Like any other first-time-to-California lad, I was also very excited to finally go to San Francisco, the city I dreamed of visiting for over eight years now! So, Finally I saved up the money and find out that my cousins also invited me there over the winter break and I decided to go there. I booked a ticket with Continental Airlines. Now as you all know there is nothing interesting about getting to San Francisco and it’s all fun only after you get there! You may be right for the most part! Well, I live at College Station, Texas and my flight leaves from Houston. All I had to do was to book a taxi or a shuttle service to the airport. Leave it to me to be ignorant till a week before travel. Finally when I checked the availability of Shuttle service; Surprisingly, there were no seats available! Now, the obvious option is to rent a car and go to Houston Airport and it’s so simple. Except it was not! Did I make it to the departure at the right time? Did I go to San Francisco the same day? What ever happened of me? Where was I when I wrote this blog? Read on to find out!
My flight to SFO leaves by 7:25PM on the 23rd of December 2009. It’s the Sunday (20th) and I ask around if I can tag along with someone to go to Houston’s Bush Intercontinental Airport. I find a friend who leaves to San Diego on the same day by 3:00PM departure time and was also searching for a ride to the Airport from College Station. So, we decided to share the expenses and asked a common friend to rent a car and take us there. Everything is fine, we ask a couple more friends to join in because it will be a boring drive back to College Station for the friend who dropped my friend and me off. So, it’s five of us, off to Houston with my friend who had to be dropped off by 1:00PM for his 3:00PM flight and me by 6:30PM for my 7:25PM flight. We are all set and it’s the 23rd and the one driving us there, rent the car for us and we are all set to start by 10:00AM. The usually lazy me packed and cleaned my stuff up only on the “day” and somehow we ended up leaving late by 11:30AM! Before that my friend who rented the car ran into a small misfortune and he was caught speeding just 10MPH over the speed limit and fined a $230 USD!!! Yeah right! And he was freaked out even before we started! Now what do you think happened on the way?
Well, I had the GPS with me and I operated it to the best of my abilities and helped get my friend to the airport by 1:45PM for his 3:00PM flight of course with a lot of trouble when we took exits and entries to freeways that we shouldn't have in the 1st place and we thought it was all a part of the game and got there. Now, that we dropped him off, we had about 5 hours to kill before our next trip back to the airport to drop me off. We decided to have some really good vegetarian food and then head to Pearland, Texas to a temple and finally get back to the Airport. Sounds simple right? As usual it’s not! The Restaurant we chose, Bhojan (an authentic Gujarati unlimited buffet) was about 30 miles away and we got there without commotion; thanks to my GPS navigating skills I mastered! With good food there, next was the temple that’s another 27 miles away! We got there with no so many commotions but late. We spent a lot of time there (mostly fooling around) and left really late like about 5:30PM (Flight Time: 7:25PM). U may think at this point, everything is going on well; there is hardly anything to make up as a story, but why muse on? Still, my question is, did I get to SFO on the same day?
My friend, who was driving the car, felt, I had the GPS all day and I was doing a good job navigating. Now that I’d be dropped off at the Airport, he wanted another good navigator by his side on his return back to College Station. He asked another friend to navigate from the start. I was ok with it and he entered the address and the route mapped out. We are like “Let’s go!”. I was still in the front seat and then the so called ‘misadventures’ start! My friend who is a 1st time navigator had some difficulties and then I took over the GPS and continued on the route because we were getting frustratingly late. For about half an hour we kept travelling on back roads filled with frigging signal lights! I was getting irritated that we kept crossing freeways and never got on it! The time was 6:00PM. My boarding time was 6:50PM, and for heaven’s sake I did not want to be late! At that time, adrenaline levels started rising. Adding to that, my friend driving was very cautious not to commit another error given the bounty on him in the morning! There it was! I was stuck in the middle of Houston with 25 miles to go for the airport and we were getting nowhere and were driving inevitably in circles with the raving mad traffic of the city! It struck me, what the hell is the GPS doing? I ask my so-called co-navigator, what did he map the route to? I always ask it for the fastest route to the destination and it usually takes freeways. And for God-Knows-What reason, he chose the shortest distance! That made me MAD! And I reconfigured the GPS to fastest route by 6:20PM and by the time we could recover, we were lost far in the city! I was freaking out. The speed at which we were travelling was faster than the speed at which the GPS was rerouting because by the time a new route is made we would have gone straight on a signal where it would then ask us to turn right! Oh God we were in trouble! Time’s ticking away and it was 6:30PM. We were still nowhere near the Interstate 45 that takes me to the Airport! We go to the Interstate-610 Loop (freeway) and decide to get to the I-45. By the time we got to the I-45, it was 6:40PM and I was sure it was neck and neck. I was calling up my cousin at SFO to check for flight status and try to calculate if I can make it or not! He said as long as I had checked in, and had the boarding pass, I can just go in straight to the gate, and he also told me the gate number was E10. I was thankful, when I get there, I’ll get my bags an simply run because I had already checked in and had my boarding pass! I put my phone down, freak out that its getting late beyond recall and ask my friend to speed up. While we were switching lanes, Wham! And OH MY GOD!
