International travel

International travel is never a sure thing. I would say that we are fairly certain to end up at our destination but am never sure when we will arrive or if all our baggage will arrive with us. So far in our trips to Mongolia and the trips of our family and friends to Mongolia events have been relatively uneventful (poor writing intended). However, one can never be sure what will happen "this time."

This time for us means a small frustration with baggage. The Korean Air folks at the counter in Seattle did an admirable job of checking in nearly 750 lbs. of luggage. To put that in context, that is about 130 lbs. of luggage for each family member. But much of that is school books and study books. Remember, we do not have much access to good English books in Mongolia. The luggage was checked all the way to Mongolia which meant that we did not have to touch it in Korea.

We also had a huge amount of carry-ons: one large roll-on bag plus a bag pack for each family member. We loaded all our carry-ons onto the plane in Seattle just fine. The boarding staff moved us to the front of the line because we had "small children."

However, today in Incheon, an official at the security desk told us that one of our carry-ons was oversized. When I went to check the bag, the baggage desk clerk here told me that he cannot take the bag until 3 PM because the plane has been "held." I asked him if that meant the flight was canceled. No. I asked if that meant the plane would take off on time. Maybe.

All that means we are sitting on the wrong side of security waiting to check a bag that we carried on yesterday. It also means that our flight may be delayed or canceled but that a decision will not be made for a few more hours. International travel: always an adventure.