The flight was great; the staff were lovely and the food
delicious and on tap whenever you wanted it.
The seats were very nice little pod things which converted into 180 deg
flat beds, perfect for me but slightly too short for Ian. The flight was about 8 ½ hours but I didn’t
manage more than an hour or so of sleep and I don’t think Ian got any, still it
was a very comfortable way to pass the flight.
Then we arrived at Mumbai Airport and it all started to go
wrong. We had two hours between the two
flights, surely that would be plenty of time to clear immigration, collect our
bags and then drop them off?
There were no trolleys for hand luggage and the distance
from the plane to the Immigration Hall was probably a good 15 mins fast
walk. When we got there it was absolutely
heaving so we explained to a member of staff that we had a connection to make
thinking he’d move us up (as was the case at Jo’burg earlier in the year) but he
wasn’t remotely interested and just motioned to us to join the separate queue
for First/Business Class which was slowly snaking its way along. When it got to 1:30 (an hour before the next
flight was due to leave) I started to get a bit panicky and asked the 25 or so
people in front of us if we could jump ahead – luckily everyone was happy to
oblige.
I got through immigration before Ian so to tried dash off
through the Duty Free to find the baggage, only to be stopped to show my
passport to prove I’d cleared immigration 50 yards away. Obviously there are too many cases for the
carousels to hold so some helpful person had taken off loads of cases and just
dumped them. Imagine the scene; I have
my camera bag on wheels and I’m running round the moving carousel trying to
spot our cases. I see one, so stop and
steady the camera bag by which time the case on the carousel has moved on 20 or
so yards. Abandoning my several ££££s worth of camera gear I dash up to the
case and drag it off. Now I have two
unruly cases on wheels and still have to find the other case, so I set off
round again and luckily found it abandoned to one side. Shortly after that Ian appeared from the
Duty Free but heading the opposite way round the belt so I had to yell at the
top of my voice to attract his attention.
Cleared Immigration – Tick
Picked up Cases – Tick
Now we have to go through some kind of scanner, luckily one
of the security personnel took pity on us and waved us through and we literally
ran to the Domestic Sector. By now the
Biryani I’d had on the flight had begun to make its presence felt and to put it
delicately I was absolutely desperate but I knew they wouldn’t let Ian check me
in without me being there. This is where
my always near the surface tears came in handy and just before I went into a
complete meltdown someone kindly let me use the staff toilets – so I left Ian
trying to stuff the two bottles of wine we’d bought at Heathrow into the
suitcases otherwise we’d lose them.
Back feeling very much relieved in two senses (been to the
loo and checked in) we were told boarding had already commenced and we needed
to go upstairs, along and then downstairs – all sounded very simple. At the bottom of the escalator someone had to
check our boarding passes then at the top the signs pointed in two different
directions but with the help of many kindly people we eventually found the way
down again. The clock ticking all the
time.
Now we have to go through security again; separate queues
for women and men so Ian took one bag and me the other, huge line of women and
some tried to push in – stern words from me but it ended amicably! Eventually my turn to go behind the curtain
and be checked and released but there was still no sign of my camera bag and
laptop/tablet/phone/toiletries which all had to come out of the bags. Eventually the camera bag came through and
the security guard told me to open it and take out the cameras and all the
lenses – WTF!!!!! He then sent the bag back to the start of the queue to be
scanned again whilst Ian desperately explained to some kind airline staff that
he couldn’t go and board without me.
All the camera gear then just gets dumped into the one large
bag and off we run, laptop/tablet and phone in hand whilst we’re passed from
one Jet Airways personnel to another – hurry, hurry Kolkata Gate 45B. Hurrah we get to the gate where they check
the security stamps on our bags only to find Ian’s bag doesn’t have a tag so
the security guy wants to go through it – remember all the cameras/lenses are
just lumped on top of each other!
Finally we get onto a waiting bus and, yes you’ve guessed it, we wait; 5
mins, then it slowly drove off to the furthest reaches of the airport. After 15 mins roaming around in the pitch
black we seriously wondered if the driver knew where he was going so asked
another passenger who said quite calmly “oh yes, it’s 2kms away! Joy of joys, we get onto the plane and sit in
our wide seated haven at the front of the plane and then proceed to taxi all
the way back to where we started from.
It’s now 3:45 am Indian time (22:15 UK) and we’ve been on the go
since 04:00). Another 1 ½ hours and we should get to Kolkata – I wonder
what trials will greet us there.