Trip to Canada: Arrival Experience
This is the first part in a 3 part series on my 17 day adventure in Eastern Canada. It is almost entirely true. Some fictional aspects have been added here and there for entertainment value…but for the most part, the following actually happened. This is going to be in a running diary format.
4/19/11- 12pm
Flying from Phoenix to Chicago… Sitting on the aisle with an empty seat between myself and an older woman at the window, which is a fortuitous start to the journey. The woman next to me struggles to find her seat belt, I wait a few minutes as she wonders aloud to no one in particular where her seat belt has gone, before mentioning that I think it is hiding underneath her bottom. She was indeed sitting on it. 1st mystery solved. This United flight had a video presentation on the safety features of the plane, which I thought was quite lazy on their part. I mean the flight attendants were just sitting there as the video was going on, so it’s not like they were being more efficient by playing it while they did something else…
During the flight, an episode of the Office is shown. It’s the one where Andy is in the play. The same play that Michael auditioned for but didn’t get a part in. It was great, but I felt awkward laughing, as everyone that was watching was wearing headphones, and anyone not wearing headphones, clearly didn’t care how funny it was.
Next feature was the movie the Tourist. “Seat Belt Lady” loves The Tourist. She has it on DVD at home. For an “in flight” movie, I didn’t have issue with it, but I just kept thinking back to the Golden Globes commentary by Ricky Gervais…he didn’t like it.
Following The Tourist, they started to show an episode of Parks and Rec, but it got turned off in the middle as we were preparing to make our descent. Seat Belt Lady didn’t like the teaser one bit.
A few rows ahead of me, the flight attendant was giving a passenger a few huffs on a portable oxygen tank. Then the announcement came over the PA that once we landed we would have to wait for the EMT crew to board the plane before anyone was allowed to get off. After the announcement, there were audible groans coming from the other passengers. Really?? Someone is clearly in need of medical attention and you’re upset, because their health situation may cause you to miss your starbucks run prior to your next flight?? Amazing.
I hear a conversation a few rows behind me, where a girl is talking to a couple who is worried about missing their connecting flight (which is still an hour away). The girl tries to calm them by telling a story of one of her friends who had to catch a connecting flight right away, and the crew let them use the emergency inflatable slide to get off the plane and on to her connection. She said maybe they would let them do that in this case as well. First off, in my mind I immediately call BS, because I’m sorry to say, this girl’s “friend” is a complete liar. What airline lets passengers just open the emergency exit, pull the chord for the slide, and jump down it, just so they can make their connection?? But that doesn’t seem to stop the girl from stopping the flight attendant and saying “hey, they have a connecting flight in an hour, is there any way they can get off the plane now? The flight attendant replied with a “No, I’m sorry, no one can deplane until the EMTs give us clearance.” You could tell she wanted to say “didn’t you hear??-An Ambulance is on its way. No one can leave until they save this person’s life. Sorry it’s an inconvenience for you, would you like some more peanuts to get you by until you can go on with your self-absorbed life?” amazing.
After about 15 minutes, the Ambulance arrives, and takes the passenger off. I have an hour and a half until my connecting flight to Halifax, so I start to play some pga tour on my phone. I’m playing a PGA tour event at St. Andrews, and it’s a tough field…
5:30pm, waiting for some lightning to clear before take-off. Tiny Tiny plane. Packed, I’ve got a Mom traveling with a toddler in front of me, and a Couple traveling with a toddler behind me. Should be an interesting flight. 2 hours, later, still sitting in the airplane waiting to take-off. Captain lets us know that Canadian Customs is not going to wait for us, so our flight is cancelled. Everyone gets off the plane and goes to stand in line with the passengers from the 70 other flights that had been cancelled. The line is 300 yards long-no lie.
9:45pm-
I finally reach a customer service agent, who has clearly been through the ringer a few times. People were understandably very perturbed at the cancellation, but honestly, what good does it do to take it out on some stranger sitting at a computer. Yvonne was pleasantly surprised that I was not yelling at her. I joked with her for a few minutes while she found me a new flight. This one would go through Boston tomorrow, putting me into Halifax at 8:30pm. Not ideal, but nothing else I could do, so I took my ticket and went to find sleeping arrangements. I booked a Courtyard 8 miles from the Airport. I walked outside to meet a Taxi and for the first time felt the Chicago Air on my face…it was 34 degrees…And I was in shorts and a t-shirt. The airline wouldn’t let me get my bags back, so I was kind of stuck with what was on my back.
