4th December 2008, Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam
It's one of those days when you are not very sure if it's a good day or a bad one. So I had to make a connection at Amsterdam for my flight to Mumbai, there is a long line at the security check but then the elite line was totally empty - it almost gave an impression that it was closed. Turned out it was open and I was able to save an hour of waiting time... and then when they were checking me in, for the first time on an international flight I was upgraded to Business Class! It's funny... only yesterday I was thinking how I used to get upgraded to First Class on domestic US flights but never on any international flight... I wondered if they do free upgrades on international routes at all... well, I have my answer now :-)
And then when the baggage had to go through the X-ray machine I asked for my camera film to be hand inspected... they said it has to be above 800 ASA for hand inspection, mine was 800! Remember how in school you used to get 79.8 points on an exam only to realize that the A grade starts from 80? That's the kind of feeling I got... I requested for a hand check anyways and they tried to convince me that it's going to be fine in the machine. Upon my persistence they agreed to hand check it but then their supervisor intervened saying it's just too many to check manually, which was weird since I got it hand checked at the Detroit airport without any issues... well, in the end I wasn't given the choice and had to put it through the machine. After the bag came out of the machine, the security guy tried to be funny and said, "See, nothing happened to it!" ... I would have smiled in most situations but considering that the film was for my newly bought Polaroid camera that I was too excited to put to use upon reaching India, cost more than $100 and probably not available in India (except may be at a few specialty stores)... I didn't find it amusing. I couldn't help but recall how I brought a lot of film back from US to India for my brother's wedding and had checked it in. I used the film to take pictures at the wedding and we were all shocked to see the prints turn out washed out, spotted and with all kind of other weird effects... never before had I screwed up such important photographs...
Oh well, I will at least get the eye shades now on the plane that I tried so hard to find at the Wal-Marts in Michigan! (to be fair to Wal-Mart I did find a pair at a Wal-Mart in Wisconsin but then those were just too fluorescent green for my taste) And for those who are going to argue that I could have got them in Economy as well... I asked and was refused... being told that those are only for business class passengers... ok, business class it is... anything for a good sleep :-)
It's one of those days when you are not very sure if it's a good day or a bad one. So I had to make a connection at Amsterdam for my flight to Mumbai, there is a long line at the security check but then the elite line was totally empty - it almost gave an impression that it was closed. Turned out it was open and I was able to save an hour of waiting time... and then when they were checking me in, for the first time on an international flight I was upgraded to Business Class! It's funny... only yesterday I was thinking how I used to get upgraded to First Class on domestic US flights but never on any international flight... I wondered if they do free upgrades on international routes at all... well, I have my answer now :-)
And then when the baggage had to go through the X-ray machine I asked for my camera film to be hand inspected... they said it has to be above 800 ASA for hand inspection, mine was 800! Remember how in school you used to get 79.8 points on an exam only to realize that the A grade starts from 80? That's the kind of feeling I got... I requested for a hand check anyways and they tried to convince me that it's going to be fine in the machine. Upon my persistence they agreed to hand check it but then their supervisor intervened saying it's just too many to check manually, which was weird since I got it hand checked at the Detroit airport without any issues... well, in the end I wasn't given the choice and had to put it through the machine. After the bag came out of the machine, the security guy tried to be funny and said, "See, nothing happened to it!" ... I would have smiled in most situations but considering that the film was for my newly bought Polaroid camera that I was too excited to put to use upon reaching India, cost more than $100 and probably not available in India (except may be at a few specialty stores)... I didn't find it amusing. I couldn't help but recall how I brought a lot of film back from US to India for my brother's wedding and had checked it in. I used the film to take pictures at the wedding and we were all shocked to see the prints turn out washed out, spotted and with all kind of other weird effects... never before had I screwed up such important photographs...
Oh well, I will at least get the eye shades now on the plane that I tried so hard to find at the Wal-Marts in Michigan! (to be fair to Wal-Mart I did find a pair at a Wal-Mart in Wisconsin but then those were just too fluorescent green for my taste) And for those who are going to argue that I could have got them in Economy as well... I asked and was refused... being told that those are only for business class passengers... ok, business class it is... anything for a good sleep :-)
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