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(RTTNews.com) – With an ever-increasing number of holiday-makers descending on Europe, there are fewer and fewer hidden gems to discover.

Cheap airfares and an impressive infrastructure of trains and highways have sent droves of visitors to formerly exotic outposts like Estonia, Croatia, and southern Portugal.

While many cities have been overrun by tacky tour groups and sketchy scam artists, a true taste of European culture is often a quick train ride from even the most overcrowded meccas.

The fanny-packer is virtually absent from smooth and sophisticated Trieste.

The city, tucked neatly in a corner of Italy that hugs its Slovenian neighbors, is an easy train ride from Venice.

Influenced by its location at the crossroads of Germanic, Latin, Austro-Hungarian and Slavic cultures, this rarely touristed city feels a world apart from the rest of Italy.

The region of Friuli Venezia Giulia has four official languages (Italian, Slovene, Ladin and German), but most locals fall back on their own Triestine dialect of Venetian Italian.

Cradled by the Adriatic Sea and the dramatic highlands of nearby Slovenia, much of Trieste’s former grandeur is still clearly apparent in the form of imposing buildings with elaborate Neo-classical facades.

The city is a pilgrimage site for devotees of the the famous Irish writer James Joyce, who began writing his opus “Ulysses” while living in Trieste from 1904 to the start of World War I.

Perhaps the safest city of its size in Italy, a tourist is more likely to be accosted for a lack of a fashion sense than badgered for spare change or pick-pocketed.

The food in Trieste is delicious, and decidedly continental rather than Italian. After hopping off the train at Centrale Station, sprint for Buffet da Pepi for its luscious pork sandwiches with sauerkraut, hot mustard and freshly grated horseradish.

The mouth-watering meats are also offered as a platter — order at the counter and try to keep your composure as the burly butcher slices the cured pork and pours you an ice cold beer.

A platter of Cotechini (pork sausages), porchetta (roast pork), bollito di maiale (boiled pork), and prosciutto is the best 10 euro you will ever spend.

Well-fed, waddle further from the train station toward one of Europe’s quintessential small hotels, Residence L’Albero Nascosto.

Immaculately clean, artfully decorated and well-equipped with amenities, Nascosto is nestled in a narrow alley, perfect for Vespas and pedestrians but a tricky path for anything with four wheels.

The absence of traffic means opening your window in the morning to the sound of the fish monger and the easy chatter of stylish locals on their way to work.

Just around the corner, the sun comes up on one Europe’s most glorious town squares. The pristine Piazza dell’Unita D’Italia, or simply Piazza Unita, is the biggest open space in Trieste.

The piazza truly comes alive later in the day, as a majestic sunset over the Gulf of Trieste is the backdrop for the Triestini to see and be seen.

Strike up a conversation with the friendly locals while ordering a glass of wine from one of the numerous cafes around the piazza.

Chances are they will point you in the direction of Suban, a renowned trattoria on Emilio Comici in the quiet North-east part of town.

The ancestors of Giovanni Suban have labored for five generations to advance the culinary tradition of Trieste, pairing a delicious fusion of Istrian and Viennese with fresh, aromatic wines from the Fruili region of Italy.

A taxi from the city centre will whisk you to Suban in ten minutes.

Wind down your stay in Trieste by visiting some of the city’s historic sites. The Roman Theater was enclosed by walls built in 33-32 BC on Emperor Octavius’s orders.

The theatre lies at the foot of the San Giusto hill, and, facing the sea, must have provided breath-taking views before the rude intrusion of modern construction.

Numerous trains depart Venezia S. Lucia for Trieste Centrale throughout the day ($32 r/t). The glorious, two hour train ride straddles the coast of the Gulf of Trieste, the northern part of the Adriatic.

If Venice is not on the itinerary, affordable direct flights from Munich, Frankfurt and London Stansted are available to Friuli-Venezia Giulia airport, about 30 kilometers outside of Trieste.

A bus service (number 51) runs between the airport Trieste’s bus station (next to the railway station).

