Ten years ago, I had the opportunity to visit Cairo, Egypt.    At the end of a trip to Israel, I hopped on the short El Al flight from Tel Aviv to Cairo, itself a tangible symbol of the 1979 Camp David accords that brought between Egypt and Israel.   My arrival in Cairo was one of the most chaotic airport experiences of my life that did not have to do with United Airlines.    Departing the flight, I descended into a haphazard arrivals hall with no real indication of where I needed to go or what I needed to do.   Fortunately, I had a guide meeting me who was able to help me navigate the arrivals process.   Somehow this person was able to make it to the gate, get my passport stamped, and help me retrieve my bags.   The entire procedure was filled with people from all nationalities shouting and walking in every direction.   At regular intervals, someone would attempt to bulldozer me out of the way with a large, fully loaded luggage cart.    As I emerged from the exit, I was again greeted by an overwhelming crowd that spilled over the sidewalk and into the street.    I longed for the obnoxious police that patrol American airports, moving everyone along whether they were causing a problem or not.

What To Do If You Are Caught Up In A Political Crisis

However bad the airport in Cairo was ten years ago, it is undoubtedly worse now.    The pictures I have seen show a much more modern terminal than I saw in 2000, but the eyewitness accounts of the situation there are disturbing.    People talk of long lines and chaotic attempts to check in.    Because of the difficulty getting to the airport, there are likely many no-shows, further adding to the confusion.    In situations like this, aircraft often depart half empty while crowds wait to check in.

Since I have never really visited a country during a popular uprising, I can’t offer any authoritative advice.  I can merely share what I would do in a similar situation.    First, I would remain in my hotel as long as I felt it was safe.  The last place I want to spend a few days is on the floor of a crowded international airport.   A decent hotel catering to foreigners will offer food, shelter, and security,while the airport might only offer the latter.   From the hotel, I would do my best to find a confirmed seat on any flight out of there.    Going to the airport without a confirmed seat for a specific flight would only be my last resort if I felt that my hotel was in danger.   When trying to secure a seat, I would investigate the recent track record of the operating airline.  Have they been canceling flights or operating irregularly?     If so, I would probably keep looking for a backup reservation.

Staying in touch with your embassy will also be a good idea.   The United States Embassy has been working on charter flights to get their citizens out of Cairo.  Another option might be to proceed to an alternative airport outside of Cairo.   I saw a story about a reporter who flew into Sharm-El Sheik airport on a flight filled with tourists!   You would be taking a chance by traveling overland, but if that was the quickest way to get home, I would jump at it.

Above all, I would try to utilize resources back home who have better access to the phones and the Internet.    This is the time to have a good travel agent or at the very least, a very travel savvy friend or relative.   They can contact the various airlines still servicing Egypt and try to confirm outbound seats.

When you finally head out to the airport, I would try to leave as early as possible, and discretely bring as much food as you could.  You never know when you might have to spend an extra day or two in a terminal before you are able to get out.

Being stuck in the middle of a revolution must be incredibly exciting and scary at the same time.  So far, violence has been relatively minimal in Egypt, and I hope this crisis is resolved in a peaceful manner.

If you have flown Southwest airlines, you know that they don’t assign seats, just a boarding number.  You may have even found out the hard way that in order to get the best boarding number, you have to check in exactly 24 hours in advance.   Yet even on other airlines, there are many advantages to checking in early.

Get The Upgrade

Many airlines are now offering paid upgrades at check in.   This is what Mr Credit Card found out on his recent trip to San Francisco.  When he checked in, he was offered an upgrade to their first class.   The upgrades sell as first come, first serve, so if you want one, don’t wait until you show up at the airport to check in.

Get A Better Seat

Often, I am unable to get a seat assignment at the time of booking as airlines are holding their best seats for their elites and last minute business fliers.    Other times, I have a very limited choice, even when booking long in advance.    By checking in 24 hours early, I have the opportunity to secure a decent seat or one that is a little better than the one I originally selected.

Get Bumped

If you are looking to be voluntarily denied boarding so you can be compensated, checking in early might allow you to be offered that opportunity and to be at the top of the list.

Don’t Get Bumped

Involuntary denied boardings are rare, but they can happen.    In that case, they start with the people who don’t have elite status and who checked in last.    Don’t let that be you.

Find Out About Cancellations

Airlines are notoriously bad about contacting their passengers in the event of a cancellation or a schedule change.  When you check in for your flight 24 hours in advance, you have that much more time to sort out any changes that may have occurred between the time you purchased your flight and the day before your travel.   You don’t want to show up at the airport only to find out your flight was canceled, but that seats were available on an earlier flight that you just missed.

Find Out About Problems

Airlines screw up bookings all the time.    Sometimes, passengers do this as well, accidentally booking a flight on the wrong day.       I have seen bookings lost or even canceled due to airline computer system screw ups.   Seat assignments get dropped all the time when their is an “equipment change”.    The time to sort these things out is the day before the flight, not at the airport when the clock is ticking.

Forget About Actually Printing

Checking in and printing a boarding pass for your outbound flight is very easy to do, but it is much harder to find a working computer and printer at the right time when you are traveling.   The answer is not to bother with the printer part.    The goal is to check in to your flight, printing the boarding pass is strictly optional.   If you have to, you can print the pass at an automated kiosk at the airport, or have the curbside check in people do it for you.   You can even log into the airline’s web site again, at your own convenience when you have access to a printer.

Anyone who has ever had a problem with a ticket or a flight at the airport will tell you they never want it to happen again.   By checking in as early as possible, you give yourself as much time as you can to fix everything and ensure that you have a smooth flight.