4/20- 11am
Security line at O’Hare was moving at a snail’s pace. Went through the line that required the full body scan with the puffs of air… Then a TSA agent called me over to frisk me. I don’t know if it was the fact that I was wearing the same set of clothes for the second day in a row, or the notion that I didn’t look suspicious, because she was kind enough to waive me on without the full cavity search-thankfully!
12:45pm
Fly to Boston without incident. I slept part of the way, and listened to my ipod for the rest of the way.
After arriving in Boston, I had to go from one end of the airport to the other it seemed. After getting lost and passing the same airport chapel 3 times, I asked someone for directions. They literally gave me an 8 step tutorial to get to the Air Canada terminal. No simple, make a left down the hall, take the escalator up to the 3rd floor, hang a right. You’ll see it on the left. Nope, this was something like, “Go past the first set of stairs, hang a right, take the escalator down to the 1st floor, pass the construction zone, go up two flights of stairs, take a right, walk to the 2nd Starbucks kiosk, look for a guy named Swenson, give him a high five with your left hand, turn 196 degrees, follow the path to Terminal B-once there, go up one more set of stairs, cross through the parking garage, and you’ll see it on the right.”
Since getting to the Air Canada terminal required me to seemingly leave the city of Boston, I had to go through security yet again…awesome. By this time, I’m starting to feel a little congested and I have a sore throat. Not a good sign. Air Canada’s terminal is tiny at Logan International Airport. I find an uninhabited corner and curl up with my laptop, while I try to charge my phone and not sneeze or cough on anyone.
6:18pm (supposed boarding time)-
Announcement comes over the PA that our plane has not yet arrived, but we anticipate boarding in 30 minutes. An hour later, we are boarding. I’m exhausted, once airborne; I turn on my ipod and sink into my chair. Thankfully, there is no one beside me on this leg of the trip. I stretch my legs into the adjoining side and stare out the window. Here are some of the songs that the shuffle playlist had in store for me while in the air. “Alone by Heart” “Here I go Again by Whitesnake” “Home by Michael Buble” and “I’ll make love to you by Boys II Men” (not really fitting for my current situation, but B2M is amazing).
As we start to make our descent, I look out the window. We start to come down through the clouds and it’s raining. The rain hits the wing and starts to freeze a little as it runs down the side...that’s interesting, I think to myself. I start to gather my things and notice my left foot is kind of wet, as is my backpack…what is that??? Turns out the lady in front of me (who was 8 months pregnant) happened to have her water break as we were making our descent…fantastic news!
We land and taxi up to the jetway. The captain comes on to say that they just need to find the piece that allows us to hook on to the jetway and we’ll be able to get off. That’s reassuring…we’re missing a piece of the plane?
After 20 minutes of waiting, they finally are able to get us off the plane.
It’s 9:45pm local time, I’m tired, but happy that I made it safely.
There were 3 customs agents still working, and I got the cranky one. She was not nice at all. I gave her my customs declaration card and she inquired as to the reason for my trip. “I’m working for 2 weeks”
“You’ll have to be more specific” she snaps at me
“I work for Marriott, I’m coming to work at the Harbourfront Hotel”
“More SPECIFIC! What are you doing at this hotel?”
“I don’t know yet, they haven’t told me.”
She just stares at me this time.
“I am going to be managing the front desk of this hotel for 2 weeks”
“You’ll have to speak with Immigration. Go down that hallway, it’s on the right.”
So as everyone else went on their merry way, I made my way to the Immigration office. The lady at the desk was wearing a full on bullet proof vest and looked about as happy as the lady I just spoke to. She finished with the guy in front of me, and I approached her window.
“don’t approach the window yet. Please back up!”
I look around me, there’s no one but me and her, but I follow her direction and take two steps back. She goes back to typing something.
A nice gentleman finally comes out and helps me. “Do you have your work orders?”
“Nope, didn’t know I needed any. Can I email them to you?”
“No, we can’t accept an email, but you can fax it to us.”
So I go sit back down, pull out my laptop, pray that they have free wifi (which they do :) and pull up my emails. I call the hotel, ask if they can fax back this email I’m about to send them, so I can be allowed to enter the country.
30 minutes and $150 CAD later (I had to purchase a 2 week work permit), I was allowed to enter Canadian soil. The only problem is, my bags have not entered Canadian soil yet. The baggage guy tells me my luggage should be arriving from Chicago in the next hour or so, and that he will bring it to the hotel.
I go outside, get my cab, and head to the hotel to check in. I had arrived. What was supposed to be 12 hours of total travel time turned into 30…but I was there.
Hello Canada, Prepare to have your dreams come true!
