Flying out of Delhi's international terminal is, to put it mildly, stressful-- even more stressful than air travel has become in general-- and chaotic. Not only is it the most aggressively anarchistic place I've ever been in, at least 75% of the passengers look like they could be featured in a Watch For Terrorists ad-- if not an al-Qaeda recruitment poster. An American profiler would short circuit.

There may be, on an office flow chart in someone's desk somewhere, a schematic for how it's all supposed to work... but I doubt it. At every step along the way, among the pushing, shoving crowds-- many of whom seem to have never been confronted with the concept of "a line" before-- there is something designed specifically to hold up the process and make you return to Go. If you ever thought getting to the airport two hours before your departure was too big a waste of time, let me assure that they must have had Delhi in mind when they made that rule of thumb... and they were being optimistic.

The first nightmare involves getting the bags you intend to check into a great big cavernous black box and collecting it on the other side. Somewhere along the arduous quest for departure someone is bound to tell you about this-- usually the man at the end of the 30 minute line in front of the check-in counter. Black box first, check in after. But once you get through the crowds to the black box and figure out vaguely what's supposed to happen and how, you need to confront several hundred Osama bin-Laden look-alikes jostling in front of and all around it. I thought I was at the Kaaba. Nothing really seems to happen-- just a tremendous amount of seemingly unfocused kinetic energy but no discernable movement towards any goal. I knew I'd be OK eventually but I couldn't help wondering if the fragile looking elderly ladies lurking apprehensively on the outskirts of the melee would wind up stuck at the airport forever.

Eventually you find someone with an airport smock, slip him 10 rupees (like a quarter) and he shoves your bag into the box, gets a security string tied around it and you're good to go-- back to the boarding pass counter line. It was worth the 10 rupees because he alerted me about the need for a security stamp or some kind before you can get your boarding pass that allows you to proceed to the security check. I'm sure regular Delhi Airport commuters are well aware of this quirk.

Once you pass through security, it's less chaotic-- but just a little less. There are families (or tribal groups) camped out on the floors, apparently not having chairs as part of their culture. (Later, on the Air India jet, I realized some of my fellow passengers were among the 700,000,000 Indians I wrote about at DownWithTyranny a few days ago who have no access to sanitary facilities. Besides explaining seat belts and oxygen masks, the flight video does a tutorial about how to use a toilet.) But first I had to find a gate for my flight. There were just 3 question marks where a gate number should have been on my boarding pass and the loudspeaker announcements were so garbled and so unintelligible that it was impossible to tell if they were in Hindi, English or something else. Eventually some airport employee started walking around the terminal shouting "Bangkok flight, Gate 11." That worked. I won't have to brave this nightmare again for another month. And in a couple of years this will place will be left to domestic passengers since India is building a new international airport on the other side of Delhi. I only hope it is as well-planned as the brand new Bangkok international airport.

I left home when I was 13, but only temporarily. I hitchhiked from New York to Florida. I only got as far as New Jersey when I was arrested on the Turnpike. The police called my father and made him come pick me up. He was pissed but he gave me the bus fare to get to Miami Beach. It wasn't until later in my teenage years that I left home for real-- this time to go to Tonga, a small island between New Zealand and Hawaii. I hitchhiked all the way to California before being arrested this time-- having stowed away on a ship in San Pedro. After that I discovered airplanes. I had never been on one and they were incredibly convenient. I mean, compared to hitchhiking... they got you there so fast.

It wasn't long before I also discovered that you are better off not checking bags. My primary motivation was getting out of the airport fast and the baggage carousel was always a place I didn't like hanging around. And on top of that checked bags get lost-- a lot. It's easy for me; I travel light. After nearly 7 years living overseas I came back to America with 2 bags; no need to check anything.

Today's NY Times published a story on the worsening checked luggage situation in the U.S. (I never noticed it overseas and I usually feel far more confident checking luggage on foreign carriers. When I fly overseas I never use U.S. carriers, always British Air if I can or another foreign carrier if there's no B.A. flight. "One in every 138 checked bags was lost during the first nine months of this year, compared with one in 155 bags a year earlier."

Holiday travelers can expect to feel the effects of six years of airline downsizing in one way or another. About 27 million passengers are expected to fly during the 12 days surrounding Thanksgiving, 4 percent more than last year, the Air Transport Association said.

But there are fewer airline employees to look after them, and their bags. And to squeeze more flights out of the day, planes are sitting on the ground for shorter periods between flights. So predictably, more bags fail to join their owners, particularly on connecting flights.

