Honeymoon in Newark

Honeymoon in Newark
by Martell

My wife and I got married the summer of 2003, and we planned a three-week honeymoon in France and Italy, book-ended by two short stays in New York City. We got off to a great start, making it to New York the first night just in time for dinner at Gramercy Tavern—which was amazing—and then rested up for our flight to Paris the next day. New York, Paris, Avignon, Milan, Venice, Florence…it was going to be quite a trip. In planning our itinerary, though, we somehow managed to overlook one other key stop along the way: Newark, New Jersey. Little did we know what awaited us there.

On July 16, 2003, we took the train from NYC to Newark International Airport. For those who have never been there, there are three terminals, and we were scheduled to fly out on Air France, which is in Terminal B. We got there in plenty of time, and headed up to Terminal B to check in. There was a quite a long line for our flight already, which was a surprise, since we were probably 3 ½ hours early. As it turns out, one of the earlier flights had been cancelled and Air France was looking for volunteers to take a later flight.

We were scheduled to land at 6:30am in Paris, and we weren’t going to be able to check into our hotel until 2pm. Plus, they were offering $300 apiece for any volunteers. The new flight we would be able to take would land in Paris right before noon—so not only would we not have to schlep our luggage around Paris for 7 hours, but we’d get $600 to boot! We took the deal.

The Air France rep let us know that we would have to take a flight on Continental to Montreal, where we would catch an Air France connection to Paris. Everything would be ready for us by the time we made it to Continental’s desk, but the flight to Montreal was scheduled to leave in about an hour and a half, so we needed to hustle. We hopped back on the monorail and headed over to Terminal C.

About ten minutes later, we make it to Terminal C and get in line for Continental. There are about 10 people in front of us, and we’re a little worried about making the flight. Off to our left, I spot a woman working a Continental booth that isn’t helping anyone. I watch for a couple of minutes and see that she’s just sitting there looking bored, so I walk over and ask her if she’s open. She looks at me out of the tops of her eyes and replies, “I guess.” At this point, I don’t really care about the attitude—we just need to get checked in.

I go back and get my wife, we take our bags to the window and explain our situation. The woman asks us for our tickets. I explain again that we just got changed to this flight, so we don’t have any tickets, but look, the Air France people wrote the flight info down right here. She begrudgingly pulls up the flight info and informs us that our names are not there. Then she kind of looks over our shoulders to the area behind us, as if she’s about to call for the next person in line. I don’t exactly agree that the situation is resolved, so I stop her before she dismisses us.

I explain our situation again, she again states that we aren’t on the flight again, and I ask her if perhaps she could call Air France’s desk and figure out what the problem is. (I know, it’s a pretty radical idea, but I thought I’d throw it out there anyway.) The Continental woman informs me that she is unable to call other counters from her phone. What? You’ve got to be kidding me?!? I was pretty sure that had to be a lie. It was becoming clear to us that this woman was probably not the most helpful Continental employee we could have gotten. I began to regret leaving the other line.

Faced with this situation, I did about the only useful thing I could think of—I pulled out my cellphone and dialed 411. Getting the phone number for the Air France desk at the Newark International Airport was no easy task—I got the wrong number the first time, then got hung up on the second time—but after about ten minutes, I had the Air France lady that had helped us earlier on the line. I told her our problem, and she was about as annoyed as I was. She tells me that all the woman needs to do is add us to the flight; they’ve confirmed that there are spots available, and have asked Continental to hold them for us. I then point out that the Continental woman doesn’t seem interested in taking directions from me, and the Air France woman asks me to put her on the phone.

I hand the Continental woman my cellphone—she looks at it like she’s never seen one before—but then puts it to her ear, listens for about a minute, says “Okay,” and then hands the phone back to me. The Air France woman tells me that everything is taken care of, so I thank her and hang up the phone. My wife and I look expectantly at the Continental woman for a few seconds, during which time she doesn’t say anything, so I ask, “So, can you check us in now?” She answers, “You’re not on the flight.”

I don’t know how I didn’t completely lose it. By all rights, I should have jumped through the little opening for checked baggage and strangled her. Maybe it’s because we were on our honeymoon, I’m not sure, but I heard myself calmly explain that there were open seats being held for us and that all she needed to do was add us to the flight. And, as if controlled by my Jedi mind powers, she began typing on her computer, looking for seats for us on the flight to Montreal. Tk-a-tk-tk-tk, tk-tk, tk—it was music to my ears. I just couldn’t believe it; it was nothing short of a miracle.

