Dovrei divulgo questo in inglese? Should I post this on another site ?

[ou Trek dronkie]

Ciao tutti, siamo tutti amici sul questo sito, lo spero. Mi preocuppo con questo problemà :

Sorry, but I gotta rant a bit.

Chaos at FCO today - so what’s new ?

EZY flights were redirected to FCO today because very important people were using CIA. This was so they can whizz up the Via Appia to the Vatican under police protection at ridiculous speeds, forcing everyone else to one side. (Don’t get bitter oTd).

So, if you were wise enough to have checked your e-mail, you would have learned your EZY flight was redirected to FCO.

No problem.

If you were relying on a telephone call from EZY to be apprised of this vital info, well buddy, you are probably still trying to get through the traffic. Don’t bother to complete the line in future.

(BTW, has anyone, ever, ever, ever, had a call from Easyjet about a flight delay ??)

I have had this EZY experience myself, it raises your temperature slightly. Luckily for me, good old Aeroflot checked me at in FCO as all the EZY people had left early.

Spasibo tovarich.

Anyway, back to the story : misery and mass confusion at Fiumicino (so how can you tell ??).

Well, you arrive in good, good, time, no sign of the EZY flight check-in desks anywhere. Screens blank for EZY. Niente. So, you ask a friendly ADR (Aeroporti da Roma) person. “Si, Si, Go to gate XXX for your Easyjet flight to Gatwick”.

Off you go, but you see this gate is down as the gate for New York and Israel. (Remember that in Italy, what you see is not always what you are going to get).

So, just to check OK, you ask another kind ADR person , the one who is a “Security person” : “Is this good for Easyjet to Gatwick ?”

“Yes, yes, yes”. (Si is the Italian word for Yes, isn’t it ???)

Through the detector you go and the lady checking your boarding pass says “Wrong gate”. “But your colleague said this is good for EZY to Gatwick ????”

Wrong gate.

Altercation with the first colleague. Who says “Not my problem,”.

Then it becomes his personal problem as the rules of boarding and security are explained to him in front of about 400 people. I say again, 400 pax.

Words are exchanged and the English language comes out tops, even though the word “******* !!!!” is used. More than once. (Look it up).

The Italiana reazione, standard, is to walk away. (Where have I heard that before ?)

More and more of the same.
On and on it goes.

A question to my many, many Italian friends and colleagues :

“When is Italy and, in particular the Italian workforce at Italian airports, going to join the 19th century ? The barest notion of service to the people (pax) who pay their wages ?”

Comments welcome.

So, here is some solid advice to those travelling in Italy (by air), don’t drive, the roads are terrifying :

1. Check the flight departure and destination times on the web, don’t believe ADR, so often incorrect info).

2. Get to the airport in plenty of time. At least 2 hours before scheduled ETD. At least. At least. (It can take 50 minutes to get a coffee)

3. Check, check and check again you are at the right gate before you go through security.

4. Take refreshment with (±150 people queuing for cappuccino, only one person taking the money - trying a short-change now and again of course - making the coffee, warming the cornetti and clearing the cups etc). Pazienza, pazienza.

5. Don’t expect any kind of apology from EZY. Niente.

6. And, don’t even think of complaining to EZY, waste of time. You just get crosser and crosser. EZY and FR have more in common than you think, EZY just does it better.

Welcome to the world of LCA in Italy !

Italia, I love it.

PS : If you detect a little bit of irritation, could be, could be, but when the water level rises, the dam bursts.

PPS : I am sure the Ryanair flights were perfect.

The Italians say “Africa begins at Rome”.

That’s quite enough of that oTd.

Mi dispiace.

Ha sbagliato il "vecchio Romano da Africa" ?
:confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused:

[Speevy]

Just immagine how difficult if for us who saw how things are done oversea and must work in this enviroment!
Bell'Italia???

P.S. Io soffro di lamentite acuta ;-)

[brucelee]

Mister ou Trek.

Please don't take this the wrong way, but it sounds like you have some bitterness towards your"italian friends" that goes beyond EZY at FCO. Allow me to make some observations about your "italian experience ".

1. You blame the security people at FCO for guiding you in the wrong direction. Personally I would never ask security staff anything- it's not there job!
2. Where was EZY throughout all this. Is it not their responsibility to make sure their passengers are notified of what's going on?
3. EZY does not normally use FCO so that explains alot to me.
4. You travel on low cost carriers.That explains alot to me.
5. I have gone through FCO more times than you can probably try in your lifetime and never had any problems. Then again I don't have anything against Italy or it's people.
6. If you are italian, i guess we are our own worst enemies.
7. If you're not, I guess that explains everything.
8. A word of advise. RELAX.
Ciao.

[Gufo]

Well, ou Trek, you're right after all. But that's not 100% about Italy. It's mostly about FCO. I'm Italian: I swear I feel sick whenever I'm getting through that airport, both as a passenger and as a pilot. But this is only a point of view. And consider that yours was a pretty "non-normal" situation, before assuming your picture as the standard Italian fashion.