“There’s a lot of opportunity for failure,” said Hans Hauck, manager of baggage operations at American’s headquarters in Fort Worth. Since Mr. Hauck started his job in September 2006, American has not met its bag-handling goal in any month. As of late last week, though, Mr. Hauck remained optimistic that he would make his November number. A look at American’s bag-handling operation, which is the biggest of all United States carriers, shows it is making lots of little improvements but still losing ground. American misplaced 7.44 bags for every thousand passengers through Sept. 30, the Bureau of Transportation Statistics reported, up from 6.04 for every thousand a year earlier. (All but a tiny fraction of misplaced bags are ultimately reunited with their owners.)

And American isn't the only U.S. carrier that can't do the job. Actually none of them can. Anecdotal evidence shows Delta being the airline most poorly run, although supposedly statistics show that the small regional airlines do even worse than Delta when it comes to lost bags and American Eagle was the worst of the worst.

Two of the biggest problems are downsizing, with fewer employees to do more work, and an inability for the system to read at least 10% of the bar codes on checked bags.

About 2 percent are misread and dropped onto the wrong pier. Then, it is up to a worker stacking the bags on carts to notice the mistake. “He better,” said Ms. Wilewski, the baggage manager.

American and other domestic airlines have resisted investing in radio frequency identification tags, which are used by big retailers to track inventory and are far more accurate. The tags cost about 20 cents each so it would cost $50,000 a day for American’s 250,000 bags, plus the cost of hardware to read them at each step in the process.

“We don’t lose enough bags to justify that investment,” said Mark Mitchell, American’s managing director of customer experience.

At one time I worked as the president of a division of TimeWarner. I was always very proud that I never-- not once-- used one of the corporate jets to fly someplace, something my peers all did. I was happy to fly with them on their trip but I always had the feeling that using a corporate jet was a tremendous waste of shareholders money and that it could be used for more productive endeavors. And I was perfectly satisfied with first class on British Air, my favorite airline. The flight from L.A. to London left at night, so you could change into your pjs, settle into your relatively private cubicle, have a fantastic dinner, read for a while, get a perfect night's sleep on a comfortable flat bed and wake up in the morning in time to get to your first meeting rested and without a trace of jetlag. All for $10,300 (roundtrip).

Now that I'm retired. I've discovered the allure of business class. Apparently I'm one step ahead of my former flying companions-- or at least the ones without corporate jets at their disposal. According to yesterday's Guardian, the British Air first class cabin is going the way of the way of the dodo bird.

Business class passengers famously draw envious glances from the herd in economy by turning left when they enter a plane, but it is the first class ticket holders who are the most pampered. On British Airways' 747s they ascend to their Kelly Hoppen-designed cabin and don their free pyjamas and slippers before supping on the likes of lobster thermidor, pan-seared wild Scottish salmon or roasted Cornish game hen, then slip between the sheets of their roomy-- and extremely flat-- bed.

Now, however, this most opulent form of travel is under threat.

The global downturn has devastated demand for expensive seats, and even Hollywood stars and bankers are shying away from BA's extravagant first class prices. The airline, stung by a slump in premium bookings that helped push the company into its worst-ever loss of £401m, has removed first class accommodation from four of its new long-haul planes, and is to review seating plans for other new aircraft.

"The long-haul aircraft that we take delivery of this year will not have any first class cabins in them," said Willie Walsh, BA's chief executive. He insisted there was no direct link to the recession, but he added: "Longer term we will review the configuration of [all] new aircraft." BA is also launching a service this year from Heathrow to Las Vegas, a prime destination for high-rollers, with no first class option.

First class is the last remnant of the more romantic days of air travel when BA's predecessor, British Overseas Airways Corporation, offered first class tickets alongside the more down-at-heel tourist or economy cabins. Its upmarket reputation has become even more rarefied over the years following the introduction of slightly less luxurious business class seats in the late 1970s, and cut-throat competition on the transatlantic market.

Walsh admitted that the cost of ripping out seats in the existing fleet is too great to get rid of first class in existing planes, leading industry watchers to speculate that upgrades for economy class travellers might become a more common occurrence... The cost of refitting an aircraft, at millions of pounds per plane, means that airlines will have to turn to riskier strategies such as overbooking flights until their new aircraft orders arrive. Airlines can guarantee strong revenues from economy class passengers if they overbook the back of the plane. Under that scenario, any passenger who is the victim of an overbooking could be upgraded to one of the many empty seats in business class, or bumped to another flight.

Of course, there's always Air Emirates. I'm not sure if this price includes tax or not, but the L.A.-London run is $24,916.97. In any case, the food looks like it's probably not that different from B.A. Business class on B.A., by the way, costs $4,274 and you'd be surprised how comfy it feels when you think of the $6,000 you save by forgoing First Class (or the $20,000 you save by avoiding Air Emirates).

