Step 1: Buy Ticket

Sounds easy, right? Go online, search flights, select flight, purchase flight, and you're done. Well, not so much.

For starters since I am flying to Ouagadougou via Royal Air Morroc getting my ticket online was not a option. No biggie, I'll call. Ring-ring. Press 1 for English. And then low and behold someone whose first language is not English picks up the phone. Oh well, we'll get through this. Pick the flight, give the credit card number and my vitals and then right as I am starting to say "Thank you" I get the email confirmation. Oh no. My name is now Kay/Crista Lee. I tell the nice man on the phone that he spelled my name wrong and his response is that I told him to spell it that way, this is what came to pass:

"My name is spelled with a K, as in kite"
"Right, K as in charlie"
"No, not C, K like in kite, not charlie"
"Ok, so it is K-C-R-I.."
"No, just K, no C"
"Right, K as in charlie"
"No, K as in kite, same as my last name. Both are spelled with K not C"
"Mame, you are being very difficult"

Low and behold ten minutes later I had a ticket in the name of Kay/Krista Lee. Yea!
End of story....

Not so much.
Day 2. The next morning I open my email to find a nice message saying that me card had been declined. Call the bank. Find out they but a hold on my account because it was a large amount. They didn't think it was necessary to let me know they put a hold on my account, but at least after going through and verifying my last 20 transactions they lifted the hold. Hang up. call airlines. Press 1 for English. Tell them to run the card again and we'll be good. Before I hang up I am informed I will receive an email in the next 30 minutes confirming everything went through. Wait 30 minutes, no email. 1 hour, no email. 2 hours, no email. Decide to check my bank account online. And guess what, the are 2, yes 2 not 1, charges listed as pending in my account and yes when this goes through my account will be in the hole by over $500. Time to start worrying. Call the airlines, press 1, all representatives are currently busy, and after 5 minutes the line goes dead. Call the airlines again, press 1, all representatives are currently busy, 5 minutes, and dead. Wait an hour. Call the airlines, same thing. Another hour, call the airlines, and wait I finally get through. Unfortunately the very nice lady on the phone proved she really didn't know too much when she got to the point of agreeing with me that yes Royal Air Morroc would pay all my bank overdraft fees. I hung up.

Day 3. Decide to call the bank and tell them to only let one of the charges go through. So I open my online account to get the phone number, and am shocked to see that both of the charges have disappeared. Yea, no overdraft fee, but wait, do I still have a ticket? Check online with the the airlines and yes there's my ticket number and my seat reservations. So free ticket? Do I call the airlines? Do I call the bank? Decide to wait.

Day 4. Check my bank account. My ticket has been charged and has gone through. Well, no free ticket but at least it's all taken care. On to Burkina.

Lesson learned: Just because you press 1 for English, it doesn't mean the person on the other line actually speaks it.