My mom just arrived from the Philippines after about eight (8) long months to take care of my brother who was having a kidney transplant. She came in yesterday via Philippine Airlines (PR106) departing from Manila to Vancouver then proceeded to Las Vegas. I and my dad were going to pick her up at the airport but we had the best scare of our lives.
My dad and I went to a lunch party (birthday) at a family friend's house before we went to the airport. We were a little bit late, my mom's plane landed about 6:30pm and we arrived about 30mins later. On our way to the airport, I wasn't worried at all because supposedly my mom should just be waiting for us at the pickup point although I expected a long sermon from her on why we were late. As we arrived at the airport she was nowhere to be found. There were still few passengers waiting outside as well as inside the waiting area of the terminal but seems nobody came out from the immigration area already. I asked the information clerk if it was possible to check the immigration and the customs area for some delayed passengers and I even gave him my mom's name. He came out saying that there was nobody inside. Worried, I let my dad stay in the waiting area while I walked to the other side of the building to look for her. I ended up at the Philippine Airlines office and asked for their help. They checked the computers which tied up to the plane's manifesto and confirmed that my mom indeed left Manila with PR106. We tried to make sense out of it and discussed the possibility that she might be left in Vancouver point. The lady however reiterated that there was no way that she can get out of the holding area while they waited for their plane to be refueled because the holding area was always electronically closed and assuming she was on wheelchair there is always someone to assist her as she will be one of the first to board the plane again. As I told my dad about this, we thought of the possibility that she took a taxi by herself but I could not convince myself on this idea. Yes, my mom can drive a car but it was only to and from her work and driving around town was not her expertise. In other words she had directional problems outside her driving comfort zone. The next best possibility was that she befriended somebody and that person tried to help her and drove her to our house. We decided therefore that we go home and checked on her. When we arrived home, she was not there as we expected. We were already stressed out; my dad started to speculate on anything and tried to calm himself by settling on the idea that she was never able to board the plane from Manila point. We decided to go back to the airport and report the case to the airport police since the PAL office was already closed when we first left the airport. On our way to the airport my phone rang and when I looked at the caller ID it said "HOME"!
My mom said that it was so windy and cold while waiting for us in the waiting area and her new found friend tried to help her. She gave my phone number but it turned out that she gave the wrong one to her friend. She could not remember my dad's phone number so she went with her friend who drove her to our house. All the while she was inside the house while we were outside try to plan out on what to do next. We were not thinking to enter the house because my dad said that she did not have the house keys so I dismissed the idea. It seemed that a heavy burden just pulled out from my shoulders. Everything ended well that night and I'm much happy that she is back home and safe.
Some lessons should be learned from this situation: Never be late in picking up somebody at the airport; Never leave the waiting area no matter how late you'll be picked up because the airport is the safest place to stay put; and Always provide the correct phone number of the person whose going to pick you up.
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