Today's Washington post, on one of the busiest flying days in history, has a story about the deadly impact of jet lag. The story is based on an academic study of mice which seems to point out that elderly mice have a great accelerated death rate from too much jet lag.

Back in 1969 and 1970 I drove from London to India and back over the course of two years. No jet lag that way, of course. But I always noted that tourists who had flown in-- especially to India-- were a mess. I chalked it up to being unable to cope with the sudden upending of their cultural universe. But, of course, the effects of jet lag can be very disconcerting.

I got home yesterday after two flights from Buenos Aires (around 10 hours) and Dallas (around 3 hours). I'm not jet lagged at all. That's because most of the trip was north-south, not east-west, which means I didn't crossed many time zones, the cause of jet lag. The Post article is worth reading and it talks about ways to ameliorate the problem (including wearing sunglasses when you arrive at your destination!).


When I had to travel to Europe on business frequently I got used to flying on an overnight British Air flight from Los Angeles to London, first class in a fully reclining flat bed. It didn't eliminate jet lag entirely but, at $10,000 a pop, it seemed to make it a lot less burdensome. I could usually be ready for a business meeting within hours of arriving. Before I found a corporation to pay for that I used to fly economy class-- my first trip to Europe (on Icelandic Air) was $99 to Luxembourg-- I was a walking disaster for at least a day or two before I could adjust.

After my previous post about what an airborne cesspool Delta has become, Ken wrote a comment that I've heard voiced by many. It's about the whole frequent flyer conundrum, particularly the hope to be able to cash in with a big trip someday. Because I worked as president of a large company and traveled all over for years (in frequent flyer miles-producing first class), both domestically and internationally, I've acquired over a million miles-- and with all the carriers. And the bad news: Delta miles are the closest to worthless of any.

The Independent Traveler has done 2 interesting articles on how useless frequent flyer miles can be. "'I've had a Delta credit card for 10 years, and have never once been able to use the miles to travel,' says Misa Greenwood, who flies approximately once a month. 'They tell me I need to book six months in advance, or that a Saturday night stay is required, or that there are no seats left.' Even for upgrades, Greenwood has been stymied. 'I bought a ticket online, then called Delta to inquire about an upgrade,' she recalls. 'They told me the ticket was not eligible for an upgrade. No free flights, no upgrades; what's the point?'"

I've spent hours and hours and hours on the phone trying to book off-the-beaten path vacations with my Delta Miles. (Damn you, American Express!). I mean look at this blog; I'll go anywhere. And, more often than not-- like by a margin of 10 to 1 or 20 to 1 or more, there is nothing available. And I always plan months and months in advance; and, being retired and without a care in the world, I'm flexible as can be. Once I was on with a Delta agent for at least 2 hours trying to book a vacation-- total flexibility for leaving and returning and a wide number of places I'd be willing to go: Europe (anywhere), India, Thailand, Senegal. Frustrated and exasperated I finally just said to Ms. Robot on the other end of the line, "OK, I'll go anywhere, any class, any time in January or February for approximately one month. Any city. What's available?" Nothing was available.

So, Ken, Helen, everyone else... don't count on a big Delta SkyMiles score. One radio talk show host who does travel talk once said that over 85% of Delta requests are turned down and that although Delta was the worst, the other big U.S. airlines were nearly as bad. Take a look at Consumer Affairs if you're brave enough to hear the bad news about Delta's SkyMiles program. The stories are pretty miserable and when you experience them in real time, they're worse than miserable. And they are standard Delta fare. Flyer Talk ran an interesting piece on the 2005 "evolution" of Delta's SkyMiles program entitled "Are Delta's Frequent Flyer Changes Their Death Knell?"


The most recent Zagat's Guide airline surveyjust came out and it does not paint a pretty picture. The bullet points: "Ratings and Reviews Worst Since Survey Began in 1990; Mid-size and International Carriers Fare Best With Traveling Public; Continental Best Among Disappointing Major U.S. Carriers, JetBlue Up and Coming." They call it "an industry in steep decline" and point out that the U.S. airlines' "relations with customers are so poor, they're fortunate that passengers have few other places to turn."

Perhaps you'd like to see the Full Text of Class-Action Complaint Filed Against Delta class action suit passengers took out against Delta? Even if all the legalese makes your eyes glaze over, the constant stream of Delta flyers' complaints that you can find online always gives the best taste of what you can expect from these not very friendly skies.

I've often mentioned that Delta is the worst of all the awful domestic carriers. I try to avoid flying that airline when there is an alternative going to the same destination. I even stopped using my American Express card and using my Master Card instead, the former hooked up to Delta and the latter to the less venal American. It seems like all the news we get from the airline industry these days is bad news. Earlier in the week I wrote about the heinous, anti-democratic rich-people-to-the-front-of-the-line-please Fly Clear program. And we've all been experiencing how the airlines are nickeling and diming us all to death with fees for everything. I'm certain pay toilets on board are next-- and I'll bet Delta leads the way.

