Life At Slow-Mo

Reading through my posts, you would notice that several of them are experiences from my travels. I love traveling for two reasons. First reason is I could see and learn about the places, people and cultures in another country. Two, traveling trains me to be more independent and interdependent with my travel buddies. Third, I learned a lot about myself during travels, both from the successes and the failures I experienced.

Speaking of failures, the trip to Atlanta in 2014 is a shining example.

First Misfortune: I was late to book my seat online. Since it was a full flight, I was left with middle seats all the way from Jakarta To Atlanta. The return flight was less crowded and I was still able to get aisle seats. This is something very important for a person endowed with active bladder like me. I still shudder to remember having to ask my aisle neighbor for some room so I could scoot out every time I need to use the lavatory during the 14-hour flight from Incheon to Atlanta.

Second Misfortune: I forgot that I had my US visa in my old passport. As soon as I entered my new passport number in the Korean Airlines mobile app to check-in, the system blocked me from continuing. I was flagged as passenger of risk for using a passport without US visa to check in to a US-bound flight. I had to report to the check in desk for each leg of the flight. Because of that, I was not allowed to check-through my luggage form Jakarta to Atlanta. I had to debark in Incheon, go through Immigration, take my luggage from the carousel, and check in at the transfer desk for the connecting flight to Atlanta.

Third Misfortune: because I was flagged, I had to go through a secondary security check when boarding in Incheon. Much time was lost. By the time I got on board, I had to hunt for space in the full overhead bins for my carry on.

Fourth Misfortune: arriving at the hotel, I was so busy bringing in the luggage into the hotel, I did not realize that my wedding ring came loose and slipped off my finger. I have been without ring ever since.

Fifth Misfortune: On our return flight, I left my DSLR camera hanging on a chair in the food court of the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. I didn’t realize it was gone until I was queuing for boarding. The gate crew forbade me from looking for my camera, for fear of delaying the take off.

Sixth Misfortune: I bought a pair of new headphones in Atlanta. Flying back home, I managed to left it in the airport hotel room in Incheon during a 24-hour layover.

What did I learned from all this misfortunes? One, those are not pure misfortunes per se. Misfortunes are incidents beyond your control, What I experienced in that trip was all avoidable. What missing was my failure to take precautionary steps. Two, I need to learn to think a few steps ahead before deciding to do anything.

The mobile app mishap, for example. I wouldn’t have happened if I had taken the time to learn about how the app worked and the correct way to complete the information it required. I could have gotten aisle seats if I had made my bookings earlier. I wouldn’t have lost my wedding ring if I had been careful enough to put it away (or not take it at all for the trip). Every problem was in fact within my control.

So what should I call it if what happened was disaster of my own making? I suppose the correct name for it was it is one of the best learning experiences I ever had.

What is the best learning experience you ever had?