This is OT-ish because it's not actually *A related. But I think it's a good story.

We used to work in the Gulf. One year when we went home on repat we took Czech Air because they had a very nice fare BAH-PRG-HEL in C. As I recall, the business class luggage allowance was 30 kg. but our bags were bulging and the four of them totaled 72 or 74 kg., something like that. Nevertheless, the check-in man just smiled and put 'heavy' tags on the suitcases, and that was that. (They had a reputation for being ... generous ... with things like that.)

By coincidence an acquaintance of ours was on the same Prague flight. During our stopover at PRG, we ran into him. He was killing time, pushing around a trolley with a suitcase and a carry-on, waiting for the check-in for his connection to London to open. 'What's with the suitcase?' we asked. 'Oh', he said. 'My travel agent recommended that I collect the bag here and check it in again. Less chance of it getting "lost", which is apparently a big problem here'.

O-K. Our travel agent never said anything like that to us but ... c'est la vie, eh? However, the funny part was still to come. A couple of hours later on our way from the lounge to our gate, we bumped into this chap again. The trolley was gone, he had only his carry-on -- and he was spitting mad. 'What's wrong?' we asked. He replied, 'When I checked in, they said my suitcase was overweight -- and I had to pay $100!'



cheers,

Henry