Still, to be fair, Delta is actually leading the way on something awesome for a change-- albeit a new way of squeezing more money out of travelers. According to today's Washington Post wireless Internet starts this fall! Actually it'll only be on 133 MD88/90 planes this fall. The rest of the fleet won't be ready 'til next summer. "The service will be available to customers for a flat fee of $9.95 on flights of three hours or less and $12.95 on flights of more than three hours."


UPDATE: Meanwhile, JetBlue Is Charging For A Pillow

I just saw a Jet Blue executive, CEO Jeff Barger, making the unique, if twisted, case that his company's decision to start charging $7 for a pillow and a blanket was a great bargain. Apparently those pillows and blankets we've all been using on planes were filthy and germ-ridden and only laundered every few weeks. The $7 ones are fresh and clean and you get to take it with you... if you have room in your costly checked luggage.

The new issue of Time points out that Southwest is the "one major airline that is bucking the trend of increasing fees... [and] still doesn't charge for checked bags (up to two), nonalcoholic drinks, blankets or making a change to your flight." On the other end of the spectrum, USAirways "broke new ground last week by starting to charge for all beverages: $2 for a soft drink (or even a bottle of water); $1 for coffee or tea. Checked bags cost $15 and $25; flight changes are $150."

Today started well enough. Instead of having to wait for a Delta service rep to get on the line in the normal 30-40 minutes, a friendly human was on within 5 minutes. I was so happy. Well, that was 90 minutes ago. I'm on hold now, still waiting for my problem to be addressed. I won't bore you with the details because the problem really is Delta, not the details of this particular glitch. Delta-- not unlike most of the big U.S. airlines, and not unlike most of corporate America-- is populated by people who are driven by the corporate imperative: profit-über-alles. The corollary, alas, is screw customer service and even safety. Like I said, this seems to fit all the big U.S. airlines. Delta just seems a little worse than the rest.

Sometimes I wonder why Delta is worse than the already excruciatingly bad United or the egregiously horrid American or the woefully foul... etc. Maybe it's because their employees are under so much stress because they are being screwed so miserably by the corporate executives who have wrecked a once perfectly fine airline that I used to actually look forward to flying on-- instead of dreading.

So why bother flying on Delta if I dread it so much? Excellent question-- and of course, there really is no good answer. I have managed to collect many thousands or their nearly worthless and unusable Sky Miles over the years (thanks, American Express; can't you find a reputable airline partner to work with?) And on this particular flight to Spain I decided to try to use some mileage up before the whole company gets flushed down the toilet (as they should). Of course they wouldn't consider ever letting me use the miles for an actual ticket but they did offer to let me use miles for a "first class" upgrade if I bought (a very expensive) ticket. So I did and they did.

First class, LAX to Atlanta. I remember what first class used to be-- even on Delta! This "first class" doesn't even have a foot rest! I mean forget about normal first class amenities that real airlines have or things like seats that go all the way back or actual trained personnel. But even before I got to my crappy and uncomfortable seat, I had to vainly try to use the closet. When the first class passengers board a Delta flight, the crew finds the most forbidding and vicious-looking employee they can to stand in front of the closet and dare you to just try to hang something in it. In the past 3-4 years I've noticed that Delta-- and only Delta-- uses all the hanging space for crew members' bags. This is a major inconvenience if you're traveling with a suit that you would prefer to not have to press when you land. I've written at least half a dozen complaint letters to Delta about this and I've never had any kind of an answer. Once I was on some no-name local airline in India, possibly called Sahara or something unlikely like that, and not only did the crew use up all the closet space, but also all the restroom space. I kid you not-- the front-of-the-plane restroom was unusable because it was filled with big boxes of electronics the crew members were... transporting. Delta hasn't fallen that low... yet.

The second half of my trip-- Atlanta to Madrid-- was slightly better but, please take my word on this: if you woud rate British Air's front of the plane service an "A," as I certainly do, it would be impossible to rate Delta any more than a "D" in comparison-- and I'm being very generous there. Delta's transatlantic front of the plane (I shudder to remember, but I think they called it "Business Elite") service has more-- far more-- in common with a Greyhound trip than it does with the service one can safely expect from almost any European carrier-- and they even make American and United look good! If the flight attendants went to school at all, it was to learn how to piss off the customers. The closets, of course, were verboten for passengers. The food was... excruciatingly bad-- as were the seats. It did, however, almost land on time.