I just came back from lunch with a couple of bloggers at Il Fornaio Restaurant in Paolo Alto. This is the first time I’m in Paolo Alto, the hub of Silicon Valley. At lunch was from Glen Millar from Prosper.com, SVB, and the Agaishan Life. (and me off course).

It was an Italian restaurant with very nice deco. I decided to get a Paitto Smeralda – Mixed grill of marinated scallops, calamari, shrimp with garlic and red chili flakes, braised tomatoes, wilted wild arugula, sautéed organic spinach, cannellini beans; grilled ciabatta rubbed with garlic and extra-virgin olive oil. The seafood was wonderfully cooked – the little squids and scallops, though I felt they had too much spinach instead.

The food was delicious, very well done and frankly speaking, I’ll go back there in a heartbeat. There’s just too many stuff I want to try – like their calamari!

Piatto Smeralda

Omelette con Gamberetti e Avocado

Uova Alla Benedettina

Here is a sample of their menu.

Disclosure – Glen from Prosper.com paid for lunch! Thank You very much Glen. But being who I am, I took a sneak peak at the credit card that he was using and it turns out that it was a Wells Fargo credit card. To which I would suggest that prosper give their employees an American Express Business Gold Card or something equivalent (looks more business like).

So for the second leg of my trip to SFO, I upgraded to first class when I checked in online for $129. And to tell you the truth, I did miss traveling business or first class. It’s been ages since I did that years ago. But I missed being served drinks when I sat down and throughout the flight. The seats (though they can’t really recline like those on international flights), were wider and so much more comfortable. Since it was a 5 hour flight, I thought it could use some inflight entertainment, movies and stuff like that. But hey – we are flying on third world style US airlines so we can’t bitch and moan too much! Here are some pics.

As I’m writing this, I’m now in San Francisco. I took a flight yesterday out of PHL to Atlanta, and then from Atlanta to SFO. And I decided to book with Air Tran because they had the cheapest flights. When I booked my tickets, I did not block a seat for myself. I decided that I was going to do that when I checked in online. Since my flight was at 2pm EST, I figured I would be “awake” and be at the computer and be the first one to check in online.

After a few early attempts when I was told I could not check in yet, I finally managed to proceed with the online procedure. On my first leg, I chose seat 11D which was an aisle seat and required no additional payment. I figured I could tolerate being cramped for 2 hours. I upgraded to a first class seat (seat 2D) for $129 on the second leg to SFO (which was a 5 hour flight). After I printed my tickets, I realized that I was assigned Zone 8 for the first leg and Zone 1 for the second leg since I was sitting in first class.

Being in zone 8, I was one of the last to board though I was sitting just 2 seats behind the first class seats. I did not know then, but later found out that Air Tran gets the passengers in the last rows to board first (after the first class folks board) to fill up the back, followed by those that sit in the middle and finally by those who sit in front. The problem I had was that by the time I board, there were no more places for my carry on luggage! Worse still, I had to go all the way to row 22 before I found any space. Once I got back to my seat, the person sitting in the middle of my row and no more space to put her carry on. She had to check in her bag (free of charge off course). She later told me that the attendant was rude to her. She wanted to write her name on her carry on, but was told not to do so because they were in “a hurry”! She did it anyway. When she got back to her seat, she was on the phone bitching and moaning about it to someone on her cell phone! The flight stewardess later apologized for the attendant’s rude behavior.

So when the plane landed, I was the first to get up from row 11 and went all the way back to row 22 to get my carry on. Then as everyone walked out, I realized that there were carry on’s in the cabin above row 14, 15 and 16 even though the folks have left the plane. That can only mean folks sitting behind put their carry on in the cabin which they are not supposed to. Anyway, I was pissed off with the whole episode. Yes, I did not pay the extra $10 for early boarding. And though the system of getting folks in the back row to board first made sense, somehow, I was left frustrated with this. I mean, a person sitting in row 11 should never have to put their bags in row 22?

Third party booking sites can give you great deals on hotel rooms.   I happen to be a big fan of Expedia because of their best price guarantee.     Unfortunately, the problem with these sites is that they cannot guarantee room choices.   You have to read the fine print to see that bed selection and even smoking preference are not guaranteed.    When you arrive at the hotel, the clerks will sometimes just give out the worst rooms to people who did not book direct.

This is what happened to my family on the first night of a recent trip to Florida.   We arrived late and checked in, but were given a smoking room that was just horrible.   Oddly, we were also given the handicap accessible room. When I asked about a room change, the night clerk curtly brushed us off and told us to complain to Expedia if we had a problem.   In the morning, the staff was much more sympathetic and switched our room to an acceptable one on a non-smoking floor.

Lessons Learned

I probably will never bother to make a third party booking at a hotel that still has smoking rooms.   For a little extra, we could have stayed at a different hotel down the street that is all non-smoking rooms and this would never have been a question.    What I also could have done was to call the hotel in advance and speak to a manager, rather than show up in the evening and settle for what was left over.

Even if you can avoid the smoking rooms, there is still nothing stopping a hotel from sticking you by the elevator or in a similarly undesirable location, just because you booked through a third party.   It still can’t hurt to contact the hotel in advance and request a quiet room, especially if you will be arriving late.

Another strategy is to contact the hotel directly, and ask them to beat the rates offered by the third party.    Essentially, you are cutting out the middle man, so everyone wins.

Nothing starts a vacation off on the wrong foot like checking into a crappy room in an otherwise decent hotel.  By contacting the property early, you can often save yourself self the aggravation, and leave the foul smelling rooms to the people who actually want them.