A truck side swiped us and broke our rear view mirror too. I thought it was over and the day is finished! He pulled up to the side of I-45 and so did my friend. A Sherriff’s car pulled over too and a very friendly officer stepped out. I was the 1st one out of the car and ran between both the cars trying to find out if it was fine if we just went on! I had no idea that to get the insurance claimed on our car we needed insurance and other info of the other driver. My friend on the other hand was bent on settling the issue with the other truck driver and getting an accident report from the officer! I was boiling and pacing helplessly on the shoulder of Interstate 45 where cars were doing 60MPH just a few feet away from me! Everyone were jus there in their own cars doing nothing! I went upto the officer and he brought up a solution that we can exchange insurance information and then simply just drive off! I liked the idea and we got on to it. Meanwhile I was on the phone with my cousin at SFO telling him this and he said there is always another option that will be available from Continental Airlines should I miss this flight! Furious, irritated and helpless, I simply waited for the insanity to be over. Then we were set to go with the GPS showing 15 miles left to the airport and the time was 7:05PM! That is right! 7:05PM (Flight Departure: 7:25PM)! Then there is the next issue, my friend driving has had incidents after incidents all day and he’s in total pressure! This fact made me fear for the worse on the roads! I had to let go of my belief that I would make it to airport and to the departure gate of my flight to SFO. I asked him to concentrate and told him there was a backup flight (when in reality there was not!) Meanwhile, I got updates that there were alternate flights by 9:00PM but knew they would be full. That didn’t take the pressure off me one bit, but I quacked it! We were almost there where we had to take a single exit to finally get on to Beltway 8 freeway leading to Airport and guess what? We missed that exit too! Drama after Drama! What on earth is wrong with my day! Then I rerouted and the GPS adds 4 miles more from 8 to 12! I got an update that the flight is delayed 10 mins to 7:45PM and the time was 7:25PM. It’s a bloody race against time! We got to the airport entrance by 7:30PM and i sat restlessly as we went around the long sweeping corners. The feeling of "I want to make it to the flight hoping its delayed more" Vs. "Who gives a damn" was going on in my head! Finally we went to our terminal and there were these signs: “Terminal C arrivals in right lane and Departures in the left lane”. At last, I was at least breathing, though it was way over the departure time by 5 mins! Then we miss departures and head towards arrivals in the ground floor by missing another road exit! Its a perfectly fitting example of Murphy's law: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong". The time is 7:35PM. Delayed flight is scheduled for 7:40PM. Did I make it to the flight with the crowd, security checks and the fact I’m at arrivals and I have to find gate E10 from there?
I know this getting juicer than one can put it, but as you see something gets delayed! I grab my bags and run into arrivals section instead of departure with no clue and sense of direction! I ask for departures, they say its 1st floor. I sprint to the nearby elevator that was just closing and made it in. On the first floor, I looked for Continental Airlines check-in kiosks which I thought it would surely lead me to right direction. And I found them, asked one of the check-in counter lady that was if the flight was still there! She said it’s about to leave and I should run! I followed her directions and went panting down the long hallways and finally after a couple of minutes of exhaustive running I saw signboards leading to gate E10 and came to security check. Its Holiday season and what would you expect? Crowd right? And that I’m doomed! Except that I’m not. I was so lucky I never realized the holdup was actually a security check till I got there. I passed on all my stuff and ran through the metal detector. Yes it beeped! Then I gave the wallet and mobile-phone. It still beeped. Next were my belt, shoes and laptop (and what is left of my dignity)! Finally I went over the other side and the guard suspiciously checked me thoroughly because I was in a hurry to get past the security check! Finally I got a sloppy set of my belongings and I tried putting all stuff back in. I bolted without wearing my belt in a hope that the flight could still be there with last calls! It was a bad idea and my pant kept falling! I ran for 100 more meters and finally E10 was around the corner. I was breathing heavily, sweating and holding my pants and the time was 7:40PM. I cannot see anything but the sign gate E10 around the corner and I expected to see was the board “Gate closed!” Hating myself, I miserably walked that last few steps, with last hope that I can still get on the flight. Did I get on it?
I strolled on till a small queue came into sight. They were from gate E10 and were waiting to board! I thanked the good lord for working things out for me. Be it this way, stood there straightened myself up in the 2-3 person queue and boarded the flight! Never have I ever raced time of this sort. I’m finally at SFO and I keep wondering what a dramatic entry into it!
PS: Wrote this Blog when I was flying to SFO in the flight filled with turbulence all the way! BTW Cali looks so amazing from above in the night!
