god bless america #1
A spur of the moment decision (more like, the travel agency rang a few days before departure and said, "Hey, those NYC tickets you asked for about a month ago? Someone cancelled on us and now they're available") led to a journey of many lessons......in which I've learnt that LAX hates me and America is a breeder of bad manners, bad taste, bad food, bad health and dead brain cells.
I'm going to split this into several posts. There's a lot to rant about.
Los Angeles airport
I hate LAX and by some law of conservation, it hates me too. I don't see why if you're going on a connecting flight in the same terminal there isn't an internal passage you can use. Instead, you have to go outside the terminal and hunt for that elusive escalator that takes you upstairs to the departure lounge, and of the 20 escalators and elevators that line the terminal......there's only one that goes upstairs. AND NONE OF THE STAFF KNOWS WHERE IT IS.
The first time I was in LAX several years ago, we nearly walked around to all the terminals (there are at least 7) before we found the one that connected QANTAS to AA. The wait was 14 hours. That was enough time for us to go to LA Kinokuniya by public transport and browse there and browse the Japanese supermarket next door and buy food there and eat there and catch the train back and go through immigration, and we still had time to spare.
The last time I was in LAX, it took us 2 hours to get out of the immigration. They had the foresight to man the immigration area with 2 people. It was lucky then that our connecting flight was 4 hours away.
This time our Sydney-LA flight was late by about 15 minutes and our connecting flight was boarding less than an hour after we got off the plane. That was a bad omen already. By Murphy's Law what can go wrong, must go wrong, and did. The stupid security computers refused to recognise my fingerprint. The n00b at the computer, who kept poking at the keyboard with two fingers and one thumb, gave me a glazed "omg-I-think-you're-a-terrorist" smile and said, "It's just a computer glitch."
Computer glitch my ass. Got escorted to secondary inspection. I got as far as, "Excuse me, I have a connecting flight at---" before the acid-faced man there snarled like some caffeine addict on withdrawal, "Just sit down, you'll have to go through here anyway."
...Look, you friggin butt-head, if I didn't think I'd have to go through there, I wouldn't bloody be there.
One nice Aussie compatriot offered to let me go first, but noooo, the acid-faced man said, "It'll be real quick."
Real quick my ass. There were 2 people before me, and they took 30 minutes processing them. The Asian chick who was on the computers had the free energy to talk about some fancy cocktail party. If it wasn't for those lovely curves of that handgun at her waist something very anatomical would have been snapped.....................
And me? They processed my file in about 3 minutes. Which pissed me off even more. All they asked were standard "what are you doing here", "when did you last come" and "what are you doing for work" questions.
Got out of there with 10 minutes to spare and firing expletives under my breath. Got to customs and the line was so long you couldn't even see the exit.
I missed my flight.
FARKING......STUPID........AIRPORT.
And the bloody hypocritical thing is......there wasn't even a security or immigration checkpoint on the way back to Australia.
That's not all (yes, there's more).
We got on the plane to Sydney, and it delayed its departure for about 15 minutes because 1) it wasn't sure if one of its passengers was onboard (seriously, what is the point of checking in then?!) and 2) it wasn't sure if its baggages were onboard......
That reminds me...LAX has one of the most retarded traffic systems in the world. There's always a traffic jam with planes all crammed on the same lane waiting to take-off. You'd think having 7 terminals would help them work around that problem. There was once we had to park. Yes, 3 Boeing 747's parked next to each other on the side of the take-off lane because there was no space to take off.
Anyhow...15 minutes after taxiing away from the terminal and waiting to take-off...the pilot realised that one of the plane's air valves was LEAKING. WTF. It's about time they replace all their ancient 747-400's with 777's, or at least 747-500's which at least has more leg room and chairs that actually reclined more than 5 degrees. The plane scrambled back to the terminal and was stuck there for another hour while the mechanics came onboard to fix it. Thus, we got to Sydney this morning at 7:40 instead of the scheduled 6:00. I feel for everyone who had connecting flights.