For comments and feedback: contact editorial@rttnews.com

http://www.rttnews.com

December 27, 2011

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AUDIO: Triple-A Predicting Heavy Travel This Holiday Season

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NCAA Says Nickname Lawsuit Should Be Thrown Out

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North Dakota Leads Three State Region In Oil, Gas Leases

The Bureau of Land Management says federal oil and gas lease sales in the Dakotas and Montana set a record in fiscal 2011. READ MORE

Last North Dakota Guard Member In Iraq Returns Home

North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple was at Fargo’s Hector International Airport to personally welcome home staff Sgt. Teresa Pavljuk, who serves with the North Dakota Air National Guard’s 119th Wing. READ MORE

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Sen. Amy Klobuchar Looks To Pass A Ban On Synthetic Drugs

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VIDEO: A Historic Bike

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A self-proclaimed “fiscal conservative,” Texas Gov. Rick Perry has billed Texas taxpayers for over $1 million in the last months of 2011 for travel costs (lodging, food and security) during his out-of-state presidential campaign trips.

Gov. Perry has defended his enormous campaign costs by claiming to be “promoting Texas” as he travels around the country running for president.

The Texas Department of Public Safety has spent more on Perry’s travels from Sept. to Dec. of 2011 than it did during all the other months of 2011 combined, according to financial disclosures published by The Texas Tribune.

In total, Gov. Perry spent over $1.4 million for security, travel, dining and lodging during that time, all on the taxpayers’ dime. Nearly $400,000 of that was for security alone.

Gov. Perry has made a practice of criticizing government workers and the poor for what he calls “living off taxpayer largess.”

Cenk Uygur, host of Current TV’s ‘The Young Turks,’ explained the numbers on Monday night (video below): “When you break down the security costs, get a load of this, on one California trip, they spent $32,000 for lodging in San Francisco, $4,400 dining in Simi Valley, and plane tickets to San Diego cost $6,400.”

“Okay, the plane tickets, maybe they got out of hand. Maybe it was last second. But what are they eating? How many people are there? $4,400 in one meal? Jesus, lord, mercy, how much food can you eat?”

Q: When are airline tickets that are paid for with frequent flier miles not free?

A: Almost never, but some tickets, booked on certain carriers, are almost as expensive as a trip to the North Pole.

This question, a composite of three recent letters, highlights a growing concern among travelers who pay for tickets with awards points: They do the work to accumulate enough for a ticket, and when they book it, they discover some amazingly high fees, sometimes under the label of a fuel surcharge. In recent months, we’ve received complaints about those charges on British Airways, Air France, Air Canada and AeroMexico, which gets its own update at the end of this column.

When you book an award ticket, you almost always have to pay something – often a ticketing service charge, plus taxes. But now certain foreign carriers are tacking on fuel surcharges, suggesting again there is no such thing as a free airline lunch. “British Airways probably leads the pack in terms of fees,” said Brian Kelly, who turned his frequent-flier miles expertise into a business and a website known as ThePointsGuy.com. “I once helped people book Toronto to Nairobi (Kenya) via London, and taxes and fees were $1,250 per ticket. … That was for a first-class seat, but oftentimes the fuel surcharges can cost as much as if you just bought the ticket with cash.”

What is a budget traveler to do? “Generally, if you book with an American carrier, you will avoid huge fuel surcharges,” Kelly said. And he, added, “If you have British Airways miles, you can avoid these fees by using them on Oneworld partners like American Airlines and LAN on non-European routes.” (Oneworld is an airline alliance; to see the partners, go to www.oneworld.com.)

Kelly also recommends that “people accrue transferable points (through) Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards or even Starwood Preferred Guest. These programs give you the option to transfer to multiple different partners so you always have the flexibility of using a partner that charges less (in) fees for the trip you want to take.”

Which brings me to the final update on a trip that reader J.A. Rogers of Long Beach, Calif., wanted to take. We first wrote about Rogers’ woes with AeroMexico last summer. Using Marriott Reward points, he booked two round-trip tickets from LAX to Santiago, Chile, and was dinged $672 for each ticket. When I asked AeroMexico why, airline reps said they couldn’t respond for “legal reasons” but that the airline would work with him to make his trip “more affordable.” After much back and forth, he received a reply in early December upgrading him to business class for his trouble, which he said was an acceptable outcome.

But I was still curious about the machinations behind this, so I again contacted AeroMexico with copies of Rogers’ emails and On the Spot columns and received a reply from executive customer service that said, “In order to provide you a better service and in relation to any doubt you have referring to our department, I will kindly ask you to send them t(h)ru email so we will be able to offer you a better and precise answer. Thank you for your time and have a nice day.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant, so I contacted the company that handles public relations for AeroMexico and asked, among other things, whether there was a better way to work with the airline on matters of customer service. Here was the response: “AeroMexico complies to and is consistent with airline industry policies. Mr. Rogers was assisted in accordance to these policies through our Customer Service Department which searched for all options available to respond to this matter. AeroMexico strives to provide the best service possible and during our constant communication with our passenger, Mr. Rogers, the matter has been resolved satisfactorily.”

