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June 2023

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No way to run a railroad!

June 30, 2023 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“We do not ride on the railroad; it rides upon us”

Henry David Thoreau

Thursday 25th May

On Thursday May 25th  – having taken a couple of nights to recover from our extended flight from Canada – The Girl and I arrived at Heathrow Terminal 5 a little after 2:00pm to check-in for our 7:05pm flight to Johannesburg. We had attempted to check-in online before leaving for the airport but the online system was not working. On arrival at the terminal, we found that none of the check-in stations were working either. We were told at the Club Class check-in desk that there had been a major IT systems failure (the which would ultimately lead to well over 200 flights being cancelled). We were checked in by hand and headed for the Club Lounge.

We could immediately see from the departure displays that European and domestic flights were being cancelled in increasing numbers, though long-distance flights seemed at that point still to be operating. At around 5:00pm there was an announcement that all European and domestic flights after 6:00pm would be cancelled – and shortly thereafter came an announcement that our flight would be delayed overnight!

As we had a connection in Johannesburg for an onward flight to Maun – in Botswana – to join our safari, we immediately endeavoured to find an alternative flight that would arrive in time. We were directed to a variety of different gates, waited patiently in queues, talked to BA reps who had no idea what was going on… but it was clear that they really just wanted people to leave the airport and to go away. After a couple of hours of this we finally we gave up and returned to the Club Lounge. We enquired at the BA desk there and the agent was able to find spaces on a later BA flight – scheduled to depart at 9:25pm. We were only able to get economy seats, but we felt this was worth the trouble as we had a connecting flight and a safari to join.

As soon as the departure gate was announced we headed for Satellite C and joined the throng of passengers already there. We could see the aircraft from the gate but shortly afterwards there was tannoy announcement that this flight would also be delayed.  We learned that the aircraft had a mechanical fault which was being worked on. As time passed all of us at the gate grew increasingly concerned that the flight would not get away and, sure enough – at around 11:30pm – it was finally cancelled. By this stage we had been in the terminal for nearly 10 hours.

We were told that we must leave the satellite and walk back through the underground passageways (alongside the no-longer operating transit system) to the main terminal building – collect our baggage from the allotted carousel and make our own arrangements to stay the night somewhere.  As this was likely the last flight that was cancelled that day, the thousands of other disrupted passengers had already found accommodation and there were no hotel rooms to be had anywhere in the vicinity.

Our luggage did not appear on the carousel. The only BA staff in the terminal rapidly disappeared and there was no-one to assist us. Whilst I searched for our bags The Girl contacted the Club World Desk to enquire about flights the following day. She was told that they were fully booked and that there was nothing that could be done to help us.  I called the hotel at which we had been staying for the previous few nights and they took pity on us and found us a room.

My brother – extraordinarily kindly – went above and beyond in getting out of bed and driving over to the airport to rescue us and to take us to the hotel. We definitely owe him for that (and for many other things) – big time!

The day had been exhausting and scary… in that we had no idea what would happen next, or how we might save our trip of a lifetime from coming to a premature and expensive end. To find out how things turned out the gentle reader must needs check in to the final installment of this saga…

…next time!

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The universality of incompetence

June 26, 2023 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“I have noticed that, with few exceptions, men bungle their affairs. Everywhere I see incompetence rampant, incompetence triumphant…I have accepted the universality of incompetence.”

Laurence J. Peter
‘The Peter Principle’

Long term perusers of these gentle meanderings will no doubt be aware that – the occasional rant aside (usually concerning matters political) – I am not in the habit of ‘trash-talking’ anyone or anything that might – for whatever reason – have of late aroused my ire.

Should you utilise the search function built into this site to seek out occurrences of the term ‘incompetence’ – for example – you would find but a handful of posts, of which only two concern the performance of an organisation with which I was obliged to deal. Those two posts refer to a single incident back in 2014 when the UK’s national communications carrier – British Telecom – contrived to leave us without telephone or Internet access for six weeks over Christmas and the New Year.

