#115 - I'm a Refugee

This post is 2 weeks to the day after arriving back in the United States. It took a while to recover 😊.

I guess it was inevitable that I would do a blog post on COVID19. As most of you know, I was in Argentina. The situation really hit so quickly that I really had not reacted to it. I had made the decision that I would ride it out in Argentina, because it quickly became clear going back to the Philippines was not an option – I only had a tourist visa there).

My friend Mark and his wife had gone through hell trying to get out of the Philippines and back to United States, and within a few days of them arriving there, he called me and suggested strongly that I get to United States and stay with them. The alternate being to stay in Argentina more or less completely isolated in an apartment on my own. I had not even given it a thought until he called me. But … upon a little consideration … I really was isolated there under the conditions of quarantine to an extent that was a little bit scary. I had no support network. The few good friends I had there were already in self isolation because they consider themselves to be high risk for one reason or the other. And although I had cash, they had closed the banks, and there was no indication of when they would reopen. In addition, a few days earlier I had slipped in the shower. Although I had not injured myself seriously, the thought had flashed through my head that in the current circumstances, who would I call? Ghostbusters?

It didn’t take me but a few minutes to make the decision. In fact, within an hour of getting off the phone with Mark, I had almost finished packing.

Next morning, Tuesday, I started looking for flights. But already the writing was on the wall. Flights out of the country were few and far between. Direct flights between Argentina and the U.S. had been stopped 10 days before or so. The Argentinian flag carrier and LATAM had both already grounded their fleets. I found a flight on Thursday from Buenos Aires to São Paulo, Brazil (on Turkish Airlines). And then a connection flight on United up to Houston and then on to Las Vegas. It still that seemed like it would be okay. It was only 2 days away.

So, I packed my bags, and worked on surmounting the other hurdle; actually getting to the airport. There were roadblocks and control points various places in the city and especially going out to the airport. Ezeiza is actually in Ezeiza province not in the city of Buenos Aires proper. And the provincial control points operated differently than those in the city (read more arbitrarily). Cars were being confiscated if the police thought you shouldn’t be out.

As a result it was problematic finding someone to take me. I finally found a limousine service through the American Express Platinum Concierge and they wanted an arm and a leg, but I agreed. I still worked on finding a backup though, just in case. My close friend Max did finally track down somebody that seemed to be OK. Good that I arranged that because on Thursday, three hours before the limo was supposed to pick me up, they called and canceled. I had also contacted a taxi driver whose card I had (through my other close friend Veronica), and when that driver was contacted, within a few minutes she had confirmed.

Claudia

So, I had a primary and a backup. But the lady did show up on time (I left the full payment for the backup driver anyway). My driver, a blonde Amazon by the name of Claudia, was wonderful. She got me to the airport and wanted to wait. But I told her it was okay. But about an hour later she called me on the phone and in Spanish told me very sternly that no matter what time of day or night it was, that if I had a problem I was to call her and she would come get me at the airport.

Thursday night ghost town

The airport was a disaster. It was a ghost town, and they had one information desk which had a large sign in Spanish saying that we don’t have any information about flights. But … all seemed well until about five hours before the flight was supposed to leave and then abruptly it disappeared from the departure board. When I called Turkish Airlines (Main reservations #), they assured me the flight was not canceled and was on time. But I was finally able to find a distraught group of Turkish businessmen who informed me that apparently the president of Argentina closed the airspace off (an hour prior in a televised speech) and our flight to São Paolo was indeed canceled. [A little anxiety may have ensued at this time 😊]

I had been aware through the U.S. Embassy mailing list that there was a relief flight from Eastern Airlines (no, not the guys went out of business in the 80s). I had been keeping their website handy on my phone and right there and right then at the checkout counter for Turkish airlines I was able to get on online via my phone and purchase a ticket for a flight that was leaving the following morning at 9:30 AM. There were (according to the web site) only 2 seats left when I made the booking.

Claudia, bless her heart, came and got me within about 30 minutes and took me back to the apartment so that I could get a few hours of sleep and print a confirmation ticket for Eastern Airlines before she picked me up at 5 AM the next morning.