But that was not our last unbelievable moment with Miss Continental woman, oh no. For you see, about two minutes later, she informed us that she would not be able to add us to the flight. We asked, “Why not? They should be holding seats for us.” She flatly replied that it wasn’t because there weren’t seats, but it was because it was now less than an hour before the flight was scheduled to take off, and she wasn’t allowed to check any luggage after that point. Of course, the only reason we had missed this deadline was because of her incompetence, but she clearly felt no obligation to make the situation right. Stunned, I got back on the phone with 411.

The woman from Air France didn’t waste any time. She got on the computer and found another flight to Montreal, this one on Air Canada. She told us to head directly over to Terminal A and she would have a woman meet us over there with our tickets. We hop back on the monorail and make it over there in just over five minutes.

We don’t know anything about the woman that is supposed to meet us, so we take our bags and get in the long line at the Air Canada counter. I stay there while my wife walks around looking for our tickets. She sees a woman in a Delta uniform standing a ways down by one of the Air Canada gates, and walks over and asks her if she has tickets for two Air France customers, but she doesn’t. My wife then walks down to the other end of the terminal and doesn’t find anyone there either. When she comes back, she takes over watching the bags and I head back to Terminal B.

Without my bags, I make it pretty quickly, and the Air France desk only has a couple of customers. I walk up to the front, where our helpful woman is working, and catch her eye. She asks me what I’m doing there, and I tell her that we can’t find the woman with our tickets. She tells me that she sent her over there right away, and that I should go back to Terminal A immediately. As a helpful hint, she tells me that the woman is dressed in a blue suit. (I had already noticed that all the Air France employees are dressed in blue suits, but I didn’t feel the need to get sarcastic with my last remaining ally.)

I dash back to Terminal A and find my wife. She’s moved about two yards. I tell her I’m looking for a woman in a blue suit and I head off to my left. About two seconds later, I tune in to the loudspeaker as it’s finishing the sentence, “….Kim, go to Gate 25.” Wait a minute! My wife’s last name is Kim! Could that message be for us? I turn right around and gather my wife and our bags and head off to Gate 25.

As we approach it, we see that it is in fact an Air Canada gate, so that’s a good sign. In fact, it’s the first gate that my wife originally went to when we got to Terminal A. Still standing there is the woman in the Delta uniform. I impulsively walk up to her and ask, “Are you looking for So Young Kim?” Her eyes light up as she says, “Yes! Where have you guys been?” Oh, you should have seen the look on my wife’s face.

The Delta woman walks up to the counter and explains our situation to the Air Canada guy, who is surprisingly helpful. He lets us know that we just have to wait behind the two groups in front of us and then he’ll take care of everything. In a moment of inspiration, I ask the Delta woman if she can wait there until our seats are confirmed. For some reason, she agreed to do so.

The first group was a young Chinese couple. Their English wasn’t too hot, which wouldn’t have been a problem, except they had something like 150 questions and the Air Canada guy couldn’t interpret half of them. This couple alone took well over 10 minutes. Even the Delta woman was starting to get impatient.

The second group was a Middle Eastern family of four that all spoke very good English, so that was a relief. That is, until extra family members started straggling in from around the terminal. By the time it was all said and done, it was actually a family of nine, with a total of 15 bags to check. I estimate that checking in this family took another 12 minutes. The Delta woman kept looking at her watch, telling us that it was time for her to get off, but she still stuck around. It was the nicest thing anyone had done for us all day.

Finally we make it to the counter. The Air Canada guy pulls up the information for the flight to Montreal, the only flight that will allow us to connect to the Air France flight…and informs us that it’s been cancelled. They check and check again, but no, it’s actually been cancelled. We've now just spent another 30 minutes waiting for a flight that doesn't exist. At this rate, we'll never get out of here.

The Delta woman asks why the flight was cancelled and the Air Canada guy tells us that it’s because the President had to make an unannounced landing earlier in the day, which made them completely clear all the runways. We spend a few minutes looking for other ways to get to Montreal in time to make our connecting flight to Paris, but there’s nothing. The Delta woman says she’s going to head back over to the Air France counter and that we should meet her there. We weren't sure she would really be there, but what else could we do? We get back on the monorail and head for Terminal B.

