Unfortunately, my flight home has been delayed until Sunday. I arrived at the airport around 08:00 for my 09:45 flight today and I was turned away by airport security. The Delta supervisor on duty would not even listen to me long enough to hear me out. I was not the only person mistreated by Delta, however. There were at least 15 others, some who had arrived at 07:00 and were turned away. Everyone was simply told they were late. Apparently check-in begins at 04:30 and ends at 07:30. I was unaware of this and assumed I would be safe arriving 2 hours before the flight, just like in America.

Although I think the rule is stupid, I can respect it; I should have done more to check on the flight. What I cannot accept, however, is the gross mistreatment extended to myself and the other paying customers. What I cannot accept is being forced to miss my flight simply because one person would not take 2 minutes to listen to me. When I left the airport around 09:50 the plane had not landed and people were still in line at the check-in counter. I could and should have been on that flight.

You don’t have to know me very well to realize that I like money and the things that it can’t buy. I learned early on, however, to save money so for a few years I have had a ShareBuilder investment account and have been investing in various stocks. I primarily invest in companies whose products I use and like. Examples include Apple, Google, and (of course) Texas Instruments.

I’ll admit that I broke this rule of investing in companies whose products I use when I invested in Delta Airlines. For those who remember, a few years ago American Airlines (parent company AMR) stock tanked to around $2 per share. At the time I was not investing, so I didn’t really give it much attention. Within a short time frame (a year, maybe) the stock was trading around $10. Now it is back up to $36! I arrived late in the game, so I ended up buying AMR at around $25, so I got a little profit. Besides the profit, I also kept to the rule; I fly American Airlines pretty much all the time. Perhaps once a year I’ll switch to save some money (and I loathe the decision each time).

I was hoping that Delta would be able to rebound like American and turn a profit, so I bought Delta, originally at $8. Over time the price plummetted to 80 cents. If I sold the stock at that time, I would have lost more money selling than staying, so, somewhat naively, I bought more stock. I’m still in the red, but not by much since I have close to 200 shares mostly bought at 80 cents and price is now around $1.10.

While I’m somewhat happy with the stock (hopefully I’ll be happier by the end of this year), I’m very dissapointed with the customer service that was shown to me today. I have flown Delta at least once, maybe twice, so I’m not really familiar with their customer service policies, but today was downright disgusting. I’m usually the type of person who gets angry and eventually forgets about the entire event a few hours later. This is different, however. This is a company that I own treating me and other customers wrongly. This is a company keeping me away from my home, as cold as it may be. I have a family that I would like to spend some time with before heading back to school for 3 months. My time with them has been slashed in half.

I am so angry I have written a letter which I intend to mail/e-mail to Delta’s CEO, VP of Customer Relations, and anyone else I can find to send it to. You can view a draft here. I am so upset right now.

So, until I hear a response from someone at Delta stating that they are looking into the matter, I am boycotting Delta Airlines and its affiliates and I urge you all to do the same. The company can go bankrupt, but I won’t care (I own Google and Apple after all) until I am assured that such mistreatment of customers will not go unpunished and will be prevented in the future.

Now that that’s all done, I’m safe here in Ghana. I decided not to return to the guest house. Instead I am staying at the home of one of Tes’s (my sister-in-law) friends. The family is quite nice and they have made my extended stay comfortable.

Also, I have a few pictures and videos from my visit to the Cape Coast on Wednesday. Cape Coast is a very nice place. I really enjoyed the drive. I wish I had my convertible; the weather and scenery were just perfect for a convertible. I visited Kakum National Park and Castle Elmina. Kakum is different from Mole in that Kakum is a rain forest as opposed to a savannah. Most of the animals in Kakum only appear at night or in the early morning, so I didn’t see any; however, I did spend time in the tree canopy above the forest. The major attraction at Kakum is a network of suspension bridges built 30-40 meters above the forest floor. Although all that I saw were a bunch of trees, the experience itself was amazing. I have a few panorama shots and a video of my wobbly walks across a couple of the bridges.

After leaving Kakum, I visited Castle Elmina, a former slave castle. When I see footage of people returning death camps (especially those from the Holocaust), and other sites of mass death, the people usually break down sobbing or faint. Before arriving, I didn’t know if I would have a similar reaction, or not. I didn’t. While walking around and hearing the story of each room, I was not sad or overcome with grief. No, the only emotion I felt was pure anger. Anger that people would even fathom chaining and selling other human beings. Anger that a few Africans actually brokered deals with the Portuguese and Dutch to allow the sale of fellow Africans. Anger that the atrocity was not corrected until centuries and generations later. There were no tears.

I doubt my pictures can relay even the slightest bit of the experience.

In any case, I had had a wonderful time here and I’ll be making the most of the additional time: I’m headed to the beach!

Pictures:

Video

More video to come soon. When I get back home, and have the time, I’ll compile everything into a single video montage, or something creative.