Expensive ?cheap? seats

July 5, 2006

Dear Sir,

After your recent article on Philip Troake and British Airways, I would like to share my dealings with BA today. Having booked my brother and his family on BA today for $5,757 (paying ?676 ($1,233) each for the children ages two and six, and ?902 ($1,644) for the two adults), I then proceeded to try and use my airmiles to see if they could be upgraded to World Traveller Plus. They are coming to get married and I thought this would be a nice gesture. I went online to try and do this, only to get a message on ba.com that you can only upgrade online with miles at the actual time you are making the booking online, not after you have made the booking. ?Please call your local executive club office to upgrade? ? (our ?local? office is Minneapolis.)

I made the call, got through four rounds of automated messages and button-pressing then held for 15 minutes. Having spoken to the customer service attendant, I was told I could not upgrade these particular seats as they were ?v? class seats. I asked what was it that made them ?v? class seats, and was told ?because they were bought cheaply?. I did almost drop my tea at that point, but managed to laugh, or maybe it was a scoff! Cheap? Are you kidding me? In short, I could pay roughly $100 per ticket to have them cancelled and then pay more to buy the same traveller seats then maybe, I could upgrade them, if that option was available, maybe.

The attendant asked me what I would like to do. I don?t think English was her first language. Funnily enough, I gave up. So a message to those who are booking online and wishing to upgrade, make sure you don?t buy the ?cheap? seats at $1,394 as you?ll get stuck in world traveller without being able to upgrade! (All exchange quotes based on the BA exchange rate of 1.823154 on July 5). (Roughly). Let?s hope the wedding goes more smoothly and they don?t actually have to sit in cargo on the way here! One last laugh, they don?t even qualify to join the BA executive club on this flight, hah!

Bad experience in NYC

May 22, 2006

Dear Sir,

Please allow me a little space to share my experience with the many Bermudians who love to travel but more specifically, love to travel to New York City.

My Mom and daughter were a part of a group who travelled to New York to attend the Mother?s day performance of Oprah?s ?The Color Purple?. They checked into The Hampton Inn, located on 31st Street and and Sixth Avenue , where I later joined them.

On Saturday my Mom and I decided to take a subway ride, and when we got into the hotel lobby I thought that it would be wise to put my valuables in one of the hotel?s safety deposit boxes, which are located in the Front Office.

In the presence of the only front desk attendant that was manning the desk at that time, I put my Rolex watch, passport, gold bracelet and airline ticket into the box. The attendant then supposedly locked the box and handed me the key. I remember thinking it a little unusual that she remained in the room and watched what I had put into the box, and that she was the one to lock it, but I quickly dismissed the idea that anything untoward was happening,after all, this was the front desk.

On our return we went straight to our room. The next day when we went down into the lobby to await our transportation for the ? Oprah? show, I went to the desk to empty my safety deposit box, only to discover that everything that I had in the box was there with the exception of the watch.

After much discussion with the hotel?s management about how this could have happened, and my threatening them with a lawsuit, the Police were called in and they began questioning the employees. The same front desk attendant who had assigned me the box was on duty and when asked, flatly denied having seen what I had put into that box.

I left my two carry on bags in the middle of the Front Office floor while I stepped out to have a word with the travel agent who had brought the group to that hotel and the hotel manager came over to join us, leaving the front desk attendant alone in the room, which is when ?someone? had the opportunity to slip the watch into one of my bags, where I discovered it on my return to Boston.

Draw your own conclusions as to who could have put it there, and no, it?s not possible that I had put it there and had forgotten about it.

Obviously, I?m very happy to have my property back, but I felt compelled to relate this experience, because the next person that this happens to may not be as fortunate. So please, when using safety deposit boxes, first get the hotel?s policy on liability and who is to be in the room with you. Make sure there are security cameras in the room and that they are working, and above all, personally check to be sure the box is securely locked, had I done those things perhaps this would never had happened, although I do think that it?s a reasonable expectation that your valuables would be safe there.

It is not my intention to paint all hotels with the same brush but it?s obvious that this particular hotel has a dishonest employee/s in a position of trust and I also wonder just how common a problem this might be.After paying $440 for airfare, $250 per night for the room and $150 per show ticket and not be able to see the show, leaves me a lot less than impressed with this hotel.

Call a spade a spade

June 12, 2006

Dear Sir,

I am writing this in the UK and am here due to years of unbearable homophobic abuse in my homeland of Bermuda. I exiled myself from Bermuda and am now a full British citizen with voting rights, exercised when I recently voted in local elections.

All the major political parties in the UK have openly gay Members of Parliament. The ruling party has openly gay ministers; the opposition party has openly gay shadow ministers. The 3rd major party recently fought a leadership election in which two of the main contenders were openly gay and bisexual. There is an openly gay bishop, in Reading, and numerous openly gay, albeit celibate, clergymen and women. All levels of society in both the public and private sectors have openly gay and fully functional participants from teachers and businessmen, journalists and CEOs. This is a multicultural and multi-sexuality society or at the worst is trying very hard to be so.

How is the above different from Bermuda? What makes Bermuda and Bermudians so different from the UK? The difference lies not in what is going on behind locked doors, but in admitting what is going on, and realising that it is nobody?s business. Bermuda has often failed to call a spade a spade and thus I will now begin to do so. It is about time that somebody stood up and said how it is, in the idyllic islands of my birth.

I know and have socialised with members of the ruling PLP who have had consensual gay relationships. I know and have socialised with members of the opposition UBP who have had consensual gay relationships. I know and have socialised with members of the clergy, of numerous denominations, who have had consensual gay relationships. I know and have socialised with local government officials, journalists and members of the honourable professions of law and education who have had consensual gay relationships. I know and have socialised with foreign diplomats and foreign government officials assigned to Bermuda who have had consensual gay relationships. I personally know and have socialised with these people.

A lot of them still live and work in their respective professions in Bermuda. The sexuality of these people is well known within the circles of power, but just like the so called lower class Bermudians on the islands, they refuse to be open about the issues of sex and sexuality.

The purpose of this letter is not to ?out? any of these people but is a call for Bermudians to wake up, acknowledge and accept that the Human Race is a rainbow of colour and sexualities and your divisive and secretive ways are old and tired. There is not enough sand on your wonderful pink beaches in which you can continue to stick your heads.

Renee Webb?s Private Members Bill must be included in Bermuda?s human rights legislation. Period.

Wanted:Good looking MPs

June 27, 2006

Dear Sir,

Boy! Am I tired of this Government ? this laughingstock ? and the faces therein! They all seem to be so humourless ? either puffed up with self-importance, or pinched with contempt; though I admit a few in between remain undistorted by too many bothersome thoughts.

I suggest that if we can?t elect people who know how to govern effectively, we can at least choose figureheads who are good-looking, likeable and witty ? who would actually be pleasant company (since they are all too much with us: in our living rooms at news hour, or through your paper at the breakfast table). I am stretched to recall a single individual amongst them I would like to spend an afternoon with; except, perhaps, one ? and he?s gay.

If he were to come for tea, we?d have a really good time. I would rib him about his not standing up like a man for his human rights, and about his backing the plan to restrict easy travel to countries steeped in the cultural stuff he so enjoys. I imagine he would have a good laugh at the joke he?s playing on himself (having no children, of course, to play it on) and then, with a sniff of his boutonniere, quote Beaumarchais, saying, ?Darling, ?je me presse de rire de tout, de peur d?etre oblig? d?en pleure!?? (I quickly laugh at everything, for fear of having to cry.)

Sign me,