If all the options involved delays and obfuscation, I’d say that was a job well done.

Have a travel dilemma? Write to travel@latimes.com. We regret we cannot answer every inquiry.

If you travel by plane over the holidays, there’s a good chance you’ll come back with an unpleasant souvenir, such as a cough, a runny nose or worse. Research has shown that air travelers suffer higher rates of infections than those using other means of transportation. In times of high volume travel, the likelihood of getting sick increases exponentially.

The crowded, confined spaces inside airplanes can turn into a breeding ground for a vast array of infectious diseases. Although most passenger jets have sophisticated filtration systems to keep airborne viruses from spreading – high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filters are said to capture over 99 percent of bacteria and virus-carrying particles – you still can get infected because you are in close proximity to the mouths, noses and hands of so many other people. Also, the air circulation usually gets shut down when passengers board or exit or while the plane waits for takeoff. It is during these time periods that infections can spread like wildfire.

The greatest danger comes from your immediate surroundings, like the seats in front, besides and behind you, according to a study published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the journal “Emerging Infectious Diseases.” Viruses and bacteria can survive for many hours on the surfaces of seats, armrests, tray tables, remote controls and inside backseat pockets.

Your body’s natural defenses can also become compromised when you spend hours in a compressed cabin 30,000 feet up in the air. “When mucous membranes dry out [because of extremely dry air in airplanes], they are far less effective at blocking infections. High altitude can tire the body and fatigue plays a role in making people more susceptible to catching colds, too,” says Scott McCartney, a travel writer and author of “Where Germs Lurk on Planes.”

So, what can you do to protect your health while in transit? Travel expert Douglas Wright recommends to be especially aware of places where germs typically breed in a plane, including water tanks, food containers and lavatories.

Water quality on airplanes deserves more scrutiny than most passengers realize, according to Wright. People should be concerned about contamination of the water they drink in form of tea, coffee, cold water and ice cubes. Tests by the U.S. Environment Protection Agency(EPA) have found traces of E. coli in onboard water tanks in both domestically and internationally operating aircraft. Many of these tanks are refilled at foreign airports where water purity standards can be questionable, says Wright. His advice is to purchase sealed water bottles or other prepackaged liquids after clearing airport security and use those instead.

Even in-flight meals (including business- and first class) are not always beyond reproach. In 2009, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) found that some airline catering companies had less than perfect preparation and handling standards (to put it mildly). “You never really know where your meal has been. If you’re concerned, eat beforehand and bring your own snacks,” warns Wright.

Not surprisingly, the lavatory is one of the airplane’s most hazardous germ zones. The CDC considered airplane lavatories a major danger area for the spread of diseases during the H1N1 flu and SARS epidemics. Instead of washing your hands with water from the lavatory faucet, Wright recommends to use your own hand sanitizer when returning to your seat.

Caution is also advised with regards to airline-issued pillows and blankets. Just because you find them sealed in a plastic bag does not mean they are new or have been freshly cleaned. The same goes for earphones. Although there is no evidence that passengers routinely fall ill from using these items, it is still not a bad idea to bring your own whenever possible.

No matter how many cautionary measures you are willing to take, there will always be a certain amount of risk involved when you travel – by whatever means. “Work, recreation and families have become global. Most of us have to fly,” says Dr. Judith Reichman, MD, medical advisor and contributor to “Today’s Women,” in an article titled “Germs on a Plane: Can You Get Sick Flying?” “With rare exceptions, we don’t risk serious illness. Simple hygiene, hydration and judgment can help prevent air related health problems,” she added.

Even so, there are a few precautionary measures worthwhile observing:

1. Boost your immune system by eating healthy and getting enough sleep. I also recommend taking vitamin supplements or an Airborne® tablet a few hours before travel time.

2. Stay hydrated at all times. If the quality of the water served on the plane is questionable, bring your own.

3. Clean your hands frequently with hand sanitizers, especially before touching food.

4. Disinfect tray tables, armrests and remote controls the moment you’re seated.

5. Bring your own pillow, blanket and earphones if possible.

6. Avoid using seat pockets.

7. Open the air vent above your seat and aim it directly in front of your face. It can help blow virus-carrying particles away from you.

