Reality Check

Yesterday Morning, 6:12am

Outside the wind has been howling and rain has been periodically pounding the windows and then taking a break. Right now I hear it in sheets blowing down the street. I complain about not having heat inside, about being cold, while I have seen the bidonvilles - the shanty towns: slabs of cardboard and sheets of metal stacked to form shelters. The lucky ones have found sheets of plywood. Some use particle board, others have stolen highway signs to us as roofs. The people huddled inside are wet and cold right now. It's been cold and wet for a week. Even indoors here I can see my breath. Many of them are sick. There will be no steaming mug of coffee to warm them up this morning. Probably many have huddled unsleeping through the night, while I complain about only having three and a half hours of sleep in my warm comfortable bed.

Dear Father,
Forgive my ingratitude! Thank you for your undeserved gifts - your love that has found me and guided me across three continents, the physical comforts of warm clothes and a dry bed, a family whose love stretches the ocean to remind me of your own. Open my eyes to bless others.

No Call, No Show

So I haven't gotten that all important phone call about my suitcase. It's now been 17 days...

I have been to the airport 5 times in the past 2 weeks looking through mountains of luggage for my baggage. The guardien of the baggage room knows me now and lets me in without the series of questions and the mandatory tour around the luggage outside of the room. Last time he even said goodbye to me by name. At the airport they insist that my suitcase is still in Paris.

I have also made 2 trips to the Air France agency downtown. My acquaintance with the man who takes care of the lost baggage claims began on a good note as I told him how I had always had very positive experiences with Air France in the past. It's true - they have the best food in the air (with the possible exception of Swiss Air who served me champagne and Swiss chocolate on a little puddle jump from Bordeaux to Basil). Anyway, before my trip to see the lost-baggage-man last night I decided that I would suggest that the best possible solution would be to send me on one of their not-quite-full flights to Paris to check out the lost luggage department at Charles de Gaulle. My theory is that it is stuck there without its tags and nobody knows what to do with it. Mr. Lost-Luggage-Man stopped and actually considered that suggestion. I was expecting for that suggestion to be shot down with an "absolutely not!" There was nobody else there waiting as they were about to close for the evening and I really think he almost said yes. But then he told me that we would have to go through sending the official report to Paris and asking them to look for my lost bag. He explained how they really were having a lot of trouble with bags getting stuck in Paris and so it would take some time to get an answer, but after three weeks we could start the process of reimbursement. I am going to try to go back in a week and see if I can talk him into that flight! It can't hurt. He didn't tell me no, so I think I have a good chance - if no one is around to hear him agree!

I miss you all (even more than my suitcase)!

MIA Luggage!

I flew out of Newark on New Year's Eve (thus skipping my annual New Year's Hat tradition, the cause of much laughter for people walking through the front doors of Hanover) and arrived in Paris with a short window of time in which to make my connecting flight. After taking a series of buses all over the airport I arrived at my terminal and ran to the gate just in time. My luggage however decided to hang out in Paris. It must have been the idea of the Red Pants. Those naughty Red Pants have just the right amount of sophisticated Paris funk to talk the rest of the suitcase contents into a Parisian escapade. If they ever decide to show up here in Africa I shall make sure to keep much closer track of them on the next voyage! I might even bribe them to be good with the promise of wearing them and giving them the chance to show off all over the airport. Hmmm.

Seriously, I'm a little concerned because my vonage box was also in that suitcase. I keep calling the airport (but it's almost impossible to get an answer) & have made 3 trips out there (eventually retrieving 1 of the 2 suitcases). Send up a few prayers!