To begin with, I had left for the airport with a heavy heart. I was stressed about leaving the house and the dogs unattended… and had felt really guilty seeing the dogs blissfully wagging their tails away while we said goodbye to them.
The husband, meanwhile, had already switched into holiday mode and was happily singing, jumping away in the car and purposefully annoying the shit out of me when all I wanted was to be left alone.
At the airport, I realised that my period had come… in addition to having to take a splitter splatter shit just before boarding the flight from Ho Chi Minh to Bangkok. To top it off, my new Dr Marten boots were killing my feet and giving me serious blisters. They hurt so bad that I had problems walking – T commented that I look like I had something up my ass.
Both flights were full (from HCM – BKK and BKK – FRA) so I did not get the window seat that I wanted. Thankfully, the guy seating next to me from Bangkok to Frankfurt moved to another seat, so I happily spread myself out between 2 seats and went to a peaceful vertical sleep with the husband sitting next to me.
Everything else was normal until we landed at Frankfurt airport. We sat at a cafe while we waited 2 hrs for our transit flight to Geneva @ 7.55am.
Just 5mins before the scheduled take off, we were told that our flight had been cancelled. Because of the bad weather and morning fog, all the planes had been diverted to Cologne and no planes were allowed to land in Frankfurt until further notice.
The alternative was to take a train which will get us there at 2.45pm (we were supposed to land at 9am). Everyone was clearly upset and rushing to get information to get to the first train.
Only my husband sat there calmly reading his magazine until I told him to go find out what’s happening. Mr Last Minute had not bothered to write down the address of our hotel in Geneva (it was in his email in the laptop)… so while everyone was already filling their forms for their baggage to be sent to their desired destination and getting to the train station, we naturally became one of the last few to get to the queue.
Me, being the Gan Cheong Spider, was tearing my hair out and losing it! I must have lost my patience at him a few times.
Then we had to run to the train station to catch our train… which was supposedly leaving in 5mins! I thought I was going to die… between sweating in the cold (which gave me a slight headache after), running because my feet hurt more walking with the blisters, worrying and already in a lousy mood… I din know which was worst.
We had no idea where we were going… the people we approached clearly din speak any English… finally we were told to get on this train and get off at Mannheim to change onto another train. At Mannheim, the lady at the counter din know GENEVA… only the German version GENF… and we had to take a risk that it was the same destination. Apparently, the next train was in 5 mins! It was another mad rush getting to the platform… T commented that it’s like we are on the Amazing Race.
And now, we are on our way to Olten which we will have to change another train to get to Geneva. We have no train tickets… and the bus conductor is 2 persons away from approaching us for our tickets. Looks like another drama is about to begin…
….
Alas… nothing happened! He din speak any English. We showed him our air tickets and that was it! Haha.
I guess there are 2 sides to every coin. It can be a blessing in disguise (if only I lighten up)… since we can’t get out of this situation, I might as well enjoy a bit of “adventure” and enjoy some sights of Germany while I am passing through in the train.
(MUCH LATER)
We arrived at 2.45pm (would have arrived at 9am by flight). After 6 long hrs on the train, all I wanted was to shower, change and freshen up...but guess what?! Our luggage had not arrived - no change of clothes and undies, no toiletries.... How annoying!
Nonetheless, I took a hot bath while I got T to dry my undie (which I hand washed)with the hair dryer. Haha.
Then we went out to meet the folks at their hotel. It took us 24 hrs to get to Geneva. Can you beat that?!
To top it off, we received a text at 5am this morning (the next day) from T's secretary saying the landlord had informed her that our house had been broken into by 2 men who have been caught and the police were not working on it.
After a lot of calls and confusion (because of language communication barrier), the maid was told to rush over immediately, we found out that it was the next door neighbour's house that was broken into... then men had tried to jump over into our house and that was when they were seen and the police was called.
What a drama la!!!
PS: This entry was typed over a period of time.
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