of course noam keeps updating posts about our trip, and I myself am working on a hostel review post, but in the meantime... food
יום רביעי, 18 בנובמבר 2009
back to basics- food
of course noam keeps updating posts about our trip, and I myself am working on a hostel review post, but in the meantime... food
he's a god in Japan
our new obssesion which helps numb the pain of reality and everyday life
Red Band.
first thing, respect to the guys who created the whole concept The Puppet Folk Revival
and a little clip to demonstrate our point:
now if only the suits in HOT would realize there is nothing on in the rest of the 999 channels and move the show out of the VOD everybody would be happy
Red Band.
first thing, respect to the guys who created the whole concept The Puppet Folk Revival
and a little clip to demonstrate our point:
now if only the suits in HOT would realize there is nothing on in the rest of the 999 channels and move the show out of the VOD everybody would be happy
useless ranting
Well, let's first start with some complaining:
(DESCLAIMER: I am going to complain about the last week of the trip, mostly about our travel agency. you can skip to the last bit if you are not interested in reading this)
Well, at the beginning we bought two tickets for 4 months. May 1st -> August 31st. We never actually planned to stay in Europe for that long. We just wanted to have some future date for our flight back, which we could easily change when we finally decide it's time to get back home. We were told that we would just have to pay a $100 fine each for changing the dates.
After about a week on the camino, we have made this decision, and tried arranging our flight back to Israel for the end of July. We wanted to continue walking until we get to Leon, then head down for a couple of days in Madrid, visit Bilbao maybe, and have a few more days in Barcelona to wrap things up easily.
We emailed Tata from Guliver (Our travel agency) and asked her what we should do about it, and she said we should just contact Swiss in Barcelona, and have them change our flight date.
We first tried contacting Swiss from Burgos, at the 18th. Well, I screwed up by not taking the tickets with us to the trail, and only having scanned pdf file of them. And we didn't have Acrobat Reader in Burgos to see the scans. The agent at Swiss asked for the "Fare Basis", and we had to sms back home for someone to look at the tickets and find it for us. We only got it the following day. At the morning of the 19th we called with the much needed "Fare Basis", and now the agent told us he needed something called the "Ticket Number". We tried getting it straight away, but the tickets had no "Ticket Number" printed on them, So we asked Tata about it, and left Burgos for a nice 30Km day.
In Hontanas, on that night, we tried calling Swiss again. This time we had the magic "PNR" number, which should have made everything possible. The agent was not impressed, and said he still needs the "Ticket Number", and can't do anything with our tickets without it. All along each agent kept insisting that it was not our job trying to change the ticket dates, and we should have the travel agency do it for us. Tata was supposed to also try and contact Swiss/Lufthansa.
Several days passed, and still no magic ticket appeared at our horizon. Tata said that if she kept on trying getting us the ticket, it will do more harm than good. I still don't know what that means. Harm to her, probably. We were still stuck in Spain.
From Carrión de los Condes we talked to Swiss again, and offered to send them the scan of the tickets, so they can see all the details for themselves. The agent said we can send it in, but that she doesn't see how it may help. We sent it. No answer followed.
After getting to Terradillos de los Templarios we decided we will not keep on walking into Leon (3 more days of walking), but instead just catch a bus there from Sahagún (on the following day), and try talking to Swiss again. We were already depressed from all this mess, and gave up on the trail.
In Leon we finally had the bright idea to ask Guy if he can have a look at the ticket, and try to help us as well. We also tried talking to Swiss once again, after Guy gave us the famous "Ticket Number" which just appears at the top of the ticket (Without any label stating that this is, in fact, the ticket number) and so we got the definitive answer from Swiss that they can't do anything about it, and we should talk to Lufthansa. The annoying agent from Lufthansa was a complete bitch, and told us that they have no contract with us, don't owe us anything, and can't do anything to help us. Die, bitch, die. I called Guliver, and their agent insisted that it was very unusual for both airlines to not offer us any help, that it is quite normal for people to change flight dates by themselves, and that it is no problem at all, and Guliver will finally change our flight dates first thing on the next morning. All the other agents we have talked to (From Swiss and Lufthansa) kept telling us that our travel agency should contact them, and not us directly.
Guy also tried talking to both Swiss and Lufthansa (Thank you very much for all the international calls you made for us that evening), and reached the conclusion that our flight tickets are worth nothing, and can never be changed (The also say "Not changable" on the tickets themselves, but I thought all along that it means we can change it after paying the fine). He advised us to try and have our fare basis upgraded, and pay for the difference.
