Tag Archives: Amsterdam

Off to See the King!

3 Nov

Today’s the day! We left in the wee hours of the morning. It’s been ages since I last woke up so early, and my usual 5.30 am wake-up for golf pales compared to this ungodly hour. I might as well not sleep and get ready for the airport straightaway.

It will be a long day ahead with our direct flight. I have forgotten what it’s like to be on a long-haul flight. And this journey will take 14 hours and 20 minutes, a little longer than the last time we flew to Amsterdam. Oh boy, my butt and body.

Separately, I’m a little bummed that my Move, Exercise, and Stand activities will be disrupted, thus ending my long record of 1,053 days in the Fitness app on my AppleWatch. Oh well, it is for a good reason; we are off to England, sadly not to see the Queen (God bless her soul) but the new King!

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When Will I Recover

9 Jul

It’s been nine days since we returned from the US and both of us have not fully recovered from the jet lag! My goodness… it’s taking rather long.

Every night the whole of last week, we were waking up twice in the middle of the night at two hour intervals. The only one night I slept throughout until morning was last Friday when I went out for dinner with my golf buddies and I drank whiskey. I think it helped. The other nights were normal routines without any aids or meds to expedite the recovery.

So how long does one take to recover from jet lag?

From what I read online, it would take about a day to recover for each time zone crossed. Hmm… the time difference for us is 15 hours, so about two weeks to recover? Gosh…

Generally, jet lag is worse when traveling from West to East. We started out from Portland, and headed East to Salt Lake City, Amsterdam and finally Kuala Lumpur, that’s going East all the way. With the extra one stop (at SLC), long transit time and flying, maybe that’s why we are taking longer than a week to recover. Our 2012 trip to the US, we flew from East to West, San Francisco to Kuala Lumpur and that time, I took a week to recover from the jet lag.

Well, I woke up once at five this morning instead of twice before sunrise. Maybe a sign that I am recovering. Hopefully by the end of this week, the body would finally catch up with the time zone I am in and totally recover from the jet lag.

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All Good on the Home Front

5 Jul

Now that the bag delay issue is settled, there are other matters to tend to.

Official pet number one, Rooney, was confused then happy to see us when we got home. Generally all was good on the home front except for two things – the Marimo Moss balls and the cocoon still hanging on the tree in front of the house.

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He loved his new chew toy

The moss balls would need some serious TLC to recover as they have turned brown but this wouldn’t be an issue to revive them. The cocoon is quite a challenge though. It’s been too long at this stage. Did we miss the emerging moment and deceived by the cocoon shell, still hanging up there? Maybe I should brave climbing up the tall ladder to have a closer look. Hmm…

I’m glad I didn’t gain too much weight, only a pound. I thought it would be more considering the 16/8 diet was thrown out the window the minute we arrived at KLIA and had a beer and indulged in snacks at the Premier Lounge before we boarded.

It wasn’t just the things we ate in the US but when we ate which was always late dinners past seven and sometimes even nine or ten at night, hardly at five or six like we normally do back home. And I ate breakfast constantly eating because it was cold and I needed food to fuel the body to keep warm.

Being back means being back to routine and I am pretty sure that extra pound will be shed in no time especially once I get over my jet lag. So it’s great that all’s good on the home front.

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Bags are Finally Home

4 Jul

Yesterday the bags were finally delivered, at 9.55pm! It was a long day for us waiting for them and the bags, I supposed for their delay and ‘adventure’.

I must say, the last three days I wasn’t overly stressed over our delayed bags. Sure there was some anxiety initially because of the unknown and no updates. But soon after, there was confidence that KLM would sort it out. It was just a matter of time.

For such a global airline, KLM was very approachable when they responded to my queries rather quickly in my opinion. They had many channels to be contacted: Facebook, Messenger, Twitter, email, WhatsApp and Customer Contact Centre.

I chose WhatsApp because to me, the other platforms were either too worldly or corporate and not personal enough. The key here is being approachable rather than professional and I am glad I chose this channel.

The exchanges with KLM on WhatsApp helped bring them down to a more personal level and faster too, giving a lot more reassurance than email, which I used with a regional airline in April and they responded a day later.

Lessons learned here: always label your check-in bags (which we did), buy travel insurance (which we did too and will claim for the delay), make full use of the best and fastest communication platform to stay informed thus, avoiding stress and have a positive attitude towards the situation, it helps.

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The Bags are Still Not Here, Part 2

3 Jul

The perils of jet lag continues! Waking up at 5.30am yesterday morning not for golf but due to jet lag seem to have clouded my senses.

I misinterpreted the information on the status of our bags as stated on the website that KLM provided. Bag One will leave Amsterdam Schiphol Airport on 2nd July, not arrive at KLIA on the said date. And the airport baggage claims office called yesterday evening to confirm this.

What this means then is that Bag One will arrive on 3rd July, today and delivered to us in the evening. Haish…

Meanwhile up till yesterday, Bag Two was still being traced. Dear oh dear…

Work and worry took the toll on me and last night, I crashed at 9.30pm; I couldn’t hold up and brave the anxiety anymore. And this morning I woke up at 3.30am. I’m not complaining though because there was a text message from KLM saying Bag Two is currently being transported to KUL! Yay.

I checked the website and indeed, Bag Two was labeled ‘Rushbag’ and on flight KL809 en route to KLIA. I hope it’s the same flight as Bag One.