8. Change seats, if at all possible, if you find yourself in close proximity to someone displaying cold or flu symptoms.

9. Alert crewmembers if the air circulation system does not work properly or is shut off for extended periods of time.

10. Do take all necessary precautions without becoming paranoid. If your health concerns cause you too much stress, it’s time to relax and rely on your natural immune system to do its job.

Bon voyage!

Timi Gustafson R.D. is a clinical dietitian and author of the book “The Healthy Diner – How to Eat Right and Still Have Fun”®, which is available on her blog, “Food and Health with Timi Gustafson R.D.” (http://www.timigustafson.com), and at amazon.com. You can follow Timi on Twitter and on Facebook.

Searching for flights on Google.

(Credit:
Josh Lowensohn/CNET)

Google is taking heat from travel companies that say the search engine is giving preferential treatment to its own travel search tools over those of competitors.

The Wall Street Journal today points to a practice begun by the search giant earlier this month, which provides results for travel-related searches–such as domestic flights–from right within Google, as opposed to pointing searchers towards places like Priceline, Expedia, and Orbitz.

The move poses a serious threat, the Journal says, for these competing travel sites, which can depend on Google for 10 percent to 20 percent of their incoming traffic. With the newer technique of putting links to airline sites right up top, there’s a chance visitors won’t scroll down to try their search from one of these other sites, the Journal argues.

Google made serious moves to get into the travel business in the middle of last year, announcing plans to buy travel software company ITA as part of a $700 million deal. ITA’s core business is curating and indexing prices, flight schedules, and open seats, and offering the data to partners. When Google first announced plans to buy the company, it said it intended to use ITA’s technology to let users buy tickets directly from its search pages.

The 500-person company has relationships with airlines and travel agencies and can be found powering sites like Kayak, Hotwire, and Orbitz–many of which opposed the deal.

In April, Google and the Justice Department announced that a deal had been struck, granting Google the right to acquire ITA. But that deal came with strings attached, including that Google continue to license ITA’s technology to competitors for five years, and pass along any complaints from competitors about their listings not receiving fair placement on Google’s results pages.

In October, a federal judge approved the consent decree between Google and the Justice Department.

The Journal points to a statement made by Google vice president, and ITA founder, Jeremy Wertheimer last month, in which he said that airlines refused to give the company data about flights if that information was linked up to travel agencies as opposed to the airliners’ own sales sites. Google declined further elaboration on that point, the Journal said.

Worth pointing out is that Microsoft has a similar practice of putting travel results on the top of its Bing search pages, as it’s done since March of this year. However that technology is a partnership with Kayak, as opposed to Microsoft’s own travel tools. The Journal notes that Bing brings in “less than a quarter of Google’s audience,” giving the practice less of an impact.

AFP – The United States is considering Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s request to visit, but would only grant him entry for “legitimate” medical treatment, a senior US official said Monday.

Officials also said President Barack Obama’s top anti-terror advisor John Brennan called Yemeni Vice President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi on Sunday to urge “maximum restraint” after forces backing Saleh killed 13 demonstrators.

Saleh, set to stand down after a presidential election in February, said on Saturday he wanted to visit the United States, though was not seeking treatment for wounds sustained in an attack on his palace in June.

But a senior US official said Monday that Saleh’s office had contacted the US embassy in Sanaa and said the president did want to go to the United States to seek “specialized medical treatment.”

“The request for approval for President Saleh to travel to the United States is currently under consideration,” the official said on condition of anonymity.

“The only reason that travel to the United States by President Saleh would be approved would be for legitimate medical treatment.”

UN envoy Jamal Benomar said last week that Saleh, treated in Saudi Arabia after June 3 explosion at his palace, needed “important” medical treatment abroad.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon had previously said that Saleh would visit New York for medical treatment.

White House Deputy spokesman Josh Earnest meanwhile said that Brennan called Hadi on Sunday to discuss the recent violence and the political transition leading up to the presidential election.

“Mr Brennan emphasized strongly the need for Yemeni security forces to show maximum restraint when dealing with demonstrations and called upon all sides to refrain from provocative acts that could spur further violence,” Earnest said.

