The Sordid Saga of my Suitcase

After having spent two great days at Lyon, K and I left for the airport with an excited anticipation running through our veins, for Barcelona was to be the high-point of our trip, especially for K. We reached the airport, checked-in and took off with a slight delay, nevertheless looking forward to Spain with enthusiasm…half an hour into the flight (and just another 40 minutes short of arriving at Barcelona), we were informed that we’d have to return to Lyon because of technical problems…so about-turn and we reached Lyon at our scheduled arrival time for Barcelona! A little re-thinking will have to be done for today’s itinerary because of this slight delay, we said to ourselves. After waiting over two hours Air France finally informed us that the next flight to Barcelona is full, so we would have to go there via Madrid - and would reach there at 19:30 instead of the initially planned 10:30! Considering that we didn’t have much of a choice, we accepted, extending (?) our stay in Barcelona by one day and thus changing our tickets to Bordeaux, and shortening our stay there!

We reached Madrid, ensured that Air France and the next airlines Span Air (an airline company at the same level as our good old Air Deccan - worse in my opinion!) would see to it that our bags were transferred and boarded the flight, which was over an hour late - once aboard we were once again informed that there are technical problems and so there would be some more delays! Amazing isn’t it? But the story doesn’t end there…so we tell ourselves that nothing could possible go wrong after this and reach Barcelona at 21:10…after much confusion about where we could collect our bags, we started looking for our bags…which don’t seem to have arrived! It was like a nightmare coming true!

After registering a complaint for the loss of bags, during which my heart kept sinking further and further seeing the number of bags lying in enormous piles all over the bloody airport, we finally exited the airport around 22:20, having lost an entire day! K’s bag reached the next day, but mine didn’t reach till the day we were due to leave and neither company was willing to take responsibility - so I left Barcelona with 3 pairs of clothing which I proceeded to wash, re-wash and wear for the rest of the trip…

My bag reached Barcelona, the evening I left (4th August) and with much relief, I asked my friend to have it forwarded to Paris, hoping it would be there by the time I got back from Cologne. After having waited 10 days for my bag, I finally went to the airport on the 11th, hoping to return triumphantly with my bag in tow…little did I know that Lady Luck wasn’t feeling particularly happy with me…

Kitana and I reached there around 11:00 and spent the whole of the day at Charles de Gaulle, going from terminal 3 to terminal 1 to terminal 2 to terminal 1 to terminal 3 to terminal 1 to terminal 3. It took us over two hours and inquiring at innumerable counters and asking innumerable people to find out that my bag has reached Paris! Triumph, short-lived happiness… because we were then informed that I would still not be able to lay hands on my eagerly awaited Delsey because of some ridiculous bureaucratic procedures…it seems Lufthansa brought the bag to Paris and Swissport is the agency that contacts and delivers the bag to the passenger…now Lufthansa is at terminal 1 and Swissport at terminal 3 (which incidentally are next to each other) but yet another company is responsible for taking the bag from terminal 1 to terminal 3 and apparently that is at terminal 2…let’s complicate things further shall we? So it appears that thousands of bags are lost everyday, despite all that elaborate checking-in procedure and all those labels and it takes them a minimum of a week to process all the bags received at CdG Paris, make an inventory and then forward them to Swissport…as a result Swissport on the 11th of August had received bags that had reached Paris on the 2nd of August! Unbelievable isn’t it? I offered to hunt through the thousands of bags myself, but they couldn’t authorize me to do so - after all I could be a terrorist couldn’t I? In the end I left the airport, defeated, frustrated, angry, and completely exhausted wondering what I’d done to deserve this turn of events that turned my dream vacation into a nightmarish bag-hunt and that had its toll even on K’s vacation and his very first trip to Europe.

Everyone told me to look at it like an adventure and we did initially, but the adventure died somewhere between Barcelona and Paris…they kept telling me that it was just a bag with some clothes, that my family wouldn’t be upset if I returned without gifts for I’d already bought most of them, that they were merely material possessions! How can I possibly not worry about my things? How do I explain to them the value of those possessions - not just monetarily (it would be a huge blow if they were truly lost) but also emotionally? How will I ever be able to replace that gorgeous top Papa brought back from Budapest? Or the manicure set he brought back from Italy? Or the Swarowski earrings that he brought for Ma on his first few trips and which she gifted to me some years back? How will I ever replace those things that he gave me, things I will never ever give away or throw away? How will I possibly replace the bag itself, which was Papa’s and represented to me my father’s trips to Europe, a legacy that I want to carry forward? How could I possibly continue to enjoy myself, and spend money without thinking more than twice each time I reached for my wallet? And how could I not feel bad about having to ask friends to run around and endure the endless bureaucratic procedures so that I receive my bag?

I have returned to Pune without my bag, entrusting Kitana with the honoured task of ensuring my bag is forwarded to Bombay, praying it reaches there safe and sound within the next few days - it’s been over a fortnight since I’ve returned (and exactly a month since my bag was first lost) and there is still no news of my bag…and that is the wonderfully sordid saga of my suitcase!

I knew that I’d experience and learn a lot during this trip, but that I’d experience this much, I had no idea! I’m not sure I wanted to experience all of this and am not sure when I’ll be able to look back at it as an enriching experience or laugh it off…as of now, my only desire is to hear that my bag has safely reached Bombay and to see it in my house, open it and reassure myself that everything that I put inside is still there! Even though the sight of my mother at the Bombay airport provided the much-needed solace and comfort I was aching ever since I realized my bag hasn’t reached Barcelona and even though being back home has taken the edge of the constantly nagging thought that ran parallel to everything else I thought about during my trip, I am still not entirely at peace…waiting to hear from Kitana that my bag is on its way home. Hope it’s soon! *Crossing my fingers*