We got the luggage.
It took 26 hours, but we finally got it.
Here are some tips when it comes to luggage handling on
international flights, and perhaps specific to Entebbe International Airport,
Uganda.
1. 45 minutes is not enough time to change planes and expect
your luggage.
2. Make sure your tags have your actual name on them,
preferably exactly as on your ticket.
The bar codes are only good up to a point.
3. Save all your
boarding passes and those claim tickets.
No one has ever checked my claim ticket in 25 years of travelling, but
if you tell a clerk, at least in Accra, Kigali or Entebbe that you lost yours,
they will look at you as if you left your sleeping baby on the last plane in
Lagos.
4. carry a change of clothes at all time. And a
toothbrush. My teeth felt like they were
wearing sweaters after 48 hours without one.
5. Fly on international carriers. The food, entertainment,
etc. sucks on Delta, and they don’t give
you little slippers or socks or a toothbrush and weird Turkish toothpaste
(which is better than none). The food on Delta was some weird rubber chicken
thing, a salad that had huge hunks of al dente cold sweet potatoes and randomly
sized bits of celery. The plane had ashtrays, and video screens from the 90’s. The
food on the little Rwandair plane from Lagos was amazing—curried chicken,
cooked bananas, fruit, croissant, real butter (Delta had margarine). Turkish
Air has fresh orange juice that is unlike anything I have ever had.
Egyptair—during the revolution—had cool chicken kebabs and hummus, etc. This does not have anything to do with
luggage, but I am venting here, and I was counting on that little disposable
toothbrush and weird toothpaste.
6. Get people working for you early. As soon as we landed in
Kigali, a very nice guy names Ernest got on the phone with Accra and Entebbe,
and sent them all sorts of information which arrived an hour before we did.
7. Be nice. These are busy people who get crapped on all day
long. Smile, say “Yes ma’am” and “Thank you so much”. You can even say it in Luganda or Kinyarwanda
if you know how. If you are nice to people they will want to help you. Rely on simply human empathy.
8. Or get impatient and adversarial. The nicer you are the
more people treat you like it’s your fault. It isn’t, it’s theirs. Not personally, but collectively. So when someone says “we need you to open the
bags for customs.” Say “Of course, no worries.” Then when the exact same
person, 2 seconds later says, “You may not enter customs, it is forbidden.” You
could say “Oh I’m sorry, that’s fine”. Or you could say, as I did, with as
little sarcasm as possible (which is about a 7 Lyndes on the Paul Lynde sarcasm
scale), “Well, that’s a riddle you’re going to have to solve, now isn’t it.”
9. The best I can say is that the Entebbe airport must not
lose many bags, because no one could figure out the next step in my bag
retrieval. That much being said, there was a large locked cage full of baggage
at the “Lost Baggage” desk. I feel bad for those 20 or so travelers who will
have to experience this too.
10, Finally, when you let them open the bags without you,
and you have five used laptops, and someone tells you that customs does not
allow used computers to be brought into Uganda, and then asks “Are these for
donation, or for your own students’ use?”
And there is a guy in a uniform with some sort of rifle sitting there,
and you are in a country that is pretty free, except when it isn’t. Consider
your options: Do you remember that each computer has a big sticker that says
“Donated to…” on it, and then say “I’m so sorry I was not aware, they are meant
to be donated to a poor rural school” or do you say “We are a group of
traveling students. This is an educational trip, and these computers are for my
students to use while they are here,” and stare directly into his eyes with a
look that feels very serious and sincere?
It’s up to you.
