Lots has happened since my last post.
We flew out of Phuket on the 5th of September via Bangkok, Abu Dhabi, Toronto and finally Ottawa. It did not happen without incident. Our flight from Bangkok to Abu Dhabi was delayed for 3 hours due to mechanical problems. Needless to say, we missed our next flight from Abu Dhabi to Toronto. We were flying with Etihad airlines who put us up in a 5 star hotel hotel in downtown but not without incident. Jaidan and I could leave the airport on our Canadian passports but Thavorn needed a visa to leave. We ended waiting 6 hours in the transit area while Etihad arranged for Thavorn's visa. Communication was very poor but the airline eventually did all the right things first class, However our trip home was 40+ hours long.
A bigger problem was, I had used aeroplan points for 3 seats from Toronto to Ottawa I had to rebook those seats for the next day and Aeroplan charged he $325 to change them. Worst still, if I wanted to cancel the tickets and get by points back it would have cost me $525. Aeroplan nickles and dime you! Beware!!!!
We eventually arrived in Ottawa and Elaine picked us up and drove us home to sleep. Jaidan was too tired for school on Friday and I booked him off due to jetlag.
To describe the trip, it would be, 'It was the best of times, and the worst of times.'.
Next up is for Thavorn to work as much as possible to pay off the visa $10,000 that our tickets ended up costing us. It was $3,600 to get there, and a whopping $5,600 to get back. The airlines seem to be gouging the international students big time as the return tickets in August, September, October are twice as expensive as the outgoing tickets.
I am coaching U19 boys basketball again this year and it is going well.
I also have a date for my kidney surgery and it is November 28th. In the meantime, I have come down with a very similar illness to the one I had in Thailand and I just tested positive for covid so I suspect another Covid strain is what I had in Thailand.
TTYL
