April 2013 - Upgrade

Its still raining here on Dartmoor, though the sun has tried to peak between the clouds a couple of times, oh well fresh coffee in hand back to it, where was I? Oh yes, I remember - Heathrow, Terminal 4.

Heathrow - Air India

Having received the news of my early retirement/redundancy via an injection of cash into out bank account and avoided a near death experience on the M25 it was time to check-in. we were flying Air India. Ah Air India! one of the last great bastions of colonial bureaucracy.

As a side note one of the many things we have taught India is that if a job is worth doing, do it in triplicate, get it counter signed, validated, un-validated, re-validated, then ignored, lost and start again. Its no wonder so many call centers are based in Bangalore, Chennai and Hydrabad our institutions are a home from home. We have also taught them the art of queuing, which they have taken to another level, it is now an official martial art there and was proposed for Olympic status by the Indian Olympic Committee at the 2020 games, but more of that later.

As we had decided to up grade we went to the check in, now I wouldn't have blamed them one bit for looking at us as if we were taking the pee and beaten us back into the economy class line. After all we were dressed for the four hour drive to Heathrow, the ten hour long haul to Mumbai, the transfer to Trivandrum by local  the shuttle plane and the taxi to Kovalam - not for business class. The queue was a short one but was dressed in smart suits and designer bling all had matching Samsonite hard cases, we weren't and diddnt.

I had on a pair of jeans, a flannel shirt (t'was nippy out when we left Dartmoor at the crack of dawn) a canvas traveling jacket and a straw panama hat. To match the ensemble, I use the word match very loosely here, I was wearing my mud stained goretex walking shoes and carrying a well worn flight bag. The luggage was a mixture of old cases which we had dragged twice to India for 5 years, none of them owed us anything and ironically should have been retired before me. The upside was no one would consider steeling them, the downside there was no guarantee they'd make it so they were both "reinforced" by the addition of  florescent straps. TIP for Long Haul Flights- The allegedly the  addition of brightly coloured straps serves two purposes, the first being to help hold your case together, the second it makes it easier to spot your bag in the ruck that is baggage reclaim, a tip passed on by my father. Both these urban myths are in fact bollocks, firstly though the straps themselves may have a tensile strength of spun steel, the plastic clasps don't and short of super gluing them together (a practice frowned on by customs officers as they look at the x-ray and try to work out exactly what is that thing attached to a battery?) they will fail. Secondly, everyone else has the same idea and they will have bought the same colour straps as you on Amazon. I'm amazed Sarah didn't pretend to be with someone else.

Back to check in - I was trying to look the typical English eccentric rather than a close approximation to Wurzel Gummage, Sarah grinning from ear to ear no doubt fantasizing about the magical land of duty free on the other side of customs.

It was our turn, in the Business, or Executive Class queue as Air India calls it, queuing is as to normal Indian queuing as Tai Chi  is to Cage Fighting. We were greeted by a portly gentleman doing a superb impression of Biggles's Indian cousin complete with flying corp mustache, wax tipped and raring to go. I told him we wanted to upgrade, there was a pause.... He looked us up and down, smiled and wobbled his head. I knew we were in safe hands. For those of you who have never been to India the ability to head wobble is an essential skill. Its meaning can be confusing at first but basically it is a mixture of the Gallic shrug (without the arrogance) yes, no and maybe. In words its "If you so wish, it may be so..." but it goes much deeper than a simple phrase. It has no limiting clause such as how long this may take, when or where this might happen, who will be involved or even if it will happen at all. He looked at his computer screen and confirmed yes there was space. Four or five key stroke later he had generated a 5 foot long document, I told you they like triplicate in India. He swiftly read it, passed it to his colleague, who tossed it into the bin. Now we were getting somewhere. Another four key strokes and another four feet of carbonized form flew from the machine his colleague ripped it off the printer with a flourish,  passed it to a third colleague (no idea where she came from) who put it in an in-tray behind the desk. I was spell bound, where would this document go next? Was there another colleague hiding out of sight below the counter?

"How would sir like to pay?"
I had been waiting for this moment, before we left i'd noticed AmEx had an offer on 2.5% cash back on all transactions for 6 months, never one to walk away from free money I'd ordered one "just in case..."
Doing my best Seve Balasteros impression I produced my Platinum Am Ex Cash Back Card, with a half smile and raising an eyebrow for effect said those immortal words
"American Express?"

"No, Visa or Mastercard"

I was gutted, my business class upgrade moment in tatters, what i didn't know was Air India's finances were in such dodgy shape they could't pay the AmEx service fee. Visa, yes. Mastercard, yes. AmEx - No.

Sarah never missed a beat and produced the Tesco Mastercard, at least we'd get some Club Card points.

We were on our way