Do you know anyone who likes flying on Delta? I don't. Everyone I know hates it. And there was a time when Delta was the airline of choice inside the U.S. Perhaps if they just thought a little about treating their stressed out employees right and then got a grasp on what actual customer service means, they wouldn't be in bankruptcy today.

On April 30 I was flying between L.A. and Jacksonville. There may be other, less horrible, airlines that fly that route, but I wound up on Delta, the flying garbage can. I guess I should be thankful it takes off and lands. The stewardii insisted we all toast Delta because they came out of bankruptcy that day. I don't drink. And I hate Delta.

Not that Im a big fan of any of the U.S. airlines anymore. I just flew from L.A. to DC to Chicago to L.A. on United and it was generally as bad as Delta. "The overall performance of U.S. airlines worsened in 2006, its third consecutive year of decline, according to the 17th annual Airline Quality Ratings released here Monday. Its performance fell in three of the four categories measured by the study: on-time arrival, involuntary bumping and mishandled luggage. The customer complaint rate was flat."

Hawaiian Air was #1 and JetBlue was #2. All the big airlines stunk. United was #8. American was #10 and Delta was #12. I fly "first class." The so-called first class sections of all three of the big three are not particularly better than JetBlue's economy class. On my United flights last week there were no foot-rests on any of the cramped seats. The staff was unprofessional to the max on each flight, as though they had never gone through any training at all. The food was abysmal and the seating areas filthy. The planes took off and landed on time.

Today's New York Times examines one sordid aspect of the industry in depth: overbooking policies; it doesn't look good.

The summer travel season is under way, and so many planes are expected to be full that, if you are bumped, you could end up waiting days for a seat on another flight to the same destination.

The number of fliers bumped against their will is expected to reach a high for the decade this year.

How could that happen? The industry's "widespread practice of airline overbooking... Airlines, of course, overbook to avoid losing billions of dollars because of empty seats. Inevitably, though, they guess wrong on some flights and too many people arrive at the gate."

Airlines would overbook far more than they do-- they certainly don't give a rat's ass for their passengers-- but fear of passenger anger holds them hold to 6 or 700,000 a year.


JULY UPDATE: IT GETS WORSE

The NY Times is reporting today that delays are getting worse this year. Maybe it's just too simple to blame Bush-- although, instinctively-- I do.

The on-time performance of airlines has reached an all-time low, but even the official numbers do not begin to capture the severity of the problem.

That is because these statistics track how late airplanes are, not how late passengers are. The longest delays-- those resulting from missed connections and canceled flights-- involve sitting around for hours or even days in airports and hotels and do not officially get counted. Researchers and consumer advocates have taken notice and urged more accurate reporting.

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology did a study several years ago and found that when missed connections and flight cancellations are factored in, the average wait was two-thirds longer than the official statistic. They also determined that as planes become more crowded — and jets have never been as jammed as they are today-- the delays grow much longer because it becomes harder to find a seat on a later flight.

That finding prompted the M.I.T. researchers to dust off their study, which they are updating now. But with domestic flights running 85 to 90 percent full, meaning that virtually all planes on desirable routes are full, Cynthia Barnhart, an M.I.T. professor who studies transportation systems, has a pretty good idea of what the new research will show when it is completed this fall: “There will be severe increases in delays,” she said.

Very severe-- and longer-- 39% longer than last year, to be precise. Republican anti-union ideological mania has wrecked the air traffic control system and the general anti-union permissiveness of the Bush Regime has made some airline employees... "grumpy." As the Times put it, "after taking big pay cuts and watching airline executives reap some big bonuses, many workers are fed up."

When Nixon was being impeached I decided to end my self-imposed exile and return to my native country, the U.S. of A. (Also I was worried because, after 4 years in Amsterdam, I had started dreaming in Dutch and that felt a little uncomfortable). Anyway, I had been away from home for nearly 7 years. I flew home with 2 bags. I never fly with more. You know why? That's all the airlines allow you to carry on. And I ain't checking nothing with those luggage-losing losers.

It's true that I have a natural disaffinity for waiting around for luggage to be unloaded. On the other hand, there's something kind of sexy to sit down on the plane with no bags to worry about. That's so trumped though by the odds that the airline will lose your bags and put you through the misery incumbent with that nightmare. What are the odds?

Well, they're worst if you fly Delta. Of the 81 million unfortunate souls who found themselves flying on the absolute most horrible of all the big U.S. airlines, over half a million Delta passengers had their luggage go missing. In fact the U.S. airlines lose 10,000 pieces of luggage PER DAY! (Suprisingly, it's even worse in Europe.) This problem has been getting worse and in 2005 over 3.5 million passengers of all the domestic airlines reported missing bags-- a 20% increase over 2004. Many of the lost bags eventually find their way back to their owners, though not before spoiling a trip and often damaged.

