Havana I’m Coming By Force By Fire - Volume 1

VOLUME 1 – You’re Havana joke right?!?

It’s January 2017 and on a complete whim I book a flight to Cuba for September (forgetting it’s the Caribbean and one ought to always look up Hurricane season), and my accommodation and think to myself “yeah why not. Yolo”. It’ll be the first solo travel for me outside of Europe but I feel comforted in knowing there will be black people there (so I won’t look like I have “tourist” etched into my forehead, I’ll be able to assimilate), and I WILL learn Spanish before I go. What could go wrong eh? I buy my visa and I wait.

In early September 2017, Hurricane Irma starts weaving a destructive path through the Caribbean. Initial trajectories shift on a daily almost 2/3 hourly basis, and before I know it, it’s heading for Cuba. It will hit some parts very badly, and Havana will also be getting a lashing (although not the strongest). This is literally a few days before my flight. I message my accommodation host to ask what it’s like in Cuba and what’s the projection, and he seems to think it’s fine. I keep checking with the airline but they don’t cancel the flights. All advice is telling people to leave Cuba pronto but this vagabond airline is not cancelling flights. If they cancel, I can get my money back, I have insurance and it covers this. Up to TWO days before, with the hurricane certified to hit Havana the very day I’m meant to land, Air France is doing African parent lying on the sofa “bring me the remote” chill. I cannot. I call up, ask if I can reschedule, they say only within the month of September, that’s ridiculous, so I say what’s another option. I get a voucher for the cost of my flight which I can use within the year.

I had booked Airbnb accommodation and so I looked up the refund policy. My booking is strict, but they have a refund provision for “Extenuating Circumstances”. I email Airbnb head office and say if I cancel will I be able to get my money back from my host for sure because of the Hurricane. My guy does a Joe Stutter Stutter reply back and I comprehend that Extenuating Circumstances is really code for death.

All the while this is happening, I can honestly say I wasn’t feeling sad. I felt removed from the situation, like it wasn’t happening to me. I’d been looking forward to it for so long (it had been THE most mentally draining past few months, and it’s not the easiest job to take time off from), but in the run up to it, honestly my spirit was so dampened. I was more excited not to be at work than go. My mind wasn’t in it, so I took the L with acceptance and a “que sera sera” attitude. I wasn’t ready to go. I spent that week chilling. Someone said “why didn’t you come back to work to save the days?” You know when people ask you dumb questions?

Now it’s one thing not to go, it’s another thing to lose money. I can fight for coin like I’m part of The 300. So the only option I had was to find flights around the same price (or not that much more) AND, make sure it coincided with when my Airbnb accommodation was free and around the same tariff so I could just postpone, as opposed to cancel & lose money. I actually managed to do this very quickly and for not more than £60. However it would be 8 months later in May 2018. Yeah that rankled at the time but the alternative option was take a chance, go and potentially die. I chose certified life.

Air France cancelled that flight on the day I was meant to fly. And only the first leg of it. LOL. Pricks.

Fast forward to May 2018 and I’ve had to buy a new visa because they only last 5 months a pop. Cool. Through November Air France has been shifting my flight times (but keeping it on the same day). I wasn’t too bothered by this as that’s happened to me before when I’ve booked flights to the Caribbean. Three days before my flight I decide to get my act together and see when I can check in. Lo and behold I read a notification that makes my blood run COLD – “Air France Call for strike May 2018”. I tap the press release…and the strike covers the day I am to fly.

Ddsgbdfhhdssghdbgfncjcbjh. WHY ALWAYS ME?

I checked that in the morning before work. I was so stunned I returned to bed for a bit and told myself it was a joke, a lie and that the next time I checked, it would be gone. I got up, got dressed, got ready for work, and I checked it again. This time I read properly.

The notification said it was too early (lol) to evaluate the possible impacts. Bearing in mind that I now know this had been planned for months. It then said once they knew more, the flight schedule would be made public and released the DAY BEFORE. What kind of rubbish?? Then at the bottom it said if you had a flight booked on those dates they were offering rebooking at no extra cost, but…only up till the 27th May. Well, that’s not how holidays work yo !!