On that day we decided we will head back to Barcelona, and just go to the Swiss counter at the airport. It was a lot of fun being on a bus ride for 10:30 hours (Overnight from Leon), get to the hostel where we couldn't get into a room to shower (Check in is only after 14:00), and then go to the airport after 40+ hours of no shower, 30+ hours of no real sleep, and also a short walk of 13Km (Which was quite easy, admittedly).
The guy at the Swiss counter was very very nice, but he told us that this is a Lufthansa ticket and he can't do anything with it. He agreed to talk to Tata on the phone, and told her that she should try talking to Lufthansa directly. He told us that by the way she reacted, she was quite sure it was very possible and easy to change our flight date. Any decent travel agent would have seen the "Not Changable" print on the tickets, and undestood that this is not the case.
She told us to wait while she calls Lufthansa, and we sat at the airport for another hour and a half, and finally called her back. She was just on the phone with Lufthansa, and after several minutes she told us that yes - finally - the tickets are not changable at all. They worth totally nothing to us, dated for the 31st of August, and she will see what she can do so we won't be stuck in Barcelona for 5 more weeks.
We waited for another hour or so, and called her back. She had the nerve to offer us a ticket with Czech Airlines for $500+ each. That's over $1,000 for us to pay, for Guliver mistake in selling us a non changable ticket! I told her I don't care about the price, and that I will not pay anything for their mistakes. They can buy us any ticket they want in order to get us to Israel as soon as possible. She let me talk to her supervisor, Nitzan, who straight away promised me Guliver will not pay anything for us to come back home, and it was strictly our own problem that we bought non changable tickets. He just ignored the simple fact that what we ordered from Guliver were clearly changable tickets, as can also be seen from their own surprise at the fact that they were non changable after all. The idiots have made a mistake, and now we were to pay for it! I promised him back that I will not buy tickets from them back to Israel, and that he will hear from us when we are back home.
We then made a survey at all the counters, and found that Swiss has the cheapest flight to Israel that same evening. 380 euro per person. We bought those tickets, and were already on the train back to the city (For a quick shower and then running back to catch our flight), when we got a call from Guliver, and Einat told us she has two tickets for us for the following day, at $150, with Arkia. This was only $50 more over the supposed fine for changing the dates, and our nerves were quite ruined, as was the ending of our vacation, so we thought it was not the worst deal possible. The trouble was the fact we had just now bought two tickets for 760 euros at the Swiss counter. She told us that electronic tickets bought at the counter are completely refundable on the same day, and we were very sceptic about it. Apparently she was right - after a short phone call to Swiss, we managed to complete void the transaction as if it never happaned, and then we finished off by buying the Arkia tickets.
Phew, what a terrible story.
We ended up enjoying our final day and a half in Barcelona, relaxing a bit, and not being at a complete nervous breakdown. That is also something.
(DESCLAIMER: I am going to complain about the last week of the trip, mostly about our travel agency. you can skip to the last bit if you are not interested in reading this)
Well, at the beginning we bought two tickets for 4 months. May 1st -> August 31st. We never actually planned to stay in Europe for that long. We just wanted to have some future date for our flight back, which we could easily change when we finally decide it's time to get back home. We were told that we would just have to pay a $100 fine each for changing the dates.
After about a week on the camino, we have made this decision, and tried arranging our flight back to Israel for the end of July. We wanted to continue walking until we get to Leon, then head down for a couple of days in Madrid, visit Bilbao maybe, and have a few more days in Barcelona to wrap things up easily.
We emailed Tata from Guliver (Our travel agency) and asked her what we should do about it, and she said we should just contact Swiss in Barcelona, and have them change our flight date.
We first tried contacting Swiss from Burgos, at the 18th. Well, I screwed up by not taking the tickets with us to the trail, and only having scanned pdf file of them. And we didn't have Acrobat Reader in Burgos to see the scans. The agent at Swiss asked for the "Fare Basis", and we had to sms back home for someone to look at the tickets and find it for us. We only got it the following day. At the morning of the 19th we called with the much needed "Fare Basis", and now the agent told us he needed something called the "Ticket Number". We tried getting it straight away, but the tickets had no "Ticket Number" printed on them, So we asked Tata about it, and left Burgos for a nice 30Km day.
In Hontanas, on that night, we tried calling Swiss again. This time we had the magic "PNR" number, which should have made everything possible. The agent was not impressed, and said he still needs the "Ticket Number", and can't do anything with our tickets without it. All along each agent kept insisting that it was not our job trying to change the ticket dates, and we should have the travel agency do it for us. Tata was supposed to also try and contact Swiss/Lufthansa.