I'm not the only person who has noticed this and now, more than ever before, overhead bins are over-stuffed and late-arriving passengers are often t a loss about what to do with their carry-ons. A few weeks ago I was flying back to L.A. from Atlanta and the attendant-- in first class where there was once a time when they were trained better-- seemed to take great delight in the predicament of the passenger across the aisle from me who couldn't fit his bag in the overhead. "You have to check it," she smirked with a self-satisfied, rotten look. I could see he really didn't want to and I offered to help. I thought the attendant was going to have us both arrested as potential terrorists and I would swear that smoke came out of her ears when I showed him that if he turned the bag around the bumpy part with the hardware would face the roomier back end of the compartment and the door would close. I mean, this is what she should have told him. Instead she just stomped off in a huff to wherever they turn Delta attendants into such miserable wretches.

People handle the fear of losing luggage in different ways. I have started taking less. I've long found myself over-packing anyway. I mean how many times do I have to travel to third world countries before I learn that I don't really need a suit and tie? I remember once badgering poor Roland to be sure to bring his Hugo Boss sports jacket on a trip to Egypt. He just acquiesced to shut me up. Turned out some fundamentalist psychopaths slaughtered a busload of Austrian tourists at Luxor and Egypt instantly emptied of Western visitors. Except me and Roland. We had one f those fantastic Nile river boats that normally hold a couple hundred people to ourselves (+ a couple of old Brits on the way back to London after a lifetime of service in Oman). Roland never wore his sports jacket once but it came in very handy for him on a bus ride across the Sinai one night when he used it as a pillow against the filthy greasy window of the bus. I think I'm finally starting to carry less clothes, although I now bring along so many nutritional supplements that it almost balances out. (I've even come up with ways to lessen that load a bit lately.)

It's 5:17 AM and my plane takes off just after noon for Buenos Aires (via Dallas). I decided to go to the end of the world (Tierra del Fuego, that island off the tip of South America). I'm half packed and pretty much ready to go. I'll be writing about Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil-- well, about the Iguazu Falls part of Brazil I'll be visiting for a couple days-- and in I figure out how to get into Chilean Patagonia, there too. But I figured I'd get some preliminaries over with even before leaving.

I'm flying on American. Needless to say, even with my 100% flexible schedule, there was no possibility of trading advantage miles for a ticket (single person/first class). So I bought a ticket and upgraded. You probably know the way that works: the less expensive tickets are not upgradable so you have to buy a pretty expensive ticket and then you have to spend another $500 for the honor of using your miles. I had never heard of that before but the AA operator assured me it had been standard practice "for years." And there were other little charges. Still, after checking everywhere and wasting lots of time talking to other airlines, it still looked like the best deal.

Did you know there isn't a single English language tourist guide to Paraguay? [UPDATE: I found one after all!] There used to be one that covered Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay but it's out of print. But what really shocked me is that several guide books on South America don't even mention Paraguay. They have chapters on every other country, even Ecuador and Guyana, but no Paraguay. When I finally located one that did include Paraguay-- in a travel bookstore-- I also found out that I needed a visa in advance. But then luck broke my way. There's a Paraguayan consulate in L.A. and, it turned out, the visa process was as non-onerous as could be. You just fill out some simple papers, hand over 2 photos and some money and off you go. The consul also told me Brazil requires a visa for Americans, who they don't like, and it takes 2 weeks. Panic.

I drove right to the Brazilian consulate. Onerous was the keyword and he was right about them being decidedly anti-American (or at least anti-American tourist). I arrived at 1:15. They stop answering questions at 1. No exceptions. Come back tomorrow. It didn't matter that I was leaving in a week and that they would be closed for Thanksgiving and that I live an hour away. And that I was there. No exceptions. There are only two hotels inside the Iguazu parks, one in Argentina (sold out) and one, a much better one from what I've read, in Brazil. I'm booked in the Brazilian one. What to do, what to do.

I decided to try my luck getting the visa in Buenos Aires. I rented an apartment for my first week in Buenos Aires in the Recoleta district and it's a block from the Brazilian consulate. If I can't get the visa in a week, I'll just cancel Brazil I guess. I mean it's hardly Brazil anyway. It's just the Brazilian side of the Iguazu Falls.

OK, I'm off to finish packing and to eat breakfast and to go for a dawn swim before heading off to the airport, Dallas and Buenos Aires (where I should arrive at 9AM tomorrow morning).


UPDATE: PITSTOP IN TEXAS

I always marvel at the ability of my friend Jane to blog and chew gum at the same time-- and to do it so elegantly. She travels everywhere all the time and blogs up a storm and runs firedoglake, one of the most admired and smoothly-functioning community blogs in the entire world. She keeps trying to get me to do learn to blog on the go. She did teach me html so I guess she could teach me bloggin' on the road too. I suspect I'll screw it up. I mean it's hard to even conceive of blogging without my ergonomic chair and wrist-rest and all my physical backup and research apparatus. And my Macs.

