Indonesian version, click here. 

continued from part 1

As promised, the driver got me at the US Airways door before 10 am. I quickly walked to the elevator-on-to-all-gates. I was contemplating about asking for an assistance. I felt that I didn’t really need a wheelchair. It’s still a bit painful to walk but I could walk fast with a cane. Also, getting an assistance could take a lot of time. At least 10 minutes to register and wait for a wheelchair. So I decided to just go by myself. Yet, I knew so well that if the queue were long, then wheelchair-journey would have saved a lot of time. I had less than 20 minutes before the gate closed! The gate would be closed by 10:08.

Walking along the way, I gazed at a special-need desk. There were so many wheelchairs parked there. As I saw that there’s no other passenger there, I decided to stop by. Lucky me, I got the attendant and the wheelchair right away. Kenny, that’s guy who’s assigned to assist me.

A very nice guy. An immigrant from Vietnam who used to live in California. He only moved to Arizona, living in Avondale, one year ago, after he lost a computer technician job he had for 15 years. Poor Kenny.

One really great thing about him, though, he didn’t sound bitter about what has been happening to him. He was all cheer up and positive. He is quick and definitely is smarter than any other attendants I’ve ever had.

On our way to the passenger lift, I saw a very long queue of passengers who were clearing the ID check. “Wow, it was really really long, how could I survive that queue?” I was just glad I chose this wheelchair path.

Quickly Kenny brought me to the security scanning gate. Unlike other attendants, Kenny really took care everything. He got me a wooden walking stick for me to go through a full body scan machine. My walking cane would beep if I used it to go through the machine.

Kenny also got all my stuff scanned. He took my laptop out of the bag and got it scanned. “Pretty good, Kenny!”

I don’t know why but today all airport officers were really nice to me. A lady who got me a body scan was so nice. She helped me getting up, held me walking through the machine and put me back on the wheels. She kept checking on me and asking, “Are you OK?” several time. She looked worry. Perhaps that’s because of my green monster look. Yet, I wasn’t feeling so bad. I mean, I’d been in much worse situation…

We cleared up the security and were ready for the gate. Kenny re-checked the gate on the monitor and made sure that we’d get on the right one. Good idea, since indeed the gate was changed from B6 to B2. Nice, we actually got a closer gate!

As we strolled to the gate, Kenny asked,”What time is your boarding?” “Now,”I said. “Oh, what time is the flight taking off?” he asked me again. “10:23,”I replied.

“Oh, it’s 10:10, but I’ll check with the airline,” he parked my wheelchair and walked to the airline desk.

I lifted my chin, staring at the monitor. I read one line, “US Airways 071 to Seattle. Gate is closing. Thank you.”

Oh, unlike this one,…. this time the door is really closed, I am really left behind….. what should I do now?

…to be continued..