Sunday, October 22, 2006

The long MAS queue

I finally got my ticket back home a few days ago and the countdown timer has started its one month ticking. Having a dateline to settle things can be disconcerting since my room has yet to find a tenant and scores of other stuff have yet to be settled to the point that its weighing heavily on my mind now. I always thought that going home by MAS would be easier and did planned it long ago to use MAS to fly back when all my studies are done here in KK. For one its more liberal 20 kg luggage requirements is an improvement of the Air Asia's 15kg but I still wish they would give allocations to students travelling to and fro Peninsular to Borneo more leeway especially at the start of their studies and end of it.

After many long hair pulling sessions from Air Asia's online booking payment and unsent confirmation bookings supposedly getting a MAS ticket would be simpler. Another reason for MAS would be the easier transfer from Kl to Kuantan that I have to take which eliminates the need to rush Air Asia budget terminal and the off chance that flights will be delayed nullifying my transfer to MAS since Air Asia does not fly to Kuantan (now why is that when Terengganu has a route?).

Imagine my surprise at first when I learnt that the MAS booking counter at Wisma Sabah was closed down and now the only two ticketing offices are at the Airport terminal (read too far off for students without transport) or at Kompleks Karamunsing (also entails several bus changes). Even is rationalizing their offices should bring profits, getting rid of one at the center of town really inconvenienced people. Never mind, I forgot it was near Deepavali and Raya and even when I reached there at noon, there were already 40 people ahead of my and not helped for the fact that only 3 of the 8 counters were opened. Suffice to say that it took 3 hours to just get a ticket issued which took under 10 minutes.

Compounded to the chaos was several foreign babes who were arguing for their transfer tickets and blocked one of the counters for near an hour sheesh. Also I find funny that several people even had the audacity to try and skip their turn by heading straight to the counter even as they got their number. It is commendable that the MAS officers didn't pay them any heed. It wasn't just anyone but even a navy man tried to skip queue, what is the world coming to. Lesson for future, it is easier to get the MASET transaction codes and pay through Maybank, else go when there is no long string of holidays in the near future. The good news is that I managed to get a reduced rate for my KK-KL ticket at RM375 instead of the RM550 but the downside is I'll not be able to make the connecting flight to Kuantan since it only reaches at 10p.m. thus necessitating a night at KLIA.

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