Given our recent experiences in the travel line you will probably not be surprised that I am about to add another couple of posts (or more!) that will share the same tag. Regrettably this example also involves a corporation that lays claim to be a UK national carrier – though of a rather different commodity. I refer, of course, to British Airways.

Back in 2019 we were also out and about around the globe – paying our first visit to the UK since emigrating in 2015 and adding on at the end a rather lovely little cruising sojourn in the Greek islands as a means of relaxing and recuperating. We flew from London to Athens and back (somewhat against my better judgement) on British Airways – who proved to be all too competent at extracting from us the cash to cover the pre-booking of extra legroom seats – but all too incompetent in the manner in which they re-assigned those seats on the return journey to other people and bumped us to the window-less back row of the aircraft. Naturally they also subsequently omitted to reimburse us. I swore mightily that I would never again fly with BA – an oath which I sadly let slip upon discovering that they alone had the best price/availability for this year’s attempted safari trip to Africa.

Now, I apologise in advance for the length of this diatribe, but I am eager to reveal the exact extent of the amateurishness (with further apologies to real amateurs) of the service provided by pretty much all concerned in this wretched business.

Here is the first part (or pre-amble):

Having decided upon our long-dreamt-of trip to the African continent (specifically a safari excursion to Botswana and to Victoria Falls) back in December last, we duly booked flights with British Airways from Victoria to London (via Seattle) for 22nd May – and on to Johannesburg for 25th May. We made a further onward booking to Maun in Botswana with a regional airline. The return flights were booked for 6th June from Johannesburg to London and then back to Victoria (via Seattle) on 11th June. All BA flights were booked in Club Class except for the short hop from Victoria to Seattle and back.

The Girl and I each made our own bookings so that we could use our own credit cards and/or points, but were assured that the two bookings could be ‘tied’ together.

Over the ensuing five months until we traveled we spent a great deal of time and money purchasing specific clothing and gear for our safari as detailed in previous posts.  The excitement was building.

Over the months leading up to our departure BA made a number of changes to our bookings; altering the time of the Seattle/London flight; cancelling the return Seattle/Victoria flight (which necessitated us staying an extra night in Seattle at our expense); changing the aircraft type for the Seattle/London leg (and seating us in different parts of the aircraft in the process)… before finally – 24 hours before our departure – cancelling the following day’s Seattle to London flight and re-booking us on an American Airways flight in economy! After a long and feisty phone conversation with a BA agent (on the part of The Girl), we were re-routed on an Aer Lingus flight from Seattle to London via Dublin – in Club Class.

Our journey from Victoria to London was at least for the most part comfortable and pleasant (kudos to Aer Lingus), even if rather longer than originally planned.

You will be unsurprised to hear that none of our dealings with BA to this point inspired confidence. The experience was, however, nothing compared with that which was to follow…

…for talk of which the gentle reader must patiently await the next post.

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The Journey Home

June 19, 2023 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

I mentioned last month – in the second of two postings bringing the gentle reader up to speed regarding the musical progress effected by The Chanteuse and I – that we would shortly be releasing a second single this calendar year. Well – ‘shortly’ is now here and our new single can be found on all of the usual streaming and download sites. Full information, samples and links can be found on our website – but for those who would prefer to get the necessary without further ado – read on:

The second Anam Danu single of the year (following January’s release of “Perfect“) is “The Journey Home” – which was released to streaming and download sites on June 16th.

“The Journey home” concerns three different types of journey; The first considers the emigrant returned home to the land of his or her birth – the second refers to the rediscovery of one’s culture – the third to that part of a life that follows the turn for home.

The finest wisdom that we can offer is that each of these journeys is best accompanied by a friend!

The track is a re-worked and extended version of the song that appeared on our first collection, “Winds of Change”. It features – for the first time on an Anam Danu recording – a musician other than The Chanteuse and I. In this case Victoria violinist Kate Rhodes does the honours on the fiddle.

