Brasil I - How not to end it all
(This is long, stick with it).
Part I.
As I mentioned a while back, we've just spent the last 10 most fantastic days in Brasil with my sister, husband and friends (more on this later I suspect). While were in Ponta Negra my wife bought a carved armadillo as a present, which required some very carefully packing.
We flew TAM Airlines and they were faultless in the way we were treated both in the air and on the ground. This leads me to what happened at Heathrow on the very last lap.
We checked our bags in yesterday at Natal, at the start of the first of two legs home.
"Make sure you tell 'em at Natal to check them through to Heathrow, and then you check the tags have GIG and LHR on them, so that they get forwarded to Heathrow at Rio! (de Janeiro)"
"We'll still have to get them from domestic inbound to take them to international outbound though, won't we?" my wife asked a bit later.
"I reckon so" I replied hopefully.
After a two hour domestic flight, sure enough, we waited at the conveyor at Rio for the bags.
And waited.
And waited.
When they started turning off the lights and sweeping up, I went over to a swarthy looking chappie at the desk.
"Um, no bags..."
"Baggage check tags, pleeze". I gave them to him.
"No, eets Hokay, checks say GIG / LHR, they goh to HLondon. Hokay"
"Now that's service my wife said, no messing about here!"
"Indeed. Let's eat..."
"Oh, your face was a picture when you saw the empty conveyor!"
Part II.
23 hours later after leaving Natal (via Rio) we land at Heathrow.
Part III.
I find the correct baggage reclaim and spot my first case already circling - which I duly grab. 290 other passengers grab theirs too and depart. Strangely though, another 10 passengers and I were still left staring at an empty belt, which most oddly, kept stopping and starting for no apparent reason.
We then spotted an odd sight - a large, black African man standing in the 45 degree-upward conveyor feed to the main belt fighting and wrestling with a person, or persons unknown. And, standing beside him, leaning on the guard rail (from the safe side), doing absolutely nothing, was a Polish employee in a yellow PPE jacket watching all this.
"WTF? I'll take a look"
The man was a passenger from our flight and was fighting with a soft holdall whose carry straps had been pulled under the belt and back under - the bag itself, of course, wouldn't fit in the gap. Every time he pulled a bit out, the conveyor freed, started and pulled the bag back again.
This continued for about 4 - 5 minutes. The employee still doing totally nothing. Eventually an announcement was heard:
"Would the passenger kindly please step off the carousel?"
He did so, everything stopped and nothing moved for about 5 minutes - not even the employee.
Another announcement:
"We are sorry for the hold up, we are doing everything we can to rectify the problem."
("No you're fucking not, it's the black guy who's doing that and not succeeding")
Another few minutes pass and another PPE'd-up English employee turns up with a walkie-talkie. He takes a look (completely ignoring the passenger and the Pole who's now standing by the emergency stop button with a key), turns round and walks back through a door. He re-appears. "(ssssclick) Err, Jim. Jim? Can you hear me? Back up conveyor 6259 a bit (ssskik)".
Nothing happens. Repeat this a few times and add another couple of yellow-vesters. Still nothing happens other than the Polish chap climbing onto the conveyor, opening the bag and throwing the contents to the other side of the guard rail - in full view of the assembled congregation of soon-to-be-getting pissed off passengers. This does not please the black guy - especially as he was handed a Next carrier bag to put some of his stuff in.
I turned round to my wife. "They're not solving the real problem are they? Why don't they simply isolate the conveyor, walk down the infeed with about 4 blokes and drag up the remaining 20 cases so we can all get going. Then they can fix it at their leisure?" My wife looked at me with that look that can only say "This is Britain, do you really think that is going to happen?"
A fifth yellow jacket turned up and at one point they were all standing at the top of the infeed doing nothing just starting at the empty bag and the pile of clothes. I heard him say "Kevin says that 6259 can't be reversed so we'll have to get at it another way 'cos the fuse has gone and..."
Part IV.
I lost it. I completely and utterly lost my temper, I really did. I picked on the last (older and presumably the boss) employee:
"WHY DON'T YOU JUST GET FOUR BLOKES DOWN THE FUCKING CONVEYOR, GET THE LAST 20 BAGS OUT, WE CAN THEN ALL CATCH OUR ONWARD FLIGHTS, TRAINS AND BUSES. YOU CAN THEN ISOLATE THE WHOLE FUCKING CAROUSEL AND FIX IT IN YOU YOUR OWN TIME!"
He stared at me for about 2 seconds. "Jim, nip down and get the last bags will you?"
Mine was the second bag to be thrown over the guard rail to the stationary conveyor. I grabbed it and my wife and I legged it through "Nothing To Declare"
"I can't believe you just did that!"
"What, the bunch of idiots they deserved a shouting at!"
"No. You used the "F" Word - twice"
"Ah, yes, but. You're face was a picture when you realised you may not see the armadillo again"
More useful than a Next bag
Epilogue.
Sadly, I have no idea whatsoever what happened next. Are the black guys boxers still in the middle of the carousel waiting for the return of a load of Nuns from a pilgrimage from Lourdes? Is the Polish chap still leaning on the rail? And, did they ever find out which fuse it was?
