else. I get to the ticket counter and the lady is like ‘you know we have a dayroom, right?’ Actually, I have no idea what a dayroom is, but it sounds better than wandering the streets of Zurich.

The lady points me back the direction that I came, and I embark on a long twisted hunt for the elusive dayroom. Small twisted corridors, up broken escalators and finally I find it! Yayyy. It's a place where you can buy beds for the night, but pshhh. I’ll take this perfectly good bench fo’ free.

I actually end up working on my blog design all night, but theoretically I would be sleeping about now, so I’m gunna go ahead and call it a night. See ya tomorrow!