On both trips Claudia was able to get past all the control checkpoints with absolutely no problem – she was very well organized and determined and had an electronic QR code pass on her phone that she showed to the police at the control points. When I got there, I was already probably the 40th person in line waiting for the flight. I struck up a friendship with a lady named Dora, to whom I donated a mask because I had a spare, and we waited. I wasn’t concerned until we got up close to the check-in point. The line was very slow because they weren’t doing anything by computer. It was all being handled by written checklists. However, as we got almost to the counter, there was a small group of people that were saying they were not being checked in because they were not on ‘the list’. And sure enough, when I got up there the lady looked carefully at these written pages and finally told me that I too, fell into this select group.

Even retelling the story is causing my stress to spike a little bit. Apparently having a ticket in my hand that was confirmed meant little. The situation was chaotic. Nobody was keeping anybody informed about what was going on. I was doing my best to be stoic about it, but it was tough I must admit.

Through extreme good fortune there was a Hispanic-American gentleman by the name of Daniel, who was in direct text contact with somebody at the American Embassy. The Embassy was fairly useless because when one called there was only a voice recording saying they were closed due to the quarantine. But Daniel, I believe, was some contractor working with the American Embassy and had a direct contact inside. He spoke with the seven or eight of us that seem to have been missed (including himself) and he texted our names directly to his contact and within 30 minutes we started being called up and checked in. Whew! I wish I had gotten his contact information. But I was pretty frazzled by this time.

The flight was supposed to leave at 0930, we didn’t get boarded until 1230 and the flight didn’t take off till 1330. The ground staff that was operating on behalf of Eastern Airlines just didn’t know what they were doing. I’m not criticizing. They had families of their own to worry about and were there trying to do manifesting and baggage check-in manually. Not to mention with some very distraught passengers.

Some of the passengers that were there had been through, literally, the wars. Some of them had been on the road for almost a week trying to get out of Chile and Peru going through riots on the street in order to be able to make it to Buenos Aires to catch a flight out. Definitely some real war stories.

I felt so sorry for some of these people because they had few, if any, resources. I mean the tickets on that Eastern flight were not cheap. And if they got stuck, where would they stay? I at least had an apartment to get back to.

The plane was an antiquated 767, and in the end, it turned out that they still had 20 empty seats. But nobody seemed to know that at the time that they were telling us that we were not on the famous list. When the lady was checking the list, it reminded me of the scene in Casablanca when Ingrid Bergman was at the airport trying to get on the last plane out 😊.

So, in the late evening hours we were ejected into a deserted Miami-Dade international Airport. The first time I had set foot in the states in more than 10 years. I was able to get about three hours sleep in a Marriott hotel, then back to the airport at 4 AM to catch a Delta flight from Miami to Atlanta to Las Vegas.

Under the small world category, I ran into a guy called Elmo in the Delta check in line who was married to a Filipina who was actually heading back to the Philippines to a resort that he owned near Olongapo. [I found later he made it back OK and had contacts in the PAF that escorted him directly back to his wife].

I checked into Delta, again having a confirmed ticket, and the first thing they told me is ‘we can’t take you, your ticket is ‘suspended’’. Although alarmed, another desk agent took care of me very quickly and recharged my credit card for the ticket. However – instant anxiety attack, but I don’t know why I was worried; there were only 40 or 50 people on the flight, and on the connecting flight to Las Vegas … probably less than 20 people.

The high point of my entire evacuation was meeting a Delta flight attendant called Alyssa on the flight from Miami to Atlanta. Kindred spirits and we had a great conversation. If she reads this, it was a real pleasure meeting you and thank you for listening to me 😊. You really helped me.

McCarran Airport in Las Vegas was depressing. Empty and echoing. But as jetlagged and as fatigued as I was, I got my rental car, drove north on nearly deserted roads, and was finally welcomed with open arms (at a social distance of course 😊) by Mark and his wife and then ensconced in a lovely AirBnB a few blocks away. I can’t tell you how relieved I was actually to finally be back with friends at this particular time. I am so fortunate and I know it.

I hope this post finds all of you well. I have to say, as an introvert, having to stay at home and relatively isolated … hmmm … kind of enjoyable … on a strictly personal level that is. I realize the global implications are severe but one has to take the silver linings where they can be found.

Argentina from Space - Simply because this is a cool picture