After almost a 10 month forced hiatus, We have put our feet back onto Honduran soil. But, as with anything we do that concerns Honduras, it couldn't be a smooth sail. We got to the airport this morning and boarded the plane without incident. After 3 hours of sleep, Tom and I were REALLY looking forward to sleeping all the way to Houston. Since you don't get fed anymore, we wouldn't be awakened for anything. The flight attendants kept getting people to hurry as it was a full flight. There is always one person on a plane that is a problem. This flight was no exception to that rule. A lady brings on a huge bulging suitcase and can't get it to fit into the upper compartment. One male flight attendant tells her it wouldn't fit and she needed to check it. She ignored him. She tried it again. It didn't fit. He told her again to check it. She continued to ignore him. There were two people from the landing crew at the front of the plane. They were watching this and one of them gets tired of the scene and decides he is going to take charge and get the suitcase. He goes down the aisle and talks to the woman. She unzips her suitcase and starts taking things out and putting them on her seat, as the now two male employees are watching. The second ground person at the front of the plane mutters something under his breath and walks sternly down the aisle, picks up the suitcase, without a word, and carries it off the plane. Everyone needs a little humor at 6:00 in the morning.
Just as we were settling down for a 2 1/2 hour nap, the pilot comes on and states the computer wasn't working properly so they had called maintenance. Our first thought was, "great another 20 minutes of sleep" and we both floated off into sleep land. That lasted for about 5 minutes when the pilot came on again and stated it would take longer than they hoped. Then, the pilot comes out of the cockpit and starts talking to the passengers, walking up and down the aisle. That was our first real clue this was going to take a while. The mistake they did make was allowing passengers to get off the plane to do whatever. We only had 45 minutes between connections, so it didn't take a genius to figure out we would miss our connection. With sleep impossible at this point, I called United from my "approved cell phone" instead of getting off the plane and going to an agent. I wish the others would have done that, too. Of course, when all these people got off, the plane was ready to go and we didn't have all the people. So, we sat a little longer. Everyone (or so they thought) had returned and the flight attendants counted the peeps and decided we were all there. The walkway is pulled away and the engines are cranking up. I was sitting by a window directing across from the agent that was operating the walkway. I saw him look at us, then I saw him look to his left. I saw the expression on his face go from relief to anger. It was so funny to watch. I turned to Tom and said, "I bet we left someone." The agent grabs his walkie and screams into it. I could almost hear him through the air space. I looked at our flight attendants and they were frozen. I looked back at the agent driving the walkway, and saw him throw down his walkie and reach for the controls to move the walkway back to the plane. The engines were shut down. I turned to Tom again, and said," I bet I know which passenger didn't come back." and sure enough, on walks the same woman who had the luggage issue carrying a LOT of food, and actually eating a sandwich while she sauntered down the aisle to her seat.. It was so funny.
We landed in Houston and didn't have to rush to make the connection as the plane wasn't there. What we didn't realize was when Continental and United merged, they did not take away one of the flights to Honduras, so there were now two flights from United going into Honduras an hour apart. We got on the second flight. Manuel was waiting for us with the biggest smile. We were home.
No comments:
Post a Comment