When we make it back to Air France, the Delta woman is already typing on the computer. At a side counter, an American couple is cussing out another Air France employee for what seems to be a similar problem to ours. Behind them, a German couple is loudly swearing at nobody in particular. (I don’t speak German, but sometimes you can just tell.) The Delta lady looked over at them, then smiled at us and gave us her A-1, top-of-the-line customer service. I think she realized that we had gone through worse, and could possibly snap at any moment. I gave her a deep exhale. She was totally walking on eggshells.

Delta woman clicks around on the computer, but after a few minutes she can’t find any good options. She then tells us that she really has to go (she had already stayed over by 30 minutes to help us), but that Steve will take care of us. As she says this, she’s pointing to a fellow at the next counter over. Steve looks over, nods, and then goes back to helping the customer he’s with. The Delta woman is satisfied with this response and prepares to leave. Understandably, my wife and I are a bit skeptical, but since the Delta woman is behind the counter, we aren’t able to grab onto her before she makes her escape. We’re now at the mercy of Steve.

Did I mention that Steve works for Swiss Air? Not for Air France or Delta or any of the other airlines we’ve dealt with today, not even for another domestic airline that can easily get us to Montreal. Sure, Switzerland’s close France—maybe they thought that was good enough. "Just get these two out of the country and they can figure the rest out themselves."

Then one of the more surreal things I’ve ever experienced happens. As we’re standing at the vacant Air France counter, some maintenance people come up and start removing things around us. They take the cardboard Air France promotional items from the counter, the plastic stands with the Air France schedules, the Air France Tensabarriers that defined where the line should be formed, the Air France sign off the wall—they take everything! Within two minutes, we were standing at a completely anonymous airport counter, waiting at the front of a line that nobody was responsible for. I felt like Campbell Scott in The Spanish Prisoner. Nothing was what it seemed.

But just a moment later, the maintenance people came back and replaced everything they had taken with Swiss Air paraphernalia. And just like that, Steve was done with his customer and walked over to help us. He asked us if we minded flying on Swiss Air instead of Air France. Was he kidding? Like we were going to complain! Hell, he could have put us in a giant slingshot for all we cared, we just wanted to make it to Paris.

He does his tk-a-tk-tk-tk thing and tells us he’s found us a flight, but that there’s some bad news. Is it okay if we fly into Geneva, and then catch an Air France flight there into Paris? We won’t land until around 12:30pm. “Sure,” we say, “why would that be a problem?” “Oh, that’s not the problem. The problem is that the flight is out of JFK.” At was at this point that my wife and I lost it. She just stares off into space and I start to laugh like a deranged lunatic. Unnerved, Steve says they’ll cover the cost of taxi ride over, but the flight leaves in about 3 hours, so we’ll need to make a decision quickly. I control myself, shake my head in disbelief and say, “Okay, let’s do it.”

We go downstairs and Steve loads us into a taxi. We take off and I tell the driver to take us to JFK, asking him how long it will take. The taxi driver estimates that, with light traffic, we could make it in 40 minutes, but at this hour—who knows? It was now about 4:30 in the afternoon. We were trying to go from Newark to JFK at just about the worst possible time of day, and we we’re hoping to make it in an hour. Fat chance. But it was too late to turn back now.

Traffic sucked, and it took about an hour and 45 minutes to make the trip. We were right up against the 1-hour bag checking deadline, but luckily there wasn’t anyone in line, and we just made it in time. The JFK Swiss Air guy noticed how haggard we looked, so I started to tell him our story. He just shook his head and offered his condolences. As I went through the part about the Air Canada flight being cancelled, he responds, “What? The President didn’t land in Newark today.” I swore to him that that’s what they said, but he insisted that it didn’t happen. His guess was that the Air Canada guy just made that up so we wouldn’t get upset.

It was the perfect ending to an insane day—we now knew we had been misled by every airline we had dealt with, with the exception of Swiss Air. But it was over, and we had survived with our nerves and tempers intact. Our “Honeymoon in Newark” was finished, and we we’re ready to move on to the real thing.

Martell can be reached at martell@babblog.com.