Passengers kept waiting in the wings

An airport departure lounge in the thunderstorm-prone summer afternoons is like a visit to a dental office in the US. You move to a smaller and smaller space for sessions of endless waiting. At times it is tantamount to waiting for a dentist called Godot to show up.

Last Thursday, I was to fly back to Beijing after hosting a forum at the 13th Shanghai International Film Festival. I heard from a friend that a storm in Beijing had caused chaos with flights. So, I had the festival double check before I left for the airport.

A volunteer diligently called up the airline and was told that my flight would take off as scheduled. However, when I arrived at the airport for my 2:50 pm flight, it was clear no aircraft could reach the capital any time soon. With a professional smile - or a smirk, to be more exact - the check-in lady advised me to change my flight or obtain a refund.

After a frantic bout of calls, I was driven back to the hotel by the festival organizer, who also took the trouble to rearrange a 10 o'clock flight the next morning.

There was no thunderstorm in Beijing on Friday and check-in was smooth. But come boarding time, there was an announcement that there was an aircraft maintenance problem and an indefinite delay.

Some passengers got into a brawl with the customer service personnel, who inadvertently disclosed that the aircraft had not returned to Shanghai the previous night, as it should have. So, they knew all along there was no way this flight would be on time. It appears they just wanted to have us all loitering around listlessly.

Finally, after another two-and-a-half-hour wait, we were allowed to board the plane. Some people started joyfully calling their friends.

"You might be unpleasantly surprised," I thought. And as expected, there was another announcement advising of a further delay.

Getting to Beijing on a summer afternoon has often been fraught with dramatic twists and turns. This was by no means my worst experience - or the lamest excuse.

As I have no ability to conquer nature, I can perfectly understand weather-induced delays. What is unforgivable is the way the airlines fool people into thinking everything is under control. Why not notify us through text messaging so that we can stay at home or in hotels - or take the train - instead of thinking of starting an uprising inside an airport terminal?

I believe I know the reason they act this way. I used to have a friend in the delivery business. He would call up his client to say that he would arrive in five minutes while in reality he was on the other side of town, and even under the best of circumstances it would take him one hour to arrive. The reason he lied was he did not want to lose that client.

Presumably it has never occurred to airline executives that a customer's time has value. They seem to take perverse delight in the hordes with hand luggage pacing around as if in a prison courtyard, totally vulnerable and unable to vent their frustrations. They also seem to relish the prospect of spinning excuses.

My most dramatic return to Beijing was a few years ago from Hangzhou. After several fits and starts, we finally left Hangzhou. But somewhere over northern Jiangsu, our plane was made to turn back, permitting me another look at my beautiful home province. And to further satiate my love for my hometown, I was kept on board throughout the night, for 16 hours. It was a journey to nowhere,

So, did I get to Beijing last Friday? I did - at 5:30 pm, exactly 24 hours after I was supposed to get there.

And I got to write this black comedy, with little imagination, courtesy of our airlines.

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