Ivana or Sabotage Averted

There once was a woman named Ivana. Her name, while sounding exotic and sexy, does not at all portray the true bitch that lies within her. Remember the copy ho? Well, Ivana is a lot like her, except worse, because we're not dealing with copies this time...we're dealing with the next year of my life.

It's March here in New Zealand (come to think of it, it's March everywhere in the world) and as the month wore on I knew it would soon be time to adjust my flight dates. "Why?" You may ask. Well, upon purchasing my ticket to come to New Zealand, despite it being an open-ended ticket, I still had to choose a return date to prove to the country that I would in fact be leaving New Zealand (since I am not a citizen). But since the ticket was good for 18 months, and apparently the airlines don't know their flight schedules that far in advance, I had to book for the latest possible date and then, if I wanted to stay here longer, I would have to change the date (for a fee damn it!!!). Sooooo, back in August of '05, the latest possible date to return was March 14. Which we have yet to reach. The point however is that I am soooo responsible that I called to get the date changed on March 6th. That in itself was a pain in the ass:

I called the airline and they told me they would have to contact the NY office. So they contacted the NY office and the NY office told me I had to GO to Auckland (yes Actually GO there) to get it changed. So i called the Auckland office and they said I could go to the Christchurch office. Which is the office I called in the FIRST PLACE. So I finally get ahold of the right people who then tell me I need to come in to show them the ticket. But I can't come in to show them the ticket bc I have to work. Oh, well I can fax it to them then. Sweet. So I do that and then call to make sure they have received the fax...they haven't. But they call back an hour later to say that they have. So much for high speed technology. And they proceed to tell me that my ticket expires on Sept 24th of 2006. "Whaaaaaaaaaa?!"

And here is where I begin the "count backwards from ten and relax stage". Other thoughts running through my mind at this point in time: did I get scammed? Did I pay nearly $1600 US for a ticket that I really should have only paid $1200 for? Who's ass can i beat to make myself feel better? So I tell the person on the other end, "I'm going to write my travel agent, hold on". So I email Silvia back in the states and in the most polite manner question what the HELL is going on. But bc of the time difference (wretched time difference) I have to wait til the next day to find out what the deal is. This leads to a lot of really unecessary reflection on my life, my situation, my relationship, my career path (lack of) and all that other crap that really doesn't need to be reflected upon all that much. But in all this reflection I realize that I'm not ready to go home, that I have a lot more to learn and do here, and that in all reality, I had mentally been preparing myself to stay. So at the prospect of being forced home in nearly seven months, I got kind of upset.

But the next day I get an email from my travel agent and she is very apologetic about the situation, and confirmed that I had purchased an 18 month ticket and that yes, i can in fact stay on until next may if i want. So now that that seems to be fixed, I still have to get in touch with their offices down here to fix things. So I call them and it is then that I encounter Ivana, the travel agent ho:

Nicole: Hi there, I'm just calling to confirm that you have gotten to "OK" to reissue my ticket from your offices in North America.
Ivana: No, what is your name and what do you want?
Nicole: Um, well I received an email from your offices in Toronto, telling me that I should call you to make sure you know you can reissue my ticket.
Ivana: We've heard nothing, what is going on?
Nicole: (Explains situation as read above).
Ivana: There is no such thing as 18-month open ended ticket.
Nicole: Umm yes there is I just...
Ivana: (interrupting nicole) no there's not. we don't do that.
Nicole: Ok well I just spoke with someone that said...
Ivana: What do you want us to do?
Nicole: I want you to reissue my ticket and change my return date.
(This goes on for quite some time. So long in fact that I don't really remember the entire conversation. But I do know that she eventually realizes the situation and finally confirms that I CAN have an 18month open ended ticket.)
Ivana: But it will cost you 120 dollars for the date change and the reissue fee.
Nicole: Why must I pay teh resissue fee if it was someone else's mistake?
Ivana: We deal with this everyday ma'am, so please don't worry.
Nicole: Huh? You scam money from people everyday!? You are a bitch. No you are a ho.
Ivana: Thank you ma'am have a nice day.

While that is not exactly how things went down, it is in essence what happened. Ivana was of no help to me, so I was forced to write to my travel agent in North America, explain her lack of helpfullness and then, finally receive a call from Ivana ho that everything would work out fine.

So after all the run around, I still must go into their offices today in order to get a new ticket that will be issued for return on March 27th of 2007. Thank god, because I was sick of dealing with Ivana the ho. Jeez, this country is full of ho-ish women who just hate their lives and want to be bitches to other people. Get OVER yourselves. Or go hang out and be miserable together. Just get out of customer service please, becase you CLEARLY lack the ability to deal well with people.

Enough ranting. I'm tired for some reason. Probably bc I didn't get much sleep last night thanks to the drunk idiots running around outside making me worry that my car was about to get robbed AGAIN. I'll tell ya, for a country with such low crime rates, I've never, ever felt so as risk of getting robbed as I do here.

Hope all is well back home.

-Nicole

ps Daddy comes in less that two weeks!!! Woohoo.