Several days passed, and still no magic ticket appeared at our horizon. Tata said that if she kept on trying getting us the ticket, it will do more harm than good. I still don't know what that means. Harm to her, probably. We were still stuck in Spain.
From Carrión de los Condes we talked to Swiss again, and offered to send them the scan of the tickets, so they can see all the details for themselves. The agent said we can send it in, but that she doesn't see how it may help. We sent it. No answer followed.
After getting to Terradillos de los Templarios we decided we will not keep on walking into Leon (3 more days of walking), but instead just catch a bus there from Sahagún (on the following day), and try talking to Swiss again. We were already depressed from all this mess, and gave up on the trail.
In Leon we finally had the bright idea to ask Guy if he can have a look at the ticket, and try to help us as well. We also tried talking to Swiss once again, after Guy gave us the famous "Ticket Number" which just appears at the top of the ticket (Without any label stating that this is, in fact, the ticket number) and so we got the definitive answer from Swiss that they can't do anything about it, and we should talk to Lufthansa. The annoying agent from Lufthansa was a complete bitch, and told us that they have no contract with us, don't owe us anything, and can't do anything to help us. Die, bitch, die. I called Guliver, and their agent insisted that it was very unusual for both airlines to not offer us any help, that it is quite normal for people to change flight dates by themselves, and that it is no problem at all, and Guliver will finally change our flight dates first thing on the next morning. All the other agents we have talked to (From Swiss and Lufthansa) kept telling us that our travel agency should contact them, and not us directly.
Guy also tried talking to both Swiss and Lufthansa (Thank you very much for all the international calls you made for us that evening), and reached the conclusion that our flight tickets are worth nothing, and can never be changed (The also say "Not changable" on the tickets themselves, but I thought all along that it means we can change it after paying the fine). He advised us to try and have our fare basis upgraded, and pay for the difference.
On that day we decided we will head back to Barcelona, and just go to the Swiss counter at the airport. It was a lot of fun being on a bus ride for 10:30 hours (Overnight from Leon), get to the hostel where we couldn't get into a room to shower (Check in is only after 14:00), and then go to the airport after 40+ hours of no shower, 30+ hours of no real sleep, and also a short walk of 13Km (Which was quite easy, admittedly).
The guy at the Swiss counter was very very nice, but he told us that this is a Lufthansa ticket and he can't do anything with it. He agreed to talk to Tata on the phone, and told her that she should try talking to Lufthansa directly. He told us that by the way she reacted, she was quite sure it was very possible and easy to change our flight date. Any decent travel agent would have seen the "Not Changable" print on the tickets, and undestood that this is not the case.
She told us to wait while she calls Lufthansa, and we sat at the airport for another hour and a half, and finally called her back. She was just on the phone with Lufthansa, and after several minutes she told us that yes - finally - the tickets are not changable at all. They worth totally nothing to us, dated for the 31st of August, and she will see what she can do so we won't be stuck in Barcelona for 5 more weeks.
We waited for another hour or so, and called her back. She had the nerve to offer us a ticket with Czech Airlines for $500+ each. That's over $1,000 for us to pay, for Guliver mistake in selling us a non changable ticket! I told her I don't care about the price, and that I will not pay anything for their mistakes. They can buy us any ticket they want in order to get us to Israel as soon as possible. She let me talk to her supervisor, Nitzan, who straight away promised me Guliver will not pay anything for us to come back home, and it was strictly our own problem that we bought non changable tickets. He just ignored the simple fact that what we ordered from Guliver were clearly changable tickets, as can also be seen from their own surprise at the fact that they were non changable after all. The idiots have made a mistake, and now we were to pay for it! I promised him back that I will not buy tickets from them back to Israel, and that he will hear from us when we are back home.
We then made a survey at all the counters, and found that Swiss has the cheapest flight to Israel that same evening. 380 euro per person. We bought those tickets, and were already on the train back to the city (For a quick shower and then running back to catch our flight), when we got a call from Guliver, and Einat told us she has two tickets for us for the following day, at $150, with Arkia. This was only $50 more over the supposed fine for changing the dates, and our nerves were quite ruined, as was the ending of our vacation, so we thought it was not the worst deal possible. The trouble was the fact we had just now bought two tickets for 760 euros at the Swiss counter. She told us that electronic tickets bought at the counter are completely refundable on the same day, and we were very sceptic about it. Apparently she was right - after a short phone call to Swiss, we managed to complete void the transaction as if it never happaned, and then we finished off by buying the Arkia tickets.
Phew, what a terrible story.
We ended up enjoying our final day and a half in Barcelona, relaxing a bit, and not being at a complete nervous breakdown. That is also something.
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