Hating Qantas!

Poor husband Keith is now down in Sydney, tropic-clad and shivering with cold because Qantas lost his luggage.

The outright rudeness and indifference of the Qantas staff to his plight definitely compounds the entire thing ... although I've just heard that he's been told his luggage is now in Perth and he may get it back tonight.  In the meantime, instead of having a lovely weekend with his sister before his flight back to HK, the poor honey is freezing in those icy, wind-whipped streets without a jumper, scarf, coat or boots to his name, trying to work up the enthusiasm to go see a couple of art galleries and museums.

Definitely a waste of a holiday, yes?

Bloody Qantas!  Although, to be fair, Cairns Airport is in such a shambles it's probably more proper to lay the blame with them.  They are re-modeling the terminal and the place is a nightmare ... but made worse because everyone is so angry and hostile, mean and passive-aggressive. Plus, what they're doing to the complex feels so nasty because they appear to be in the process of turning it into some giant money-making venture, which is so wrong at an airport.

When we first arrived in Cairns two weeks ago late at night from Melbourne the airport seemed practically empty and in darkness and there were no proper signs where to go or where to pick up the luggage and then, eventually, somebody passive-aggressive and nasty told us we had to pay some stupidly large sum of money for trolleys and then sent us walking miles to some out-of-the-way building, through all this cordoned-off garbage and rubble, and the entire plane-load of Melbournites (trying to escape the southern winter) were as cross as we were.  It really was horrible and not at all a nice start to anyone's pleasant tropical holiday.

So let's blame Keith's lost luggage on them.  Oh, and when we dropped him off at Cairns airport, the new carpark is so stupidly organised and so counter-intuitive it's practically impossible to find your way out of it and into the half-built new terminal so I have great pity for anyone in a hurry for a flight.

Oh, and now anyone is allowed into the departure area which would be nice if you intended long, drawn-out farewells, but you can tell it's not intended to be nice because it's really all about making more money at the restaurants and Duty Free shops.

Something truly stupid is going on there and I strongly suggest some aviation authority take a long hard look at what's going down because it certainly isn't right.  And now poor Keith is paying a high price for their inefficiency and stupidity ... and that is just WRONG!