Sendin' the family to the States: Pre-flight chaos

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As most of you know, I am sending my four kids off to boarding school in the States. Why? Better education and actually less costly too! Since two of my kids are actually nieces, I had to get them visas which was an adventure in itself. For those that missed it, that saga was detailed here and finalized here.

 

The plan was to leave as soon as the visas were issued, and I had a pretty good idea of that date courtesy of the Embassy staff. So I booked my tix early so I could get a deal. I did: B27K round trip and B18K one ways on SQ. Sweet. But of course, the agent could not issue the tix for the nieces until their visas were issued. So she made two reservations. Seemed like a smart thing to do. But like anything in Thailand, things do not go as planned...

 

Now the plan was to fly to Las Vegas and stay with wifey for a while and have a comfy place to get over the jet lag. Then we would travel about with the girls showing them the scenery doing the desert, Grand Canyon, Mt. Charleston, maybe skip over to LA/Hollywood, etc. getting them acclimated and comfortable before starting school in October. Our real daughters have been in the States before, but they were only 8 & 9, too young to appreciate any of it (and they hated it then). They are now 16 & 15 and the nieces are 9 & 10 and all are excited to begin a new adventure. The nieces are going to be fine I think as the daughters are very close to them and are raring to go, so they are excited too.

 

So back to the TIT bit. Two days before we are scheduled to leave, I look at the tix. Uh-oh. The nieces tix are through to Las Vegas (LAS) but mine and the daughters are only to Los Angeles (LAX). Well, it is only one letter difference... Off to the travel agent who apologizes profusly and tries to rectify the situation to no avail. She suggests buying LAX-LAS tix at the airport when I arrive. She is cute, but has never travelled in the States. I am sure that that would either a) cost me $400/ea one way and/or be full and/or c) give me grief about the volume/weight of the luggage we were bringing from Thailand (what is acceptable on an international flight is NOT acceptable on a US domestic flight). Shit. I tell her to just book the tix here. She tells me that they are expensive: US$150/ea one way. Shit. I am kee niow and cannot see paying $150 for a 30 mninute plane ride! OK, I'll look into it myself.

 

Not finding any other option, I look at the United web site. Hmmm, plenty of seats and only $102. OK, that's still expensive (I was thinking $80), but acceptable at this late hour. So I book them online. Uh-oh. TIT again. One must have a credit card with a US billing addy to book online through the UAL.com . Shit! Me no have. Only AmEx Thailand and Visa/Master through K-Bank & Citibank Thailand. So I make a call to my buddy Mehkong Kurt as I knew he had a one. We meet for lunch at the Texas Lone Staar and get online to book it.

 

Uh-oh. TIT rears it's ugly head again! "If the card holder is not travelling with the party, then he has to go to the airport and show the card to the ticketing agent." Awww, shit. More time wasted and another favour to ask. But Kurt is a good friend and he says "Let's go." We both expect this to be painful;, with the Bangkok ticket agents not having a clue what to do. After all, how many people in Bangers buy a domestic USA ticket with someone else's credit card LOL?

 

Upon arrival to the UAL office in Srindihorn Tower across from the US Embassy, we are greeted by a receptionist with the most incredible set of crossed eyes I have ever seen. She was literally staring at the tip of her nose. Yikes. Very disturbing. How does she function? But she was nice and efficient and knew exactly what I wanted, even in my bad Thai. Five minutes later we were seated in front of a most beautiful ticket agent. She had trouble getting the job done because of computer issues, but she knew what to do. Wow, a pleasant surprise and most appreciated. Another issue closed!

 

Now keep in mind that we are also moving house during this time so all is chaos. The three of us are going to stay the night in a really small condo (~25m^2) that we own thanks to wifey's loan-sharking activities on Sukhumvit Soi 77, Sub Soi 17, Sub Sub Soi 16. The nieces are staying with other family who will drop them at the airport in the morning. This condo is really out of the way and chock-a-block full of all the stuff that I want to move to my new condo when I return. No aircon and quite cozy.

 

In the morning, the daughters want their boyfriend/girlfriend to go with us to the airport. That means two taxis as we have eight bags, plus purses and a laptop bag. It is all called and booked and we expect to leave at 0700. Surprisingly, both faens are there on time and the BF even helps take shit out to the taxi. But there is only one taxi. Shit. Taxi radios and the dispacher says that there should be two there. Like Abbott & Costello, they go round-n-round until she finally gets that there really is only one taxi here. She sends another one. But it is not 0730 and rush hour and we are out pretty far, so it may take 20 minutes or so. Shit! After 30 minutes, I go out to the street to try to flag one down. No joy. But there are two empty taxis parked on the street, the drivers prolly eating at one of the nearby foodstalls. So I waiot. And wait. And finally one of the drivers goes back to his taxi. I flag him down. He asks if I called for a taxi to the airport. Stoopid bastard!!! Ya, an hour ago. "I was hungry and had to eat first" he says. Arrrgggghhh. "Then why did you accept the run if you could not do it right away?" "Mai roo." Arrrgggghhh. OK, let's get outta here.

 

No dramas except for traffic on the way to the airport but we were not late. Knowing teenagers and Thai females, and especially teenage Thai females, I never told them that the flight was actually at 1115. I just said we needed to leave the house at 0700. Heheheheheh.

 

After an uneventful cab ride to the airport, we get there and begin the check in process. I was a little concerned about the baggage as we had ten checked bags, all over 20Kg for sure, a couple over 30Kg(!), plus the carry ons. Well, Singapore Air was great, as always, checking in the bags (even though some of us were on separate tickets to Las Vegas) with absolutely no hassles. The ROP Gold card I am sure did not hurt either.

 

So it was the tearful goodbye time for the boyfriend/girlfriend tagging along. A few pix and a few private words and it was painlessly over. I was quite surprised as my daughters are usually drama queens. This time it was 99.9% tearless. What a relief!

 

Everyone hated giving that stupid machine B500 (Wah! Paeng mak!) for a silly piece of paper, but the young nieces did have fun feeding it. The immigration officer was cool, joking with me about taking care of four kids on my own and wishing me luck, saying I would need it LOL!

 

We then went off to the ROP Biz Class lounge to eat and while the time away. #2 daughter thought the having a gold card was way cool and stated that "I have to get one of those!" After explaining that it takes 50K miles in one year, she then decided that it was not worth it LOL. The daughters spent the time burning up all the time on their mo-by fones and proceeded to use mine. Well, that and filling their face with the free food. The nieces busied themselves on the computer looking at that most popular Thai teenybopper website Kapook.

 

Well, boarding call. Next installment: flight, layovers and immigration into the States. Yup, it is still an adventure with more hilarity and frustration to come!

 

Cheers,

SD

[OCgringo]

well when you told me what you were doing I thought there were only 2 of them coming here for school

 

With 4 of them , you are my hero for getting it all together ,

 

Let me know if you are in town for a beer !

[limbo]

Hi Suadum,

 

Good luck with your travels and keep on posting your adventures, I love to see what's happening.

 

My only concern is that the nightlife in BKK is now in serious danger, the new closing times and on top of that you out of the country. Tough times ahead for a few bars.

[Zaad]

Well said Limbo.

 

Tiger,

You must have a serious dose of patience for what you have been through, unless you are using the trip to the US as a recovery from a mental breakdown. That would surely be my case!

 

Keep writing!