paint your faith

Planes, Trains and Automobiles instead...NOT

So what a week it has been.  On Saturday we started to learn that airports were starting to close all across Europe.  The Volcano eruption in Iceland was not only affecting thousands of passengers who were trying to get home but more importantly it was about to affect us. Faith47 our artist from Capetown, South Africa was suppose to be on a plane on Tuesday to Vancouver connecting through Frankfurt in Germany.  The Frankfurt airport was closed until further notice on the weekend, and we were now faced with the potential reality Faith47 would not be coming to Canada and creating her section of the wall and missing the artist gallery event at Ayden Gallery http://www.aydengallery.com/ this Saturday, April 24th.

We reached out to the travel agent in Capetown but because of the time difference we just missed the office closing on Saturday.  Email after email, voice message after voice message we called them to try and get us alternate flights.  Well airports finally opened early Tuesday however the flights are so backed up that it would be weeks before things got back to normal in Europe and specifically Frankfurt which was our connecting airport to Canada.

The travel agents in Capetown, said they would get back to us but they never really did, they never came back with any alternates and at the end of the day they never came through for us.  At that moment, I decided that enough was enough and I was determined to get Faith47 to Canada and to be a part of this.  It is Tuesday and Faith47 is not coming.  The ramifications of her not arriving would be tremendous.  How can we do her section without her, could we get another artist to do it who would keep the same them, would the city of vancouver allow us to alter the image since it was approved based on the draft we submitted. We even thought of maybe bringing her back in June to finish her section on her own, but that really didn’t make any sense.  Trying to find an alternate artist really would have been difficult because of the various factors like paint, right fit with other artists, and so on and so on.

Always have a back up plan and another back up plan.  That’s what they tell you in school, in workshops and what you learn along the way in the business of events production and marketing.  Well how do you have a back up plan when the world is in a bit of massive travel chaos and the airlines aren’t answering the phones, the travel agents aren’t responding and your artist is not feeling good about the situation for a variety of reasons, and probably doesn’t want to travel because of what is going on.  I don’t own a private jet, the continents aren’t connected by bridges or underground tunnels, and they don’t make boats that can get her fast enough.

We had to find a way to get her.   Well, one the most important part of this business is your partners, the people you choose to support, supply, and help you when you need it most.  A good supplier is not just about giving you a good product but more importantly the service when you get it, or don’t get it, or need it right away.

I reached out to my best friend Ryan Cresswell from FCMTravel in Chicago http://www.us.fcm.travel/eng/home.html, yes Chicago, not Toronto, not Vancouver but a travel specialist who is a wizard with finding flights, times and getting you to wherever you need to get in any circumstance. It is not the fact he is my best friend but he is a true professional and cares.  We knew the travel agent in Capetown was not going to come through, we needed alternate flights and options so we searched and searched and searched and it was not looking good.

So far things had been running smoothly assembling and piecing this project together.  We got the artists we wanted, we got the wall we wanted, our doc was going to happen, we arrived in Vancouver and things got off smoothly and we were a few days away from getting up on the wall.  This was just going to be such a huge set back.

We never gave up and our first search found some flights through the USA and the pricing wasn’t too bad.  We knew we would get a full refund back from Luftansa so we knew what we could afford in order to fix the situation and get Faith47 to Canada.  Well, the flights through the USA wouldn’t work because we needed a transit VISA to go through the USA from South Africa and even though Faith47 has a British Passport and living in South Africa it wouldn’t matter.  We needed 72 hours to apply for one and do the whole waiver thing but that would mean she would come on the weekend or maybe Monday if we got it approved. There was no way we could go through the USA it was now not an option.

So now it is not looking good.  Ryan kept searching and he came up with flights through South America, prices were fine, all look good but the return dates had to be May 2nd.  Well, Faith47 has a project in Europe around May 8 and she was going to be away from her family for over 10 days which wasn’t cool and this flight pattern was not going to work.  Totally understandable and we now had to look for another flight that could work.

For a few hours it seemed pretty dire.  A million thoughts were going through my head, I called Indigo to get her opinion, I ran through 10 different scenarios.  I kept the United Church of Canada key stakeholders up to speed throughout the entire situation and I was as transparent as possible.  They understood the situation and realized we had to do whatever we could do to bring Faith47 to Canada.

Well after hours and hours of trying we did find a flight that could possibly work, but this flight pattern is a travel itinerary from hell.  It would involve over 40 hours of travel from South Africa to Canada, Faith47 would connect through four cities, travel through four continents and it would just be nasty.  At first we thought this just would be nuts to do, but both Faith47 and I have done these flights before and they are possible to handle but not fun. After discussions with the United Church of Canada, Ryan at FCMTravel and most importantly Faith47, Faith47 said she would do the flights as long as it could get her back home before May 1st or on May 1st.

Not too many people would do this type of flight and I really think she is a pretty amazing person for agreeing to come based on this flight. Had she said no we would have understood and there was really nothing we could do because no one anticipated this Volcano eruption and how it would affect the world.

We can’t thank Faith47 enough for doing this and really stepping up to make it here.  Check out this flight pattern and time she will take to get here.  5:00 am flight from Capetown to Johannesberg, then layover and flight to Sao Paulo, Brazil, layover and then a flight to Mexico City, Mexico, then a layover and then a flight to Vancouver.  She will be traveling for about 40 hours and will arrive in Vancouver this Thursday evening at 11 pm.

If there is a will there is a way and we made it happen.  She is on her way here, she will be a few days late but everyone is ready, prepared and timing will be tight, but she will be able to make the best of such a messed up situation.  Her accepting this new itinerary was truly up to her and again I can’t say how pleased and excited we are to have her again with us.