Nevertheless, it happened to me that I was in Paris CDG, wearing a uniform, back in my airtaxi days; I was trying to get some info about how to get back to the gate I came through.
Well, could you imagine a fair lady at the central information desk refusing to speak English? Hope you can, cos that's what I got, that day.

So, ok, we're just Italians, eating pasta and playing mandolino. But this is not the only place in the world, where you can find people lacking the will -or habit- to get their job done reasonably.

Cheerz

[Henry VIII]

u Trek,
you fly low cost, so... you pay peanuts.
When you pay peanuts your relationship is to monkeys.
All the rest is simply polemic.
Ciao

P.S. - If you don't like Italy, feel free to live away.

[tarjet fixated]

As an italian i think that the african border will move from rome only the day when we learn how to take criticism and shut up instead of taking evertything personnally.
Many international turists and businessmen find this country beautiful and folkloristic but extremely backwards for everything that concerns service and professionalism (exeptions apart).
We surely know how to dress,cook and have a good time in the evenings..all things we can teach; but at the same time we should learn from others about all the rest.
Admitting this without resentment would be our first step towards change.

[brucelee]

Tarjet.

Please. Italians are no different than any other people. Good critism is always welcome and hard to dispute. But I sense there is more to Mr. ou Trek's thread than we are reading. It sounds very much to me like he has some deep personal hatred or at least misunderstanding about a place and its people. The experience he had could have and has happened elsewhere. No, not in Africa but in places like North America. Insted of blaming the company he chose to fly with, he took the oppurtunity to put down a whole nation. Mi sbaglio o no? Ma. Io la vedo cosi'.

[tarjet fixated]

Bruce,
if we were talking about a single case i would be totally with you on this...the thing is that living here everyday you sort of realize that's the way things actually work and that's probably why those who see this on a daily basis sometimes just can't take it any longer.
And the main thing is that we (italians) cannot blame anyone else for this but ourselves and it's up to us to change or join the 3rd world soon.

[ou Trek dronkie]

OK, OK, OK. Forse quello posting era un po’ OTT. Mi dispiace, vero.

Still, some of you got the plot hopelessly wrong.

Per mettere la cosa chiaro e alto : Mi piace l’Italia tantissimo, anche gli Italiani, tutti. Italy comes light years ahead of almost every other country I know in Europe. I have felt this way for a long long time and nothing can change it. Never known such tolerant people as you Italians.

But, the point is, I detest the type of thing that goes on at FCO and so should you. By the way, it was not me who was there, otherwise I would probably have been locked up. As aviation is my prime interest, I take it seriously and offered it up for comment. Tarjet seems to understand exactly what I was saying. Ringrazie Tarjet.

What do you guys want ? Keep quiet and pretend nothing is wrong ? Justify it because it happens elsewhere ? These people must do their job properly. That’s what they are paid for and it’s the pax who pay, even the nasty “Low Cost” pax. If someone has a bad experience with a hotel or a restaurant, they never return. It’s the same with an airline, even, maybe an airport. And people talk afterwards.

If you don’t like the criticism (or do not believe it because it hasn’t happened to you) or excuse it because other people are like that, that’s up to you. What I resent is bad behaviour which bounces back on the country. If you had heard what the b*ggered about pax were saying, you might agree.

So, cut the sensitivity please.

Bruce, hai sbagliato complettamente, complettamente.

oTd

[brucelee]

ou Trek.

You obviuosly are missing my point. You critisized a whole nation and its people because of something that happened on one day at one airport. Is Italy to be judged by Fiumicino airport? Are Italians to be judged by the same guidelines? Go back and read what you wrote and see if you can't see what I'm trying to get you to see. Why don't you tell us where you are from and we'll have something bad to say about your country and your people based on what happens at one of your airports? Doesn't sound right does it? Get a life pal. Best of all go find yourself another country to sh*t on. Non ho sbagliato per niente.

Tarjet. We are our own worse enemies.

[Gufo]

Come on, Bruce and everybody.. ou Trek sounded a bit harsh in his first post. We agree it was a bit rushed, to evaluate a whole nation from an episode. But we also agree with Tarjet that we, Italians, surely need to work harder when it comes to organization. That's kind of biological :)
But sure, everyone has to put their efforts in trying to change these attitudes with the right tolerance and adaptfulness; two virtues that are starting to fade away, even in this small thread..

And, ou Trek, when I recalled that happening in Paris, I surely didn't mean to justify that FCO stuff. You would be impressed by how hardly -for a Spaghetti man- I hate and fight people who don't take their job seriously. I believe that's one of the worst plagues of mankind, really. I was only trying to explain that these "poor professionalities" do exist everywhere, in different concentrations, and it's up to everybody to discourage these issues the way one can, when they show up.

Hope I could reasonably match the thoughts of everybody here and settle things down a bit ;)