A close call - Kahani Ek Damaged Passport Ki

"Hi, Good morning", I greeted her with my usual warm and affectionate smile. The official behind Korean Air's desk at the Mumbai International airport was a young, genial looking lady. "Good morning", returning my greeting with a reciprocative smile said she.

She took my passport in her hands and looked at her with a bit of puzzlement on her face. She called a man who looked to be in charge at the Korean Air area at the airport and gave him my passport. The man looks at it and says, "Sorry, but we can't allow you to fly without Immigration clearance of your passport. It is the case of damaged passport"

Darn, I cursed under my breath and looked at the passport. The lamination of the back page had been torn off and the page was exposed. Everything else looked in place. My negligence, I thought; I should never have kept the passport in my pocket. But I had not realized the gravity of the situation until I went to speak to the Immigration officer.

"Good morning sir", I started, "This is my passport and the Korean air people think it is a case of damaged passport and they want your nod before they can issue me a ticket"

The officer takes the passport in his hands and says

"Nahi ho sakta. Yeh to bilkul fat gaya hai. You can't travel with this passport"

I can't say I have never felt helpless and hopeless like this but this surely was one of those incidents in which your mind blanks out for a few seconds.

"Sir please. I am a student. My flight takes off in a couple of hours and I have to fly. I have no other way"
"Nahi ho sakta. Impossible hai. Agar humne yaha se permission de di to aapko aage jake problem hoga aur humko bhi musibat hogi fir"
"Sir you show me a way. What should I do now?"
"Cancel karva do ticket"
"Sir ticket to refundable nahi hai"
"Sorry. Bola na aapko nahi ho sakta kuchh bhi"

Now I had realized the pathetic situation I was in. Trying to find a reasonable argument, I worked out various scenarios in my mind as to how to go back to Ahmedabad, how to book a new ticket and so on. I continued,

"Sir aap apne sahab ko puchh lo ek baar. Unke paas koi raasta hoga. Please aap meri situation samjo. Yeh abhi Ahmedabad-Mumbai flight mein hi hua hai. It was not like this before I boarded the plane from there. It got damaged in my pocket on the flight"

"Thik hai, puchh leta hun", and he goes inside to meet his boss. A few seconds passed and I saw him coming out of his boss's office. My heart raced at the speed of a Ferrari.

"Impossible hai", and my heart sank. "Sahab bol rahe hai nahi ho sakta. Yeh bilkul damage ho chuka hai and we can't do anything. Naya passport banva lo"
"Sir, naya passport to kaise banva lun abhi. Usme to time jayega and I have to reach my college. Please aap kuchh kijiye". Now I had almost lost all hopes but yet I hung around for those last desperate few moments. As if waiting for the last and final blow in a fight.


"Sir please. Kuchh karo aap"
"Thik hai, jaao flight ke representative ko bula ke lao yaha pe"

Hearing this, I felt like a loosing boxer who got an unexpected time-out from the match referee.
I rushed to Korean desk and asked that person who had sent me to Immigration to come with me and deal with the situation. He looked uncertain but certainly unhappy with this. He clearly did not want to get involved. Helping a troubled man was not to his liking for sure. He mumbled something and called out another person to go with me. He turned out to be a real kind hearted man. He came along with me to the Immigration and met with the boss there, indicating to me when to speak, when to follow the boss, where to stand and so on. He certainly seemed to know the ways of bureaucracy.

"Why are you going to US"
"I am a student sir, I study at University of Arizona"
"What do you study"
"Masters in Computer Science"

He walks away to some immigration booth. This was definitely a positive sign. More time indicated less probability of rejection. He spent about 5 minutes there, came back and handed my passport to that Korean air guy and whispered to him about signing some agreement.

"Ho gaya hai. It's okey", he came to me, smiled and said.
"You just need to sign an agreement saying 'Korean air is not liable' for this"

Whatever. Let me out of here, I thought. So finally I signed that agreement and got my boarding pass. I almost flew away from there without looking back. Lest they change their mind and call me back.

Throughout the flight the thought of having problems at the LA immigration check troubled me. I have done nothing wrong and it happened while I was in flight, I kept convincing myself.

Luckily the immigration officer didn't seem to be bothered about that page of the passport and I had no trouble clearing the immigration.

Happy ending to a tense situation. Thank God for that. It reminded me of those trying moments during my visa interview where I had to struggle for more than an hour and thirty minutes to convince the visa people of genuineness of my case and establish my credibility.


P.S.

My sheer dislike for travel is not unjustified. I always get my checked in baggage in the end after every bag has arrived on the carousel. Whenever there is a connecting flight, the two gates are separated by at least a mile's distance which I have to walk. I hate packing. I dread those narrow seats and small legrooms on the flight. How I wish I could avoid those long queues at security check in and avoid the trouble of emptying everything on your body except clothes (Thank God and American Government for that). And now this incident!

[Image Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_passport]