Tales from the African Forum - Mauritius story

Tuesday, 3 June 2008 | posted by WEF_Africa

I was very happy to be invited again by the British Council to represent Youth at one of the influential forums...British Council Mauritius got my ticket booked to Cape town; a supposedly direct flight but once i reached the airport in Mauritius, there were a lot of hassles there, because of a problem of double booking and the airport staff had to move around 30 passengers to Johannesburg first, and then get on a plane about an hour later to Cape Town.

And what bugged me then is that they lied to the South Africans, saying that the pilot is refusing to take additional passengers because of the winds supposedly...And the Mauritian passengers could understand everything that was happening..The Mauritian staff were basically taking the South Africans for fools, but mind u, the latter knew that they were lying...Anyway, we were compensated- we had to choose between 50 euros or being upgraded to premium class and the whole lot chose the latter one..At least, i enjoyed the 4 hr flight enjoying the comfort of the seat in the premium class..However, once in Johannesburg, we missed our flight coz we had to go thru customs etc etc and we had limited time in our hands...so we had to get in the next plane..I was the last one to board..N once i reached cape town, my luggage did not come along, so i had to wait another hour to get my luggage..So instead of supposedly reaching cape town at 1300, i reached at 1700...What a waste!!

God, it was really not my day that day!!! Once in Cape town and the program enfolded, i was beginning to forget the hassles and enjoy the sessions and it was really great to meet my South African friends again after 3 years when we met for the first time during the Inter action program organised by the British Council itself...God, it felt so good to see those familiar faces again and to reminisce abt the gud times we had..

by Chanda Ghoora