Part I.
As I mentioned a while back, we've just spent the last 10 most fantastic days in Brasil with my sister, husband and friends (more on this later I suspect). While were in Ponta Negra my wife bought a carved armadillo as a present, which required some very carefully packing.
We flew TAM Airlines and they were faultless in the way we were treated both in the air and on the ground. This leads me to what happened at Heathrow on the very last lap.
We checked our bags in yesterday at Natal, at the start of the first of two legs home.
"Make sure you tell 'em at Natal to check them through to Heathrow, and then you check the tags have GIG and LHR on them, so that they get forwarded to Heathrow at Rio! (de Janeiro)"
"We'll still have to get them from domestic inbound to take them to international outbound though, won't we?" my wife asked a bit later.
"I reckon so" I replied hopefully.
After a two hour domestic flight, sure enough, we waited at the conveyor at Rio for the bags.
And waited.
And waited.
When they started turning off the lights and sweeping up, I went over to a swarthy looking chappie at the desk.
"Um, no bags..."
"Baggage check tags, pleeze". I gave them to him.
"No, eets Hokay, checks say GIG / LHR, they goh to HLondon. Hokay"
"Now that's service my wife said, no messing about here!"
"Indeed. Let's eat..."
"Oh, your face was a picture when you saw the empty conveyor!"
Part II.
23 hours later after leaving Natal (via Rio) we land at Heathrow.
Part III.
I find the correct baggage reclaim and spot my first case already circling - which I duly grab. 290 other passengers grab theirs too and depart. Strangely though, another 10 passengers and I were still left staring at an empty belt, which most oddly, kept stopping and starting for no apparent reason.
We then spotted an odd sight - a large, black African man standing in the 45 degree-upward conveyor feed to the main belt fighting and wrestling with a person, or persons unknown. And, standing beside him, leaning on the guard rail (from the safe side), doing absolutely nothing, was a Polish employee in a yellow PPE jacket watching all this.
"WTF? I'll take a look"
The man was a passenger from our flight and was fighting with a soft holdall whose carry straps had been pulled under the belt and back under - the bag itself, of course, wouldn't fit in the gap. Every time he pulled a bit out, the conveyor freed, started and pulled the bag back again.
This continued for about 4 - 5 minutes. The employee still doing totally nothing. Eventually an announcement was heard:
"Would the passenger kindly please step off the carousel?"
He did so, everything stopped and nothing moved for about 5 minutes - not even the employee.
Another announcement:
"We are sorry for the hold up, we are doing everything we can to rectify the problem."
("No you're fucking not, it's the black guy who's doing that and not succeeding")
Another few minutes pass and another PPE'd-up English employee turns up with a walkie-talkie. He takes a look (completely ignoring the passenger and the Pole who's now standing by the emergency stop button with a key), turns round and walks back through a door. He re-appears. "(ssssclick) Err, Jim. Jim? Can you hear me? Back up conveyor 6259 a bit (ssskik)".
Nothing happens. Repeat this a few times and add another couple of yellow-vesters. Still nothing happens other than the Polish chap climbing onto the conveyor, opening the bag and throwing the contents to the other side of the guard rail - in full view of the assembled congregation of soon-to-be-getting pissed off passengers. This does not please the black guy - especially as he was handed a Next carrier bag to put some of his stuff in.
I turned round to my wife. "They're not solving the real problem are they? Why don't they simply isolate the conveyor, walk down the infeed with about 4 blokes and drag up the remaining 20 cases so we can all get going. Then they can fix it at their leisure?" My wife looked at me with that look that can only say "This is Britain, do you really think that is going to happen?"
A fifth yellow jacket turned up and at one point they were all standing at the top of the infeed doing nothing just starting at the empty bag and the pile of clothes. I heard him say "Kevin says that 6259 can't be reversed so we'll have to get at it another way 'cos the fuse has gone and..."
Part IV.
I lost it. I completely and utterly lost my temper, I really did. I picked on the last (older and presumably the boss) employee:
"WHY DON'T YOU JUST GET FOUR BLOKES DOWN THE FUCKING CONVEYOR, GET THE LAST 20 BAGS OUT, WE CAN THEN ALL CATCH OUR ONWARD FLIGHTS, TRAINS AND BUSES. YOU CAN THEN ISOLATE THE WHOLE FUCKING CAROUSEL AND FIX IT IN YOU YOUR OWN TIME!"
He stared at me for about 2 seconds. "Jim, nip down and get the last bags will you?"
Mine was the second bag to be thrown over the guard rail to the stationary conveyor. I grabbed it and my wife and I legged it through "Nothing To Declare"
"I can't believe you just did that!"
"What, the bunch of idiots they deserved a shouting at!"
"No. You used the "F" Word - twice"
"Ah, yes, but. You're face was a picture when you realised you may not see the armadillo again"
More useful than a Next bagEpilogue.
Sadly, I have no idea whatsoever what happened next. Are the black guys boxers still in the middle of the carousel waiting for the return of a load of Nuns from a pilgrimage from Lourdes? Is the Polish chap still leaning on the rail? And, did they ever find out which fuse it was?
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