Tuesday, October 31, 2017
I feel better now....
We woke up a bit early so that we
could get our breakfast and get to the airport in time to meet the Kenya Air
people so they could help us with the visa.
We determined to leave at 8 AM because we heard that it would take 2
hours, 1½ hours, 1 hour, 30 minutes to get to the airport. Okay then, so we chose 1 hour. It took less than 30 minutes, even with
creeping traffic for more than half the way.
But, to back up, we went to get
our buffet breakfast as advertised and found that there were a few types of muffins,
a little fresh fruit and juice. If we
wanted breakfast such as an omelet, they would have to call the cook, who was
not there even though it was advertised that breakfast started at 6:30. We did not get bothered by this under the
circumstances because as far as we could tell, there was one man at the hotel
other than us. We told them that we were
fine and left at 8 AM. Jim told me that
the hotel was actually large but that with all the newer ones they didn’t get
much business till the weekends. We have
no idea how they could possibly stay open, and it was a pretty okay hotel.
After we got to the airport we
just hung out with our luggage for quite a while before we saw anyone from
Kenya Air. Since we had plenty of time,
Jim happened to looked at our new visas again and noted that they were actually
good for 48 hours!! What a happy
break! All this worry for nothing. (It
has now occurred to me this trip that maybe I should also check things like
visas on my own because Jim has not done so well lately on this problem!). So, we hung out some more till we got our
luggage checked and our new tickets.
Once I looked at the new seats I pointed out to Jim that we were up
closer to the front, but that the seats were window and middle seats, not
matching aisle seats as before. So, he
got that changed; but this problem drew our attention to the fact that we had
two sets of boarding passes. As it
turns out, we were not flying to Liberia after all—we were flying to Sierra
Leone, and then on our way back we would be finally getting to Liberia! So, back to the phone again (borrowed from
Kenya Air employee) to the office to let the couple know not to pick us up at
the scheduled time because we’d not get there till 5 PM. The couple was driving to the airport at the
time and so they just made more stops along the way!
When this was taken care of we
were feeling okay until it occurred to us that they might not fly to Sierra
Leone from Liberia on Friday, as it is usually reversed and that we’d have to
fly back to Accra, get another visa, stay overnight and then go to Sierra
Leone! It was all too much so we wanted
to just ‘bag it’ and go home!! Then, a
little gift from heaven…we found out later that the Friday flight out of
Liberia is the only one that flies directly from Liberia to Sierra Leone!! We were more than relieved about that—now we
could fly the rest of the trip as first planned!
I was holding it all together
pretty well after so much confusion the last couple of days and taking it in my
stride, but what happened next totally unhinged me—perhaps it was just one last
little straw, so to speak. When we
boarded the plane (having asked for matching aisle seats) it was quickly
apparent that they had given Jim a bulkhead seat and I was in the seat behind
on the other side. Why did they give him
bulkhead and not me, because we asked for matching aisle seats and it didn’t
occur to them that it would be better if we sat together in a bulkhead? I noted upon sitting down that for some
reason the seats seemed to have gotten closer together, and I couldn’t even put
my backpack under the seat in front of me because it wouldn’t fit. I was immediately beside myself. Jim offered to change seats, but I don’t
think he would have lasted 5 minutes.
They have removed bathrooms and added more seats, and even my body
wasn’t fitting very well in the seat, and he has longer legs. Lucky for me, Jim and perhaps a hapless Kenya
Air employee, it turned out that the seat next to his remained empty for the entire
trip from Accra to Sierra Leone and back to Liberia. Any good travel agent would have mentioned
that perhaps we’d sit together if it was a bulkhead seat! I was
really, really, done!! It probably also
has to do with things like Jim getting special privileges on some plane rides
we’ve been on because he complains more…either way, I was probably going to
change seats with Jim if someone showed up in that bulkhead seat next to his—after
all, he wouldn’t want his wife to be charged with a little murder…
Okay, I am finally done venting. Whew!
I really do feel better now!
It was so good to finally land,
and to feel that after what has seemed like forever, that we actually get to do
something that we came here for in the first place. It seemed to us that we’d been gone a long
time and had gotten nowhere. We saw the
Teerlink’s waiting for us as we emerged from the little terminal with all our
luggage, and what we brought for them.
They had ordered a few things, but mostly canes for the blind. The cost of mailing them to Liberia would
have been quite out of the question, so we were able to bring almost all that
they sent us. No one in the whole
country makes canes for the blind.
Hallway, Royal Grand
Hotel
We drove to the new hotel that
they have wanted us to stay at, but in the past we haven’t wanted to spend that
kind of money. The reason we agreed to
this, this time, was because of the election.
The Grand Royal Hotel is adjacent to where they live and very convenient
for them. During the runoff election
here, the roads could be cut off, and we’d be on the other side of the town
from them and on the opposite side of possible rally-closed roads. This way we will be together. Also, on Thursday night we will stay at a new
hotel across from the airport, just in case election rallies close the road and
we can’t get there in time for our flight on Friday.
So, the Royal Grand—it IS royal and it is grand. It is a beautiful
building with all the fancy things you could imagine that would dress up a
place like fixtures, walls, art, floors, beautiful ceilings, etc. It has 3 places to eat at the hotel, and
after unpacking we came down to one of them and begged for quick service. One never gets good service in Africa. We got amazing service! It came out so quickly that we were happily
stunned. It was late, and we have to get
up early. And the food was really,
really good. This really makes it an
exceptional hotel!
Second
floor view of entry chandelier.
Entry to hotel. All around the hotel as you peek out the
windows, all you see is depressing buildings—makes one feel guilty.
Our room is over-sized, and I
immediately wanted to rearrange it to make more sense, like fill it up with
just one more nightstand, perhaps a small sofa, or to make the bathroom larger,
or to have places to put more stuff. The
bed is two doubles put together, so it is exceptionally wide. The curtains are beautiful.
And then I got in the shower—only
1 bar of soap; a very narrow shower, where the water surged harder, softer,
harder, softer... I went to grab the one
bar of soap on the sink while in the shower and the whole sliding door fell
off—I put it back on again. In the
stairwell half of the hand railings have already fallen off. It’s a shame that in this beautiful place the
workmanship is not holding up very well, just to remind us we’re still not in
Kansas anymore Toto.
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