Jo Chipchase
A single mother of two young boys with a slightly quirky view of life. Your author’s interests range from dyeing clothes on the terrace (a relatively harmless pursuit) to digesting the latest gossip, dining on whatever is on offer, imbibing the odd vino blanco, frequenting car boot sales, partying when child minding is available and having the occasional 'man hating rant' (I love 'em really... ahem!). Oh, yes, and I enjoy a good book and a night spent watching 'Shameless' or ‘Skins’ on the sofa when there's nothing better to do ...
Jo Chipchase Articles
A Cautionary Tale of Lost Luggage
How we flew from Malaga to Newcastle and our luggage to Leeds...
Many years ago, when jetting off on foreign holidays, I was totally paranoid about the airport losing my luggage and/or it being stolen by some dodgy miscreant in baggage reclaim. People in my party often seemed to lose their luggage. That wasn’t a good sign. So I would stick multiple address labels on to my hold baggage and worry endlessly that somebody would mistake my suitcase for a similar one. Upon arrival at the destination airport, I would drive my friends mad by elbowing everybody out of the way as I raced to the luggage carousel, where I would stand nervously at its mouth, biting my finger nails, making absolute sure that nobody could grab the precious case which contained my prized, umm, dresses and sandals and possibly a cheap bottle of plonk if it was a return flight.
OK, so my behaviour was two shillings short of a pound. And why would somebody want my worn sandals and swimwear anyway?
A decade and a few dozen flights later, my paranoia turned to apathy. Address labels
long abandoned, I would chuck my bags on to the conveyor belt at check-
However, as stated in my last blog entry, pride comes before a fall. Before a recent flight from Malaga to Newcastle, I was far too smug about my baggage: how well I’d selected a delightful “capsule wardrobe” that coordinated with itself and would please the likes of Gok or Trinny and Susanna, how I’d decided not to transport the damn kitchen sink for once in my life and then – oh, clever me – how I’d guessed the weight contained within my big, pink bag to within half a kilo of the 22kg allowed by budget carrier, Jet2.
On the day of the flight, my terrible toddler twosome (aptly nicknamed “Ronnie and
Reggie”) and I duly arrived at Malaga Airport – a stressful experience at the best
of times. I was thoroughly annoyed that Terminal 2 now shares its security zone with
Terminal 3, forcing us to do a half-
Anyway, I digress. As the bag containing the belongings required for my family to
spend a week in Newcastle and Scotland disappeared along the conveyor belt, my one
concern was that I’d forgotten to include a bottle of delicious chilli sauce made
by Allchillies.com . But perhaps I had a slight premonition of what was to come as,
just after we boarded the plane and I was about to chuck the boarding passes into
a handy sick-
The flight progressed and R&R were hell-
The flight dragged on. The snack trolley took 40mins to arrive at our seats, by which
time Reggie – bored of trying to break his empty plastic food tray by climbing on
top of it -
“Oh sorreeee that my child is looking at you,” I retorted. “I challenge anyone to keep toddlers still in a space this size for three hours,” I voiced aloud, with a haughty tone. He piped down. I thought about adding “my son is used to Spain where people actually like children” but decided against it.
“Oscar, do not look at the man behind us,” I loudly repeated several times during the rest of the flight, just to ensure the man definitely heard. I then resumed my fascinating discourse about plane crashes.
But – aha – bad flight karma was about to get me. Although the boys had persistently mauled the passengers’ seats in front and behind us and my “Ronnie and Reggie” jokes hadn’t gone down as well as expected (ahem!), when the plane finally landed at Newcastle Airport, the unfortunate couple seated in front of us helped escort my errant children into baggage reclaim. And that’s where it all Started Going Horribly Wrong.
We stood at the carousel for Jet2 reclaim. Reggie’s buggy appeared but my large,
pink, 22.5kg bag didn’t emerge. Dozens of people left with their cases. R&R, fed
up with the airport experience and excited about seeing their grandparents who were
waiting outside, constantly tried to stick their fingers down the side of the conveyor
belt, oblivious that little digits could be chopped off if it started suddenly. Mummy
became increasingly agitated with the boys’ finger-
Eventually, we were left standing in an empty room beside an empty conveyor belt. The boys were still trying to stick their hands in dangerous places. It finally dawned on me with the stereotypical sinking feeling: the pink bag was not going to join us... not now and possibly never.
I wanted to throw myself on the floor and have a tantrum like Reggie. I kept thinking about my lovely new sundress procured from a Spanish shop that has a name similar to “sewage”. And my favourite sandals, which could be in Amsterdam for all I knew. I started squawking and flapping like a deranged pigeon. I enlisted some helpful chaps to take R&R out to meet their grandparents and filled in a lost baggage form amid much screeching about “going to Scotland with no clothes and my bag isn’t insured against loss”. It dawned on me that I wasn’t covered for inconvenience either.
And what was the upshot of my smugness and lax behaviour re “I never lose my baggage”?
I had to foot the bill for an entire set of holiday clothes for me and the boys -
Before travelling again, I will bother to complete the form for the free travel insurance that comes with one of my credit cards. Travel insurance clearly isn’t just for paranoid package tourists. No siree! How pigheaded to think that lost bags won’t happen to me. Pride always comes before a fall. And, clearly, ranting on about plane crashes just for fun will send you or your bags to Coventry... or Leeds.
*Tourist who stands out like a sore thumb.