How Terrorists Saved Amtrak

I have tried for years to support trains in the US usually with abysmal results. I was on a train that was 23 hours late, I had a friend get a concussion from the rough ride over the tracks on the supposedly successful route from New York to Philadelphia. Thus, Amtrak did not come to mind for a trek from Chicago to Indianapolis. Until the airlines went a step too far.

I am still an American. I have a blue passport. I talk midwestern standard. I move faster than Europeans and require more interpersonal distance, and so I thought I understood Americans. I thought it would be simple to flight from Chicago to Indianapolis. My blue passport, midwestern standard dialect, and American bank account were scunnered by a foreign billing address.

Travelocity, American Airlines on phone and online, and United Airlines online all refuse to accept a card that has a billing address outside the United States. After many annoying conversations and frustrating gaps in responses, I turned to Amtrak. They have an automated operator whose artificial intelligence worked better than that of the carbon-based life forms. The conversations with the carbon units reminded me of two of my most annoying phrases:

1. This is really for your protection...

and

2. I even asked a supervisor if there was anything we could do.

Now I could have used someone else's charge card or gone to the counter and paid in cash. But on top of not being able to cope with a foreign mailing address, the airlines required me to be at the airport an hour and a half in advance of my one-hour flight and charged me $10 extra per ticket for the privilege of talking to a human who told me my tickets were confirmed and then left me hanging in limbo waiting for e tickets that did not arrive. On top of that the tickets would have cost nearly $400.

And on Amtrak I can knitting needles on board with me.