Airline Travel

I never finished this like I said I would. As a seXXy world traveler, I think the world needs to know what I think about airline travel.

This thing is, I flew to Frankfurt, Germany on June 10 of this year by way of New York JFK airport. My luggage, it seems, decided to stay behind.

I had to talk to a nice fellow in an office in the airport to track down my bag. He put in a note to have it shipped to Cologne, where I would be staying for three days and then gave me a claim slip and a phone number to call the next day.

Well, after three days of calling, borrowing t-shirts, not bathing, and trying to coordinate the delivery of my bag to the apartment I was staying in, I finally got the bag four days after arrival.

Inside the bag I found that everything had been unpacked, a plastic travel mug had been shattered, and the friendly folks at the Transportation and Safety Administration (TSA) had left a little note explaining what had happened. The TSA is the outfit that ensures your safety everytime you board a plane in the USA. Somehow they deemed my luggage to be safe leaving Minneapolis for New York, but the New York guys decided they needed to take a look as I was boarding my Singapore Air flight to Germany. The note they left was actually a 4" wide by 10" tall printed card with the usual BS about security and a phone number I could call if I wanted to complain.

I really got the sense that the TSA cared about what I thought. First, they didn't bother to send any notification ahead to the airplane so that someone could tell me not to expect my bags. Instead, I waited an hour at the conveyor and then another half hour in line at the claims office. Over the following four days, no one was able to tell me if my luggage was lost, where exactly it was, or when it would arrive. And ultimately it was Lufthansa, the German airline acting as an agent for Singapore Air, that came through for me and delivered my bag to Cologne.

I had put a small padlock on the bag to thwart curious baggage handlers. One of my travel companions explained to me that there is an official TSA padlock one can buy at Target that will thwart the baggage handlers but allow the TSA to use a master key to open it. I've used the same little lock on my baggage on trips dating back to 1998, but they cut it off and thoroughly used and abused my bag this time around.

So what did I learn about airline travel and security? If you are a terrorist, put an official TSA lock on your luggage. An unofficial lock will draw attention. In the event that your luggage does get confiscated, you've got four days to make your getaway after touchdown. Most importantly, though, it is probably best that you don't put your bombs in your checked luggage because they could end up blowing up the airport instead of the plane. And we all know that use of wireless detonation mechanisms is not permitted while in the air. So take your bombs along with you in your carry-on bag.

Seriously, what could I put in a checked bag, other than explosives, that could pose a threat to security? A gun? A grenade? A missle? None of these things would get past the x-ray machine and none of them is useful if I can't be there to operate them. Timed or remotely detonated explosives are really the only thing. Did the TSA really think that is what they were going to find? Did something at the JFK x-ray station catch their attention, and if so why did MSP miss it? And if something did catch their attention, why wasn't there a security team waiting for me at the airport in Frankfurt?

Airline security, my friends, is a fallacy.

Now that I've gotten myself added to whatever ridiculous Homeland Security Terrorist Databases that may or may not exist, I'll switch to the actual flying experience. I flew on NWA to New York and then switched to Singapore Air. I had heard Singapore Air was nice. This arrangement allowed me to use NWA miles to get to New York and then take advantage of the ridiculously low fare of $640 to Frankfurt on Singapore Air.

The thing that distinguishes Singapore Air is the in-flight service. The planes and the gates and the departures and arrivals are the same as any other airline. But they have several meal choices, including such exotic things as Japanese, Indian, seafood, and vegetarian options. I chose seafood for my flight there and got some sort of steamed whitefish and vegetables. For the flight back I chose Indian vegetarian and got a bunch of bland vegetables. I guess it is great that they had options, but the stuff wasn't any better than any other airline.

I'd estimate that over the course of the trip the flight attendants made a trip down the isle at least once per hour to offer drinks and crap. After the meal was done, they handed out bags with slippers and toothbrushes in them (both of which I had saved for some reason and which came in handy given my checked bag was delayed). When you consider all the time spent collecting trash and handing out headphones and meals and drinks and slippers and customs forms, the interruptions were too much. I suppose it is nice to be loved, but after a while it started to get annoying.

As for NWA, I don't see what the big deal is when people complain about the service and the fact that they are in bankruptcy. Sure they have cut back on service, but in a country like the US where the standard of living is so high, I think we need to get used to it. As for meals, I wish they would start serving all food and drink a la carte as they do in a train. Maybe they could set up a little snack stand up front and improve the quality to the point that one would actually be inclined to buy it that way. I think as long as the fare prices are lowered and the food quality was better than the stuff they have now, people would be receptive.