But here I am, in the Admiral's Club in the Dallas-Ft. Worth Airport. It was a nicely uneventful flight, short and uncrowded. And here in the lounge: free computer usage. Ah... at least they give you something for stealing the $500 just to use "your" miles! They just called the flight. I just blogged on the road. Jane will be proud.

It seems to be buried in the backpages, but you may have heard about a report on the airline industry that came out today co-authored by Dean Headley of Wichita State University. The short version: service sucks and everyone is pissed off.

More airline passengers bumped, more bags lost and fewer on-time flights. For the third year in a row, those problems grew worse for the industry, according to an annual study that rates airline quality.

"They just don't get it yet," said Headley. Who's "they" and what don't they "get?" Well, take this statement from a spokesman for the Air Transport Association: "We're going to see more delays and those delays translate to cancellations, mishandled bags and unhappy passengers," It's not a pretty picture." He doesn't expect that picture to get better soon and he blames... the weather. I think we could look for a better answer-- and solutions-- from Jonathan Tisch.

A lot of executives at my former company, Warner Bros. Records, used to stay at the Regency Hotel on Park Avenue in NYC. Before I started working at WB, an incident at the hotel became part of Warner Bros lore. One night during a series of executive meetings at the hotel all the rooms on an entire floor were broken into and 4 of our guys were robbed. The hotel handled their complaints so poorly-- practically blaming them for the problem and telling them that the hotel was too busy to help them or to even call the police-- that the Regency went from being the hotel of choice for our company to a hotel no one trusted... or stayed at. This was long before Jonathan Tisch became CEO of Loews Hotels.

In fact, reading Tisch's new book, Chocolates On The Pillow Aren't Enough-- Reinventing the Customer Experience, is almost like getting a response to the whole hideous incident. Something like that could never happen under his leadership. Tisch is one smart cookie and this latest book by him is a must read for anyone involved in marketing. But aside from being an author, CEO of Loews Hotels and one of the heads as the whole U.S. tourism industry (as Chairman of the Travel Business Roundtable for over a decade), he is also mixed up with government and politics. That's what I wanted to talk with him about when I got him on the phone last week. It isn't what he wanted to talk about.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's flattered people are pushing his name out there to be NYC's next mayor but he just wanted to talk with me about his ideas about customer service. He's got a great reputation as an old-fashioned-- or is it futuristic-- CEO who champions corporate responsibility and believes-- as well as acts on-- the premise that a company can do well and do good at the same time. That's a very hard line to sell to Wall Street. (He told me it's his cousin's job to talk with the Wall Street analysts, not his.)

He says tourism is 100% non-partisan and that it's part of the lifeblood of every state and every congressional district in the nation. He spends a lot of time working with government on issues critical to the tourism industry. A Democrat, in 2003 he was appointed to the Department of Commerce's U.S. Travel and Tourism Advisory Board and he was a founder of the Discover America Partnership. I asked him if the Bush Regime is trying to politicize the Board he serves on the way they have been politicizing the Department of Justice and the General Services Adminsitration. I could almost see him rolling his eyes on the other end of the line. "No," he said.

So what did Tisch have to say about today's report about the airline industry? By now you should be able to guess yourself. "It would be wonderful if the airlines could think of themselves like other parts of the travel and tourism industry, and not just in the business of transportation. These new numbers show that as a group, they may be wining the battle of profitability, but losing the war of customer service."

I don't know about you, but when I'm on a ridiculously long line 2 hours before my plane is scheduled to take off-- and it probably won't be on time anyway-- and I'm holding my shoes and praying my belt buckle won't set off an alarm and that I'll remember to take back my cell phone and keys, I'm just hating George W. Bush even more than usual. And every foreigner I've spoken to who either comes here to visit or contemplates coming here to visit, is a lot more pissed off than I am.

OK, now we're getting into Tisch's territory. Foreign tourism is down nearly 20% since Bush, at heart a paranoid, provincial hayseed and a xenophobic nativist, took over the White House. The Republicans may have once been a business friendly party but now... well, during the Bush era our economy has lost $93 billion in revenue from global tourism (and $15 billion in taxes)-- not to mention 58 million fewer visitors and nearly 200,000 lost jobs. Last week the Department of Commerce released figures that reveal that overseas travel to the U.S. remains below pre-9/11 levels in six of the top eight overseas markets-- Mexico and Canada being the two exceptions. Travel to the U.S. in 2006 fell further in five out of the top eight overseas markets. A 2006 survey of overseas travelers conducted by the Discover America Partnership found negative perceptions of the U.S. entry process to be the greatest deterrent to visiting the country. That's not pro-Business and it's not good customer service. Tourists and businessmen from Britain, Japan, Germany, France, Italy, and Brazil are opting to go elsewhere.

