Thursday, August 4, 2011

Number 5 of 5!

Just returned from the airport with our final bag! Since it has been so long, we had almost given up the hope of seeing it again.


The Numbers Required to Secure Our Luggage
  • 0 of 5 bags arriving with our flight, but 3 the next day, 1 the day after that, and the final one today
  • =1 week, 4 day wait
  • Enduring a 3 hour plus standing in line (after our night flight) to immediately claim our lost bags at the airport
  • Over 20 phone calls to 5 different countries (Cameroon, Morocco, France, UK, USA)
  • Conversations in French and English
  • Making a detailed report of the last container's contents (English and French)
  • 5 trips to the airport (one of them taking over 3 hours)
  • One detailed document of all the vital information related to baggage claim
Q&A
What is the first thing you want to do, now that the last piece of luggage arrived?
  • Chris: trim my beard (my clippers were in the bin)
  • Elizabeth: put on make-up!

Why it Took So Long?
We are pretty sure it's because the right side strap fell/broke off, the strap on which they had attached the baggage sticker information (destination, name, etc). The sticker above was a new one they made after matching our container with the info and photo we emailed them.

Lesson learned
Instruct the gate agent to stick the luggage sticker on the container itself!
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4 comments:

  1. AnonymousAugust 5, 2011 at 1:32 PM

    I Love the big smiles on your faces as you now have your bag in hand..i know there are many people rejoycing with you when the word got out that it was found....Praise God..

    ReplyDelete
  2. Chris and ElizabethAugust 5, 2011 at 2:10 PM

    Thank you!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Cara HerzbergAugust 5, 2011 at 10:09 PM

    SO GLAD you guys got all your bags. This was our experience moving to Senegal also - but one bag never was found...Joe's guitar. Good to see your smiling faces.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Chris and ElizabethAugust 6, 2011 at 2:37 AM

    Herzbergs: the guitar never arrived? Had you tried to bring it on as carry-on luggage and place it in one of their front closets?

    One of our French tutors yesterday told us a similar story about his sister who was flying from Cotonou, Benin to Yaoundé, Cameroon and none of her bags arrived, (only in her case) never at the destination city. They were flown to Brussels and then back to Cotonou, and it was only on her next visit to Cotonou several months later that she was able to get her bags back, in Benin!

    ReplyDelete

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