Sometimes the comments made to booking agents by their clients provide a humorous insight into the travel industry as a whole. From mistakes about time zones, to location confusions and malapropisms of every sort, experienced agents sometimes enjoy a good laugh remembering a client’s remarks.
Just consider some of these situations: a prospective air traveler begged his agent to get him a seat along one of the jet’s aisles. Why? He worried that a window seat might rearrange his hair. Another client expressed concern that the city code for Fresno (“FAT”) affixed to her luggage actually represented a snide remark about her weight.
Other people have discussed plans to take trains to Hawaii, visually identify passenger jets on the tarmac before boarding, and hire rental cars to navigate between the Dallas-Ft. Worth airport terminals. One agent, unable to explain time zone differences to a caller concerned about why her plane would seemingly leave one city at 8:20 a.m. and arrive just 13 minutes later, persuaded the woman planes travel extremely fast today. When informed he would require visa documentation to enter China, a businessman insisted that the Chinese “always” accepted his American Express card!
Many travelers display sometimes funny confusion about geography and maps, too. For instance, one gentleman assured his travel agent that he should expect an ocean view anywhere in Florida because of the state’s narrow shape. Callers sometimes confuse “Hippopotamus” with “Buffalo” and “Capetown” with “Cape Cod”. One even referred to Pensacola as “Pepsi-Cola” when discussing her travel destination.