Friends who stay at Loews hotels swear that service and overall product are noticably improved since Tisch took the helm. I couldn't find a dissenting view. When I asked friends in NYC what they thought of Tisch as mayor, those who knew who he is were enthusiastic. By chance while I was writing this my old boss, Seymour Stein, called me to fret about the possibility of Giuliani becoming president. I assured him it wasn't going to happen and when he was calmed down I asked him about Tisch. "He's very smart and he has a good heart. His family are equestrians and they once wanted to buy my ranch. He'd be a great mayor. That Giuliani... he was the worst..."


Tisch has been a super generous contributor to Democrats over the years, although almost all of the donations have been to button down Establishment and conservative Democrats, from the Blue Dog PAC, Harold Ford, Joe Lieberman (a former Democrat), Evan Bayh, Ken Salazar, Rahm Emanuel... and (many) hundreds of thousands of dollars to the big Inside-the-Beltway committees like the DNC, DSCC and DCCC. I didn't find many contributions for Republicans other than to Mark Foley, and token donations to Al D'Amato (once a cost of doing business in New York) and Conrad Burns. This week Jonathan made a very cool contribution to Blue America: a boxful of personally autographed copies of Chocolates On The Pillow Aren't Enough. We'll be giving them away this Saturday at firedoglake as part of a live blog session with the man who represents-- among others-- Jonathan Tisch: Congressman Jerry Nadler. Come over and join us at 11AM est. The book is great.

Airplanes and Bush just never were a good mix. First he was a disaster as a disgruntled, mostly AWOL semi-member of the Texas Air National Guard. Even worse-- for America-- Bush's pig-headedness about paying attention to President Clinton and his outgoing administration's dire warnings regarding the dangers posed by Al Qaeda were contributory to the catastrophe of 9-11. And now Bush is setting up an airline catastrophe that could be even worse! Even Bush's rubber-stamp congress can nip this one in the bud.

Right in line with the Bush Regime's seething hatred for working men and women exercising their rights to collective bargaining, as of last week, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has broken off contract talks with the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) that would have saved taxpayers, $1.4 BILLION over the next five years.

Air traffic controllers (ATCs), for those who don’t follow aviation, are the folks who guide planes the second they leave the gate to your destination.  Their job is one of the most stressful in the world yet they remain dedicated and hardworking public servants. They’ve been negotiating with the FAA since September 2005.  According to FAA Administrator and Bush-appointed crony Marion Blakey, the FAA wants a “fair” contract that would save taxpayers money.  What part of $1.4 billion in savings Ms Blakey and Bush don't get no one quite understands.

If that’s not bad enough, here’s something else I didn’t realize. So the FAA broke off contract talks and submitted a contract to Congress. If Congress doesn’t act within 60 calendar days-- and we know how lazy and unwilling to put in an honest week's work these people have been for the last 5 years-- the FAA gets to impose their contract on NATCA-- take it or leave it.

So in other words, these dedicated controllers are forced to take whatever the FAA gives them (and, from what I'm hearing from my sources, it's a steaming pile of crap). To make matters worse, the FAA’s version actually penalizes veteran controllers for staying-– creating a situation where it makes more financial sense for eligible controllers to retire than to stay in their vital jobs. By end of 2007, 1 in 4 controllers-– over 4,000-- could retire – and the problem would increase for the next five years by which time over 40% of current controllers will actually be penalized for staying in their jobs.  

BTW, it takes 3-5 years to train an air traffic controller. Unlike most jobs where you can fill the spot immediately with someone new, ATCs take months (and sometimes a year) to learn new positions.  The aviation system is already experiencing a staffing crisis which you can read more about here. Although it may not have dawned on this particular incompetent Bush crony with a fancy job, penalizing veteran controllers if they come to work certainly won’t help the situation. 

I hope this is all getting you as pissed off as I am. That's because, like I said, this could be nipped in the bud. If you go to this site it'll help you contact your congresscritters and tell them to get off their duffs s-- BEFORE this turns into another Bush disaster.

Remember, these are the professionals who landed almost 4,500 airplanes within a matter of minutes on September 11th. And they're the same people who lost their homes and belongings during Hurricane Katrina, Rita, and Wilma but stayed at work to make sure others were lifted to safety – they are heroes. Don’t we owe it to them? Or is it just Bush playing President on Air Force One that deserves a safe flying experience? John Carr, NATCA's president has a cool blog you might want to check out-- entertaining and informative.