Hotel Crown, Okinawa City, Wednesday, 1998-05-13 21:00 local (Z+9)
Hello, All,
Well, I envy most of you for being able to spend your next night in your own bed with your favorite bed partner. I really wish I could do the same.
I've been out way too long, having left home April 8th. I did get to stop by home for about 24 hours around the 20th of April while en route from JFK to Anchorage.
A couple of clean up items from Jakarta: when I went to check out of the Jakarta Hilton, the hotel presented me with a bill for several million Rupiahs. I assumed they had just made a mistake and pointed out that I was responsible only for the incidentals, meals other than the breakfast and telephone charges. They said no, that I would have to pay the entire bill personally since Tower had not paid their bill and had no further credit with the hotel. One other person was checking out with me, the engineer I would be flying with out of Okinawa, and they were telling him the same thing.
Both the engineer and I politely told them we would not pay Tower's bill. I knew that Tower's Jakarta manager was downstairs in the Tower operations office, so I took my bill, went down there, and told him what was happening. He called New York, talked to Tower's president, and then told me to just leave without paying.
When I got back upstairs, I found that my baggage and that of the engineer had been put on a baggage cart behind the concierge's counter, and three security guards had been positioned in front of it. The assistant manager was there also. I told him that my company had instructed me to simply leave, but that I would, of course, pay for my incidentals. I requested and received a calculator, added up the incidentals, put the money on the counter, and turned toward the concierge's counter. The manager blocked me and stated that I could not leave until I paid the entire bill. Now, telling me that I do not have freedom of movement is a sure way of making me drop my usual passive nature. That plus my anger at Tower for having created the situation resulted in a slight display of temper. I think I said something like, “Well, you better call the police then, because I'm leaving.” There might have been a four letter word—or two—in there, and I think I may have been shouting. Oh, well, even I can get mad.
The impasse was broken by the arrival of Tower's Jakarta manager, to whom I loudly proclaimed that the hotel intended to keep me from leaving. He jumped into the fray, and it became quite a scene. Tower's manager and the hotel manager finally took the argument into a private room. The engineer and I stood around as close to our baggage as the security guards would permit.
Something like ten minutes passed. The manager came out of the room and told us we could leave, and we were off like a shot.
I am really beginning to hate Tower Air!
Hmm, having had to bring this to mind to recount it has made me almost as angry as I was when it happened. So, though I haven't even talked about the Okinawa to Thailand shuttle, I'm going to quit here, calm down, and pick up the thread in a subsequent message. Actually, I think I'll take a couple of Excedrin PMs and drop into a depression-fed twelve hour sleep. <g>
Damn, I want to go home!!!
Terry