....Next time, I'll ask for a Sydney-NYC flight that changes at San Francisco. The suckiest parts of my trips to America always happen at LAX.
I'm going to split this into several posts. There's a lot to rant about.
Los Angeles airport
I hate LAX and by some law of conservation, it hates me too. I don't see why if you're going on a connecting flight in the same terminal there isn't an internal passage you can use. Instead, you have to go outside the terminal and hunt for that elusive escalator that takes you upstairs to the departure lounge, and of the 20 escalators and elevators that line the terminal......there's only one that goes upstairs. AND NONE OF THE STAFF KNOWS WHERE IT IS.
The first time I was in LAX several years ago, we nearly walked around to all the terminals (there are at least 7) before we found the one that connected QANTAS to AA. The wait was 14 hours. That was enough time for us to go to LA Kinokuniya by public transport and browse there and browse the Japanese supermarket next door and buy food there and eat there and catch the train back and go through immigration, and we still had time to spare.
The last time I was in LAX, it took us 2 hours to get out of the immigration. They had the foresight to man the immigration area with 2 people. It was lucky then that our connecting flight was 4 hours away.
This time our Sydney-LA flight was late by about 15 minutes and our connecting flight was boarding less than an hour after we got off the plane. That was a bad omen already. By Murphy's Law what can go wrong, must go wrong, and did. The stupid security computers refused to recognise my fingerprint. The n00b at the computer, who kept poking at the keyboard with two fingers and one thumb, gave me a glazed "omg-I-think-you're-a-terrorist" smile and said, "It's just a computer glitch."
Computer glitch my ass. Got escorted to secondary inspection. I got as far as, "Excuse me, I have a connecting flight at---" before the acid-faced man there snarled like some caffeine addict on withdrawal, "Just sit down, you'll have to go through here anyway."
...Look, you friggin butt-head, if I didn't think I'd have to go through there, I wouldn't bloody be there.
One nice Aussie compatriot offered to let me go first, but noooo, the acid-faced man said, "It'll be real quick."
Real quick my ass. There were 2 people before me, and they took 30 minutes processing them. The Asian chick who was on the computers had the free energy to talk about some fancy cocktail party. If it wasn't for those lovely curves of that handgun at her waist something very anatomical would have been snapped.....................
And me? They processed my file in about 3 minutes. Which pissed me off even more. All they asked were standard "what are you doing here", "when did you last come" and "what are you doing for work" questions.
Got out of there with 10 minutes to spare and firing expletives under my breath. Got to customs and the line was so long you couldn't even see the exit.
I missed my flight.
FARKING......STUPID........AIRPORT.
And the bloody hypocritical thing is......there wasn't even a security or immigration checkpoint on the way back to Australia.
That's not all (yes, there's more).
We got on the plane to Sydney, and it delayed its departure for about 15 minutes because 1) it wasn't sure if one of its passengers was onboard (seriously, what is the point of checking in then?!) and 2) it wasn't sure if its baggages were onboard......
That reminds me...LAX has one of the most retarded traffic systems in the world. There's always a traffic jam with planes all crammed on the same lane waiting to take-off. You'd think having 7 terminals would help them work around that problem. There was once we had to park. Yes, 3 Boeing 747's parked next to each other on the side of the take-off lane because there was no space to take off.
Anyhow...15 minutes after taxiing away from the terminal and waiting to take-off...the pilot realised that one of the plane's air valves was LEAKING. WTF. It's about time they replace all their ancient 747-400's with 777's, or at least 747-500's which at least has more leg room and chairs that actually reclined more than 5 degrees. The plane scrambled back to the terminal and was stuck there for another hour while the mechanics came onboard to fix it. Thus, we got to Sydney this morning at 7:40 instead of the scheduled 6:00. I feel for everyone who had connecting flights.
....Next time, I'll ask for a Sydney-NYC flight that changes at San Francisco. The suckiest parts of my trips to America always happen at LAX.