Do please listen and (hopefully) enjoy!

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Glenda Jackson

June 17, 2023 in Life as we know it | Permalink

Glenda Jackson

1936 – 2023

RIP

Victuallers and the authors of en:Glenda Jackson and en:Candice Bergen (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:May9_Woman_of_the_Day.png), „May9 Woman of the Day“, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode

 

Very sad to hear of the passing of Glenda Jackson. The United Kingdom has – during my lifetime – produced such an extraordinary run of incredibly talented actors and actresses that sometimes the details of individual careers can be taken a little for granted. Glenda Jackson was one of the brightest of acting talents back in the 60s and 70s and it is all the more to her credit that she moved on from acting to a career in politics – believing fervently as she did that she could make a difference and do some good for the less fortunate subjects of the UK.

It is a great shame that not of all those who entered politics during this period (and subsequently) have held such high moral standards and noble intentions – or behaved with such integrity.

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Substitutes for joy

June 10, 2023 in Life in BC, Photos | 2 comments

“I sometimes wonder whether all pleasures are not substitutes for joy”

C. S. Lewis

This post should have featured wild animals in their natural habitats in the Botswana bush – though perhaps not quite: “Herds of wildebeest sweeping majestically across the plains”… as John Cleese would have it.

Instead, here are some photos of the flora in our garden:

Photo by Andy Dawson ReidPhoto by Andy Dawson ReidPhoto by Andy Dawson ReidPhoto by Andy Dawson ReidPhoto by Andy Dawson ReidPhoto by Andy Dawson ReidPhoto by Andy Dawson Reid

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Out of Africa

June 3, 2023 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

The Girl and I have always believed ourselves to be a lucky combination – a notion based largely on evidence drawn from direct experience. An example of this good fortune would be the sale of our Buckinghamshire apartment in the UK back in 2015, the year that we moved to Canada.

We had been trying to sell the property for nearly four years – without success – before finally doing so just a week before we emigrated. This might seem to stretch the definition of good luck were it not for the fact that the sale was completed just as the sterling/Canadian dollar exchange rate hit its most fortuitous level for the best part of a decade – a figure that has not been matched since.

It came as a considerable and most palpable shock, therefore, when our latest adventure – the African safari trip trailed in my last post – imploded spectacularly over the last week.

That is right… we did not get to Africa… we did not go on safari… we finally retreated to the west coast of Canada to lick our wounds in a state of considerable shock.

In short – we are not happy!

I am not going to catalog in detail the entire fiasco here, though I will undoubtedly be naming names in a subsequent missive. Those who live in the UK may well have seen the news items of a week ago which recounted the spectacular and catastrophic failure of British Airways’ IT systems that laid waste to much of the operation – ticketing – check-in – baggage handling – online services – etc, etc… On what was touted as being the busiest travel weekend since the COVID pandemic British Airways cancelled well in excess of two hundred flights and wrecked the travel plans of thousands of customers.

The ‘highlights’ of our particular experience include having one flight delayed overnight and a replacement finally cancelled at around midnight – after we had spent ten hours in the terminal. We were told that we must collect our checked baggage and leave the terminal building – to join an already extensive queue of folk trying to find a room in the airport hotels. This was the point that we discovered that BA had lost our safari luggage!

Over the following three days we spent many wearisome hours on the phone trying to reschedule flights (including connecting flights in Africa for which we will  get no refund!) and to search for our missing bags. When it became apparent that there was no chance of both us and our bags coinciding in Johannesburg we finally gave up and spent another day trying to persuade BA to let us go home – the which they would not do without considerable further outlay.

Now we have to attempt to recover at least some of the cost of this ‘trip of a lifetime’.

This whole has been a deeply traumatic experience for us both and has left our confidence considerably shaken. We both had moments in which we could not see how the situation could be resolved – and I think it may take a while before we again attempt anything similar.

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