“Vice President Hadi said that he has initiated an investigation into the deaths and injuries that occurred and that he would do his utmost to prevent further bloodshed,” Earnest said in Hawaii where Obama is on vacation.

Thirteen people were killed on Saturday in an attack by security forces and loyalists of Saleh against a march of thousands of people calling for the embattled leader’s trial, medics said.

Dozens more were injured.

Brennan and Hadi also agreed on the importance of the transition leading up to the election in February, Earnest said.

Brennan also said Washington was a “strong and fervent supporter of the Yemeni people” in their quest for security, political stability, representative government, and economic prosperity.

The United States is acutely concerned about further instability in Yemen, and the presence on Yemeni soil of Al-Qaeda and affiliated extremists who have posed a direct threat to America’s people and security.

Two years ago, while Obama was also in Hawaii for Christmas, Nigerian extremists Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who was trained in Yemen by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), allegedly tried to blow up a US airliner over Detroit with explosives sewn into his underwear.

In September, US-Yemeni militant Anwar al-Awlaqi, who is believed to have masterminded the airliner plot, was killed in what was apparently a US air strike in Yemen.

AQAP has taken advantage of 10 months of deadly protests against Saleh to bolster its presence in the restive provinces of Marib, Shabwa, Abyan.

Militants linked to Al-Qaeda control several regions and towns including Abyan provincial capital Zinjibar, where they clash regularly with government forces and tribal auxiliaries.

On Sunday, gunmen shot dead a local intelligence chief in the port of Aden in south Yemen, a police official said.

Colonel Hussein Shabibi was the latest security officer to be targeted in recent months in south Yemen in attacks generally attributed by officials to Al-Qaeda.

Government forces are sometimes supported by US drone strikes in their battle against the Partisans of Sharia, the Al-Qaeda-linked insurgent group that took over most of Zinjibar in May.
 

Gas prices were lower on Christmas Day than they were a year ago in Oklahoma, and holiday road travel is expected to be higher across the country.

The average gasoline prices in Oklahoma were 1.1 cents lower per gallon during the past week, averaging $2.98 a gallon, according to Oklahoma Gas Prices.com. Last year on Christmas gas was 13.5 cents higher per gallon.
Gas prices are 9.4 cents lower per gallon in Oklahoma than they were a month ago.

Nationally, the price of gas has actually increased 0.8 cents a gallon in the last week; averaging $3.23 per gallon. The national average decreased almost 9 cents per gallon during the past month and is 21.3 cents higher than it was one year ago, according to Oklahoma Gas Prices.com.

This information was released the day after Christmas, during a time when AAA has predicted 91.9 million Americans will travel 50 miles or more from home. Those numbers are up 1.4 percent from a year ago, and are the highest since 2006.

Nationally, 33.6 million are expected to travel by a motor vehicle, according to AAA.
Across Oklahoma, auto travel was forecast to increase 2.8 percent over last year with 787,500 traveling over the holiday period. That number is a 3.2-percent increase from 2010.

AAA also estimates that travel by plane would decrease over the holidays, with 44,900 flying, a 6.5 percent decline from last year.

Fifty-nine percent of travelers said the economy has no impact on their plans, or that things have improved for them since last year. Forty-one percent said they intended to scale back on their holiday travel plans because of economic concerns, according to AAA.

The airline industry expects airports to be less busy this year and AAA reports that airfare is 21 percent higher over peak travel periods this year.

Travelers on average will travel 726 miles over the holiday periods, which is from Dec. 23 to Jan. 2, 2012, according to AAA.

Median spending is projected at $718, 3 percent more than last year.

AAA also expects to come to the aid of 5,800 stranded motorists in Oklahoma during the holiday season. The need for a tow is the most common roadside rescue provided by AAA. The second most common service is replacing or jump-starting dead batteries.

The next most common needed assistance is helping members get into their locked vehicles, changing flats and delivering fuel, according to AAA.

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On Christmas morning did you look in your stocking and pull out tickets for your dream trip? Or when you opened your presents from under the tree did you find an exotic cruise?

If Santa missed your house this year I have some ideas that might just bring you some belated Christmas joy during the coming year.

If you are looking for some sunshine there are great deals right now on Caribbean and Panama Canal cruises, especially the departures out of San Juan. You can also get your bronze tan in Hawaii but the dates around spring break are filling up fast. You can find better deals going in January or February than in March.

