Before I even left Pucallpa in the summer, I had decided to return during my December break. In September I started the scholarship fund and so that became part of my agenda for heading back, and I really wanted to see my friends and spend time in the church and with the Lucases again. September through November the scholarship fund collected a significant sum of money and by the time I arrived in December, various organizations had donated over $2,000 and I was really excited to form the committee which would give out the scholarships in Pucallpa.
I bought my tickets for the day after school ended (December 13th) returning a few days after school started again (January 13th). WELLL, at least I thought I bought the tickets for December 13th....
Over Thanksgiving break, mom and I were looking over the itinerary for my upcoming flights and I saw that it said "wednesday" instead of saturday for my day of departure which wasn't right and then I rechecked the dates and it said December 3rd! NOT the 13th! So after a period of great panic, I called the airline's hotline and explained the mistake and asked what I should do about it. Naturally, the airline tried to suck out every bit of money they possibly could and said there would be a $200 penalty for changing an international flight and then I would have to purchase a new ticket. Grand total: over $700 which would've been more than my original tickets....
Feeling even more panicked, I called everyone I knew who was even remotely travel savvy but it seemed like there was no way to avoid this penalty. Everyone seemed to come to the conclusion that I would just have to pay the consequence... I would be heading back to Geneva pretty soon and decided that a 45 minute drive to the Pittsburgh airport might be worth a shot. I figured that they had to be nicer in person because when I had trouble flying to Costa Rica the year before, the front counter was where I was able to fix my flights.
Nevertheless, I spent a good portion of that day praying hard because I really felt drawn to go back and didn't have the budget to be making this mistake. The next day (sunday), I went to church at Christ United Methodist wanting to thank Laura Kline for her help in donating money to the scholarship fund from the leftover undesignated mission committee budget. Before I could tell what was going on, Laura said something to the effect of: "yeah, it's no big deal! We had a lot of money left over and decided to spread it out over several ministries and it's just so great that we can help you. AND there's money in the education fund that we are looking to use before the end of the year for missions so if you want to go on a mission trip soon to like hondurus or the dominican republic and would need money, we would LOVE to sponsor you!"
I couldn't believe the coincidence and said "Well, actually...." and told her what had happened the day before. I was absolutely shocked, she said that there was $600 in that extra fund and was overwelmingly willing to have me use it. I felt really embarrassed to take it though because it was my error and the church didn't need to cover up my mistake. Erin Corne told me not to be embarrassed to take the money but I decided I should still go down to the airport and see if I could get the tickets fixed any cheaper, knowing that the goal of the people on the phone is to get all your money and the people at the ticket counter is to fix problems.
I borrowed my friend Chito's car the day we returned to school and went down to the pittsburgh airport december 1st (cutting it pretty close). I dressed up as innocently-looking as possible, had everything with me that they could possibly want to see and prayed HARD before heading out. To my surprise, when I arrived at the American Airlines counter, there was absolutely no one in line and the girl at the counter was about 25, really sweet and couldn't be more perfect for the occasion. She didn't look upset or annoyed from earlier in the shift or anything. I said, "I bought my tickets for what I thought was the 13th but in my email confirmation it shows december 3rd." She asked to see the papers and I waited for her to ask me anymore questions, but all she asked was "You said the 13th right?" and "Is an overnight flight from Miami to Lima ok?" A few minutes of typing and she looked up at me and said "alright, you're all set" and I tried to keep my cool but I was bursting with excitment. I asked her if there was any type of new confirmation that I could have and she said that she was printing the tickets right then and there. I was jumping up and down inside with excitment, honestly, thinking about it makes me all giddy even though this happened almost a year ago.
All in all it cost a grand total of $1.50 in tolls and 1/2 hour parking fee! Lesson to learn here: go to the ticket counter if you have an issue. American Airlines has saved me twice now and both times that is how I fixed my problem.
The mission committee still gave me the $600, most of which I felt bad using on myself so I gave about $450 of it away and spent the rest on tickets to and from Pucallpa. I flew from Pittsburgh to Miami and then flew from Miami to Lima where I met up with Andrew (from the summer trip) and spent the day with my buddy Joseph. At night, Andrew and I headed out from Lima to Pucallpa and I don't believe I've ever been more excited/giddy in my whole life as I was when we approached and finally landed in Pucallpa.
My buddy Joseph
Andrew, the robo foco claun
Joseph is insane