This is the first part in a 3 part series on my 17 day adventure in Eastern Canada. It is almost entirely true. Some fictional aspects have been added here and there for entertainment value…but for the most part, the following actually happened. This is going to be in a running diary format.
4/19/11- 12pm
Flying from Phoenix to Chicago… Sitting on the aisle with an empty seat between myself and an older woman at the window, which is a fortuitous start to the journey. The woman next to me struggles to find her seat belt, I wait a few minutes as she wonders aloud to no one in particular where her seat belt has gone, before mentioning that I think it is hiding underneath her bottom. She was indeed sitting on it. 1st mystery solved. This United flight had a video presentation on the safety features of the plane, which I thought was quite lazy on their part. I mean the flight attendants were just sitting there as the video was going on, so it’s not like they were being more efficient by playing it while they did something else…
During the flight, an episode of the Office is shown. It’s the one where Andy is in the play. The same play that Michael auditioned for but didn’t get a part in. It was great, but I felt awkward laughing, as everyone that was watching was wearing headphones, and anyone not wearing headphones, clearly didn’t care how funny it was.
Next feature was the movie the Tourist. “Seat Belt Lady” loves The Tourist. She has it on DVD at home. For an “in flight” movie, I didn’t have issue with it, but I just kept thinking back to the Golden Globes commentary by Ricky Gervais…he didn’t like it.
Following The Tourist, they started to show an episode of Parks and Rec, but it got turned off in the middle as we were preparing to make our descent. Seat Belt Lady didn’t like the teaser one bit.
A few rows ahead of me, the flight attendant was giving a passenger a few huffs on a portable oxygen tank. Then the announcement came over the PA that once we landed we would have to wait for the EMT crew to board the plane before anyone was allowed to get off. After the announcement, there were audible groans coming from the other passengers. Really?? Someone is clearly in need of medical attention and you’re upset, because their health situation may cause you to miss your starbucks run prior to your next flight?? Amazing.
I hear a conversation a few rows behind me, where a girl is talking to a couple who is worried about missing their connecting flight (which is still an hour away). The girl tries to calm them by telling a story of one of her friends who had to catch a connecting flight right away, and the crew let them use the emergency inflatable slide to get off the plane and on to her connection. She said maybe they would let them do that in this case as well. First off, in my mind I immediately call BS, because I’m sorry to say, this girl’s “friend” is a complete liar. What airline lets passengers just open the emergency exit, pull the chord for the slide, and jump down it, just so they can make their connection?? But that doesn’t seem to stop the girl from stopping the flight attendant and saying “hey, they have a connecting flight in an hour, is there any way they can get off the plane now? The flight attendant replied with a “No, I’m sorry, no one can deplane until the EMTs give us clearance.” You could tell she wanted to say “didn’t you hear??-An Ambulance is on its way. No one can leave until they save this person’s life. Sorry it’s an inconvenience for you, would you like some more peanuts to get you by until you can go on with your self-absorbed life?” amazing.
After about 15 minutes, the Ambulance arrives, and takes the passenger off. I have an hour and a half until my connecting flight to Halifax, so I start to play some pga tour on my phone. I’m playing a PGA tour event at St. Andrews, and it’s a tough field…
5:30pm, waiting for some lightning to clear before take-off. Tiny Tiny plane. Packed, I’ve got a Mom traveling with a toddler in front of me, and a Couple traveling with a toddler behind me. Should be an interesting flight. 2 hours, later, still sitting in the airplane waiting to take-off. Captain lets us know that Canadian Customs is not going to wait for us, so our flight is cancelled. Everyone gets off the plane and goes to stand in line with the passengers from the 70 other flights that had been cancelled. The line is 300 yards long-no lie.
9:45pm-
I finally reach a customer service agent, who has clearly been through the ringer a few times. People were understandably very perturbed at the cancellation, but honestly, what good does it do to take it out on some stranger sitting at a computer. Yvonne was pleasantly surprised that I was not yelling at her. I joked with her for a few minutes while she found me a new flight. This one would go through Boston tomorrow, putting me into Halifax at 8:30pm. Not ideal, but nothing else I could do, so I took my ticket and went to find sleeping arrangements. I booked a Courtyard 8 miles from the Airport. I walked outside to meet a Taxi and for the first time felt the Chicago Air on my face…it was 34 degrees…And I was in shorts and a t-shirt. The airline wouldn’t let me get my bags back, so I was kind of stuck with what was on my back.
