Travelling Trials

July 27th 2005

In the last 11 months Omer and I haven't done too badly on the travelling front. When he was two months old we travelled from London to Bahrain. When he was 3 months we travelled to Dubai, at 4 months to Malaysia (KL, Penang and Lankawi), at 7 months to London again, at 10 months to London, Birmingham, San Francisco, Montreal, Ottawa, and Toronto, not to mention the wayside excursions and detours taken to arrive at our final destination.

I can say that we have air travel down, to the point where the two of us can cope long haul. It helps that most airlines are quite accomodating and generally help lone travelling mothers. However in North America I have found airline services to be particularly child unfriendly. Bassinet seats seem an alien concept, as do child safety belts. My single worst experience has got to be on a United flight from London to SanFrancisco. At the very outset upon booking the flight, my husband requested a bassinet seat for me. I was told that seats could not bepre- assigned, but that my bassinet seat was confirmed. I subsequently rang United on a further two occasions to confirm my seats and re-affirm my bassinet request. I checked in a whole 3 1/2 hours prior to take off. Upon boarding the flight I found my son and I had not been given a bassinet seat at all. I pointed this out (considering it is a 10 hour flight). I was made to stand carrying my son, till all the other passengers were seated (around 35 minutes), then moved to another seat where again no bassinet could be attached, but I was told one could be put on the floor!!!! (Which made me fume!!!). Finally feeling at my wits endand out of the kindness of a fellow passengers heart I got what I should have had at the outset - a bassinet seat. I then requested a blanket for my baby but was told there was only one blanket per person. I need not point out that my son is a little person too!

In these regards Emirates, Gulf Air (who actually have skynanny's to assist mothers), Malaysian Airways and British Airways are far better. These flightshave also been long haul and never have I come across such a baby unfriendly service. Furthermore all of these airlines provide lap belts during take off andlanding which is a safety measure I did not get in United. As United has no problem charging little people to come on board, you will agree they deserve a little more respect and service too.