So I woke up at 9:30 am feeling the after effects of the night before and wishing that the dance party hadn't decided to take residence in my head and from the feel of it they were still going strong. By 11:00 am I finally got myself together enough take a shower, get dressed, and wandered downstairs only to find out that I had just missed breakfast. I wasn't feeling like I could keep much down but I still needed something if I was going to be in and out of airports all day. I scheduled a taxi for 12:30 and went back up to pack. I didn't have any time to shop, and since I had no money of my own I didn't buy any souvenirs to try to pack up. At 12:15 I ran downstairs, checked out of the hotel and then tried to find some food nearby before the taxi came. All I found was a little kiosk. I ordered a panini and some water. It was a nasty little thing that I could barely eat, the new bottom of the list for meals in Krakow, so I threw most of it away when I got back to the hotel. Besides my taxi was there and I had to run.
We drove in silence out to the airport. Thoughts of how easy it would be to take me out to nowhere, murder and bury me, and take my stuff went through my head as we got further and further from the edge of the city. I knew I was paranoid, but I couldn't help it in my current state. We got the airport after an uneventful drive and I paid the man and went inside. That's when I met Remigiusz at the information desk, the most helpful guy in the universe, no kidding.
I couldn't find my check-in counter and when I asked he said it was too early and it would open at 1:15. No problem. I waited and was the first person at the check-in at 1:14. Things started to go south as soon as I handed the guy my passport and he couldn't find my boarding passes. He sent me to the ticket counter. I thought to myself "This isn't good" and headed over there. At the ticket counter I had the misfortune of meeting the worlds meanest and ugliest hag with giant swollen lips. She made everything more difficult then it had to be and was the perfect counter balance to the extreme helpfulness of Remi. She reluctantly looked up my reservations and told me that I needed a paper ticket for this flight. I had never received one, and only had the boarding pass receipts from the flights over. She couldn't do anything about it because flights from Krakow to Vienna required a paper ticket. We argued about that for awhile reaching a stalemate.
that's when I sought the help of Remi again, because I needed access to the internet to get my flight confirmation emails and such. There was no public internet access or net-cafe nearby, but he was trying to work out a way for me to use the VIP room, but finally just let me jack into his connection at the counter. I also couldn't figure out how to use my pre-paid phone-card with the pay phones there and he figured out that it was useless with them so he offered me his personal cellphone to make a local call. The only number I had at the time was LLP office, but of course it was Saturday so no answer. I didn't really know what Paul could do in little over an hour anyways so I gave up on that. I was starting to get frantic now, it was 2:00 and I still couldn't check my luggage or board the plane. I got my internet up and copied down the relevant info and ran back over to the ticket booth, with Remi in tow to help with the hag. They argued for a bit until they reached the same stalemate. No ticket, no fly.
So I needed to call United Airlines and get it straightened out but it was an international call. Once again Remi came through with his personal cellphone and helped me use the pre-paid phone-card which was only good for an hour. I ended up using the whole hour on the phone as I watched the departure time get closer and closer until the check-in counter closed for that flight and it was no longer going to be possible to be on that plane. By this point the gal on the other end of the line had determined that there wasn't a way to issue me a paper ticket for that flight and was trying to help me decide on either purchasing a new ticket to Chennai or pay $200 to reschedule the original flight plan which would take me back to Eugene. I attempted to purchase a ticket to Chennai, but it was either too expensive or too suspicious of a purchase so soon after my canceled credit card and it was not approved. I was stuck. I had to take the option back to Eugene. Unfortunately the first flight they could get me on back to Munich wasn't until 7:00 Sunday morning. That meant finding a place to crash for about 12:00 hours and the airport wasn't very inviting.
Again Remi helped out by suggesting a hostel that was cheap but had internet and breakfast. Then he called me a cab because the cabbies lurking outside the airport routinely overcharge. I had just enough time to go to the exchange counter and get a pocketful of zloty before the cab got there. I thanked Remi profusely, shook his hand, got his contact info, took his picture, and ran to jump in the cab.
Another silent cab ride back into town and I was practically back where I started, just outside of old town. To be continued...
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