4/20- 11am
Security line at O’Hare was moving at a snail’s pace. Went through the line that required the full body scan with the puffs of air… Then a TSA agent called me over to frisk me. I don’t know if it was the fact that I was wearing the same set of clothes for the second day in a row, or the notion that I didn’t look suspicious, because she was kind enough to waive me on without the full cavity search-thankfully!
12:45pm
Fly to Boston without incident. I slept part of the way, and listened to my ipod for the rest of the way.
After arriving in Boston, I had to go from one end of the airport to the other it seemed. After getting lost and passing the same airport chapel 3 times, I asked someone for directions. They literally gave me an 8 step tutorial to get to the Air Canada terminal. No simple, make a left down the hall, take the escalator up to the 3rd floor, hang a right. You’ll see it on the left. Nope, this was something like, “Go past the first set of stairs, hang a right, take the escalator down to the 1st floor, pass the construction zone, go up two flights of stairs, take a right, walk to the 2nd Starbucks kiosk, look for a guy named Swenson, give him a high five with your left hand, turn 196 degrees, follow the path to Terminal B-once there, go up one more set of stairs, cross through the parking garage, and you’ll see it on the right.”
Since getting to the Air Canada terminal required me to seemingly leave the city of Boston, I had to go through security yet again…awesome. By this time, I’m starting to feel a little congested and I have a sore throat. Not a good sign. Air Canada’s terminal is tiny at Logan International Airport. I find an uninhabited corner and curl up with my laptop, while I try to charge my phone and not sneeze or cough on anyone.
6:18pm (supposed boarding time)-
Announcement comes over the PA that our plane has not yet arrived, but we anticipate boarding in 30 minutes. An hour later, we are boarding. I’m exhausted, once airborne; I turn on my ipod and sink into my chair. Thankfully, there is no one beside me on this leg of the trip. I stretch my legs into the adjoining side and stare out the window. Here are some of the songs that the shuffle playlist had in store for me while in the air. “Alone by Heart” “Here I go Again by Whitesnake” “Home by Michael Buble” and “I’ll make love to you by Boys II Men” (not really fitting for my current situation, but B2M is amazing).
As we start to make our descent, I look out the window. We start to come down through the clouds and it’s raining. The rain hits the wing and starts to freeze a little as it runs down the side...that’s interesting, I think to myself. I start to gather my things and notice my left foot is kind of wet, as is my backpack…what is that??? Turns out the lady in front of me (who was 8 months pregnant) happened to have her water break as we were making our descent…fantastic news!
We land and taxi up to the jetway. The captain comes on to say that they just need to find the piece that allows us to hook on to the jetway and we’ll be able to get off. That’s reassuring…we’re missing a piece of the plane?
After 20 minutes of waiting, they finally are able to get us off the plane.
It’s 9:45pm local time, I’m tired, but happy that I made it safely.
There were 3 customs agents still working, and I got the cranky one. She was not nice at all. I gave her my customs declaration card and she inquired as to the reason for my trip. “I’m working for 2 weeks”
“You’ll have to be more specific” she snaps at me
“I work for Marriott, I’m coming to work at the Harbourfront Hotel”
“More SPECIFIC! What are you doing at this hotel?”
“I don’t know yet, they haven’t told me.”
She just stares at me this time.
“I am going to be managing the front desk of this hotel for 2 weeks”
“You’ll have to speak with Immigration. Go down that hallway, it’s on the right.”
So as everyone else went on their merry way, I made my way to the Immigration office. The lady at the desk was wearing a full on bullet proof vest and looked about as happy as the lady I just spoke to. She finished with the guy in front of me, and I approached her window.
“don’t approach the window yet. Please back up!”
I look around me, there’s no one but me and her, but I follow her direction and take two steps back. She goes back to typing something.
A nice gentleman finally comes out and helps me. “Do you have your work orders?”
“Nope, didn’t know I needed any. Can I email them to you?”
“No, we can’t accept an email, but you can fax it to us.”
So I go sit back down, pull out my laptop, pray that they have free wifi (which they do :) and pull up my emails. I call the hotel, ask if they can fax back this email I’m about to send them, so I can be allowed to enter the country.
30 minutes and $150 CAD later (I had to purchase a 2 week work permit), I was allowed to enter Canadian soil. The only problem is, my bags have not entered Canadian soil yet. The baggage guy tells me my luggage should be arriving from Chicago in the next hour or so, and that he will bring it to the hotel.
I go outside, get my cab, and head to the hotel to check in. I had arrived. What was supposed to be 12 hours of total travel time turned into 30…but I was there.
Hello Canada, Prepare to have your dreams come true!
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