We hope to receive both bags this evening. Fingers crossed.

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The Bags are Still Not Here

2 Jul

Yesterday evening fighting jet lag, we waited in vain for our bags to be delivered. It was exasperating to call the airport and put on hold until the line went dead. Eeesh…

We checked Delta’s website—as we checked-in at their counter and our KLM flight codeshare with them—and the status showed the last entry being ‘Bags removed planeside at SLC’. What did this mean? They never left Salt Lake City? But we were told they were stuck in Amsterdam! Gulp.

So using the power of social media, I messaged KLM directly on WhatsApp last night and they responded in less than an hour. Pretty good. They gave me a new site to check which I did. And status showed ‘Tracking continues and to check later’. Hmm… at that point, it was getting late and the body couldn’t hold up anymore, what else can we do but sleep?

This morning, I woke up at 5.30am unable to sleep anymore. And I checked again. There’s some progress – the same website showed one bag, not both, is on the next flight in. As we did only one PIR (Property Irregularity Report) for both bags, how come status indicated only one bag coming in? Is it not necessary to indicate both? Hmm… not very reassuring I thought. I queried KLM this morning and they responded after an hour and a half. The second bag is still being traced! Goodness. But there’s no need for another PIR.

A quick counter check on flightaware.com showed the aircraft departed but was late. And Schiphol itself is experiencing a lot of delays, an average of 43 minutes for arrivals and one hour three minutes for departures.

We were just there on Sunday and our departure was delayed 24 minutes; I thought it was the inconsiderate dude (whom the Captain did announce to everyone) who came onboard late. But it’s actually more technical than that with the delays at such lengths for inbound and outbound.

Well, looks like we have to hang on again tonight to receive bag one of two coming home. Stay tuned for the adventures of Bag Two.

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Oops, The Bags are Not Here

1 Jul

It’s mind boggling when I look back now at the total time of the whole journey inclusive of the car rides. So from the time we left Corvallis for the airport, the flights, transits and our taxi ride home, it was 43.5 hours! Goodness gracious me.

The delay of the bags added to this and it could have been worse if the delayed flight departures were longer. But being under half an hour each time, the flying itself made up for it.

Yesterday when we touchdown at KLIA, all I was thinking of was a nice cold shower and a good sleep to start my recovery from the jet lag. But our checked-in bags never arrived. With this clouding our minds, how to sleep snugly?

We stood at the baggage conveyor belt for more than half an hour and our two checked-in bags never came. They are still in Amsterdam, along with the bags of several other travelers who transited at Schiphol Airport.

Some of them were connecting from Paris and Japan, and us from the US. Like them, we lodged a report and this took time too as the office was packed. Initially I thought we had to go to the airport this evening to get them but hubby said they will be delivered to us instead. I await anxiously for them.

This morning I woke up at 6.20am. I had a good eight hours sleep with four and a half of it being deep sleep. That’s good, maybe a faster recovery but the nagging headache is still there, I don’t know why. Hubby on the other hand, woke up every two hours. He said he was still in airplane sleep mode and each time, he was expecting to be served a meal or ice cream! Hahaha…

We jumped right into work this morning, not wasting any time to rest.

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Oh My Body, Part 2

30 Jun

There’s always something about the return journey compared to the initial arrival one. The traveling hours are about the same or sightly longer but the woes seem to be different.

When we first arrived in the US three weeks ago, the next day upon arrival I had recovered from the jet lag. The same can’t be said for returning to Malaysia for sure.

I recall our 2012 US trip, I took a week to recover from the jet lag. Now, seven years later, a week too or longer? Hmm…

Maybe the fact that we are returning from a holiday – back to reality, makes it hard for the body to accept, thus longer to readjust.

In the meantime, I was hoping to sleep 18 hours throughout when we arrive home but I cannot do so because our checked-in bags never arrived at KLIA! Haish…

Looks like recovery sleep has to be shortened to return to the airport tomorrow as our report has been done and bags should arrive by then to be collected.

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We Wait Again

29 Jun

The transit this time at Schiphol is in the main terminal and there are so many things to eat and shops to browse. We arrived by 2.30pm after a rather pleasant journey with no bad turbulence. But the same can’t be said for comfort and the inability to sleep well. Our next flight is at 8.50pm but boarding, as printed is 8.09pm. Still… a long wait. Again.

By now, with three hours still to go, the both of us are really tired and no will to explore. Somehow with one extra transit and stop throws the whole body system awry. I just want to lie down and sleep if I can. Big yawn…

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So Tired

29 Jun

I was feeling tired and we were not even halfway when we were in transit at SLC International Airport. I suspect waking up at 6.30am could be the factor.

We boarded our Amsterdam-bound aircraft at 8.15pm mountain time and there was a 20-minute delay before the aircraft departed at 9.20pm. Finally, on the way home.

The cabin lights before take off

Two hours into the flight, dinner was served. I watched a movie and then tried to sleep. It was so difficult. The space was not comfortable – I twisted and turned but could not find a snug position. My Mi Band2 showed four hours of light sleep and zero deep sleep. Yawn…

Before I could try again, the cabin lights were turned on and our next meal was served. Breakfast? Lunch? It’s hard to tell because it’s almost five in the morning Oregon time and almost one in the afternoon Amsterdam time.

The cabin lights before the second meal

By now the body is all confused, the perils of long distance travels. And we have one more 12-hour leg to go!

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