At this point I said “I cannot”, but I checked for a flight the next day (not affected by the strike) just to see, and there was one seat remaining). I was a bit like “oh??” but I went to work and I was calm. Because I was sure that my God would not allow Air France to cause my blood pressure to tango like this. I was sure the strike would be called off.

So I’m at work now and my resolve is disintegrating after reading several articles about several strikes Air France have held this year, the chaos it’s caused, and the fact that even French trains have been striking too. And there are more dates planned this year. I swiftly conclude that they are really about this life and this strike is going nowhere. The thing is, I’m not mad at the people striking, the reasons why actually sound reasonable, but I also work hard for my money. I check if that one seat on the flight the next day is still there, IT IS, in 5 seconds I weigh up the pros and cons of losing 24hrs in Cuba vs most of my money & my mind and I call Air France. You see, we’ve already established they don’t cancel flights in time (and only partially), and after a rigorous read of their refund policy, it didn’t affirm for certain that they refund in the event of strikes. And I’m not finna spend ten years getting my money back through insurance. I call them and ask them to transfer my ticket to the next day. They do. I’m relieved, but I also have an inherent sense that this is not the end of this story…

Whenever something changes with my flight, I update my host who is always very lively and encouraging about it. Bearing in mind we’ve been communicating for over a year now. So I update him on the strike, then when I change flight, and I update my booking which he kindly refunds (he doesn’t have to) and to which he replies something like: wow you’ve really tried very hard to get here. We have to make sure you have an amazing time in Havana.

How sweet!

It’s one day before I was originally meant to fly, I check that flight…and I see that it was cancelled. Again only the first leg. I praise God and I share the news with some folk who’ve been in on the whole saga like “oh my days, see God!”. That was during the day. It was my last day at work and when I get home, I’m packing bits and bobs, a little tentatively, but I’ve fully accepted flying a day later and actually I’m not mad. I feel calm. All throughout this I’ve been a little anxious, but for some reason not really upset and not too worried. I mean after all in the grand scheme of things, not going is hardly the end of the world. Truly. It’s a first world problem.

At around 8.10 or 8.15, I’m on a phone call and I get an email alert.

My new flight has been cancelled. Only the first leg to Paris. Again. I finish that phone call.

Insert utter bewilderment and disbelief. It’s not a strike day!

I call customer services.
It’s only open 8am – 8pm.

I start looking on twitter, I see many similar stories and few resolutions, or ones that look like people spending extra for new flights, or to meet a connecting flight. I literally cannot. At this point I start thinking, if only I can get to Paris I could still get on the other flight. But then common sense punches me and I remember that would mean trusting this same Air France to keep that flight, and spending extra money, and Eurostar is also striking, and imagine if I got there and it was cancelled. Someone would have to die.

I stop packing, toss my stuff on the floor, and start thinking of all the BH motives I declined to attend because I was supposed to be in Cuba, but now I might actually be here, and I’m VEX. I set my alarm to 7.58am and I fall asleep. I will try this one more time because why would my God do this to me? Lol. But if it doesn’t work out, at least the weather will be nice. I even consider going back to work to save my annual leave. A whole me. Wow.

The next morning at the strike of 8am, (I literally watched my phone clock change from 7.59 to 8), I called Air France customer services and I said “Get me…to Havana…pliz” in the politest way I could muster. Some people get it wrong, they think that’s the time to be doing ranting and raving, no it’s massage egos time, lay it on thick time, “oh I just really need not to have to cancel all this over again, it’s been devastating, is there anything you could possibly please do?” time. Him: yeah sure just wait a moment and I’ll see if I can book you on another airline because the issues look to keep running into the weekend…

…I wait..

Him a few seconds later: so how about this flight on the same day, it will pass through Madrid instead and it’s a different airline so you shouldn’t have any cancellation problems.

Me: thankyousomuchohmygoshimsooverjoyedicanttellyouhowmuchiappreciatethiswowyoudidthatsoquicklythankyouthankyouthankyou

Him: laughs nervously okay.

End of call

So…almost 18 months, 2 visas, a hurricane, a strike, 3 flight cancellations, and 4 re-bookings later…I fly to Havana.

Look out for Volume 2.