It is summer in the land down under and the perfect time to explore Australia and New Zealand. There are amazing land tours where we take care of every detail. Explore the Outback, the Great Barrier Reef, beautiful Sydney Harbor and the rugged Blue mountains.

Or there are incredible cruises showing you amazing scenery and sites. Picture serene Milford Sound, the countless white sailboats in Auckland’s harbor or a visit to wild Tasmania. Since you are going that far you probably want to combine a land tour and a cruise to see it all.

Imagine gently gliding down the rivers of Europe passing quaint villages, majestic castles and thousands of years of history. A river cruise gets you up close to the unlimited scenery and stops in places you have never heard of but you will now never forget.

For a more adventurous river cruise, try the Mekong River through the jungles of Vietnam and Cambodia.

Last summer my big trip was a Mediterranean Cruise and this year there will be more ships than ever in the region. Explore the ruins in Rome, the incredible Greek Islands, mysterious Turkey or the canals of Venice.

More ships will bring the price down but now is the time to book your air because there are a limited number of discounted seats during the peak summer travel time to Europe. You may want to avoid the crowds and go during September or early October.

It is also summer right now in South America, where you can admire the jungle covered peaks of Rio de Janeiro while relaxing on Copacabana Beach. Or discover the spectacular roaring Iguassu River as it crashes over beautiful Iguassu Falls.

Q: When are airline tickets that are paid for with frequent flier miles not free?

A: Almost never, but some tickets, booked on certain carriers, are almost as expensive as a trip to the North Pole.

This question, a composite of three recent letters, highlights a growing concern among travelers who pay for tickets with awards points: They do the work to accumulate enough for a ticket, and when they book it, they discover some amazingly high fees, sometimes under the label of a fuel surcharge. In recent months, we’ve received complaints about those charges on British Airways, Air France, Air Canada and AeroMexico, which gets its own update at the end of this column.

When you book an award ticket, you almost always have to pay something — often a ticketing service charge, plus taxes. But now certain foreign carriers are tacking on fuel surcharges, suggesting again there is no such thing as a free airline lunch. “British Airways probably leads the pack in terms of fees,” said Brian Kelly, who turned his frequent-flier miles expertise into a business and a website known as ThePointsGuy.com. “I once helped people book Toronto to Nairobi (Kenya) via London, and taxes and fees were $1,250 per ticket. … That was for a first-class seat, but oftentimes the fuel surcharges can cost as much as if you just bought the ticket with cash.”

What is a budget traveler to do? “Generally, if you book with an American carrier, you will avoid huge fuel surcharges,” Kelly said. And he, added, “If you have British Airways miles, you can avoid these fees by using them on Oneworld partners like American Airlines and LAN on non-European routes.” (Oneworld is an airline alliance; to see the partners, go to www.oneworld.com.)

Kelly also recommends that “people accrue transferable points (through) Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards or even Starwood Preferred Guest. These programs give you the option to transfer to multiple different partners so you always have the flexibility of using a partner that charges less (in) fees for the trip you want to take.”

Which brings me to the final update on a trip that reader J.A. Rogers of Long Beach, Calif., wanted to take. We first wrote about Rogers’ woes with AeroMexico last summer. Using Marriott Reward points, he booked two round-trip tickets from LAX to Santiago, Chile, and was dinged $672 for each ticket. When I asked AeroMexico why, airline reps said they couldn’t respond for “legal reasons” but that the airline would work with him to make his trip “more affordable.” After much back and forth, he received a reply in early December upgrading him to business class for his trouble, which he said was an acceptable outcome.

But I was still curious about the machinations behind this, so I again contacted AeroMexico with copies of Rogers’ emails and On the Spot columns and received a reply from executive customer service that said, “In order to provide you a better service and in relation to any doubt you have referring to our department, I will kindly ask you to send them t(h)ru email so we will be able to offer you a better and precise answer. Thank you for your time and have a nice day.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant, so I contacted the company that handles public relations for AeroMexico and asked, among other things, whether there was a better way to work with the airline on matters of customer service. Here was the response: “AeroMexico complies to and is consistent with airline industry policies. Mr. Rogers was assisted in accordance to these policies through our Customer Service Department which searched for all options available to respond to this matter. AeroMexico strives to provide the best service possible and during our constant communication with our passenger, Mr. Rogers, the matter has been resolved satisfactorily.”

If all the options involved delays and obfuscation, I’d say that was a job well done.

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