The Complaint

Ana had planned her trip to Ireland for almost a year. She was going to spend two weeks walking along the west coast, from Galway to Kerry, and she had packed everything carefully: waterproof boots, a good jacket, three novels and a small notebook for her drawings. When she landed in Dublin, however, her suitcase did not appear on the belt. After forty minutes at the lost luggage desk, a tired young man looked at his screen and frowned. "Your bag is safe," he said. "It's in Reykjavik."

It took six days for the suitcase to reach her, by which time she had bought a second pair of boots, a second jacket and an umbrella she did not like. When she got home to Zaragoza, she sat down at her kitchen table, opened her laptop and wrote the most formal letter of her life.

"Dear Sir or Madam," it began. "I am writing to complain about the service I received on flight 742 from Madrid to Dublin on 3 May. On arrival, I was informed that my luggage had been sent to Iceland. I would be grateful if you could explain how such an error occurred. Furthermore, I would like to request a refund of the expenses I was forced to pay, for which I enclose receipts. I look forward to hearing from you. Yours faithfully, Ana Ruiz."

She read it three times, felt rather proud of the word "furthermore", and sent it. She expected an automatic reply, or nothing at all. Instead, ten days later, she received a letter from someone called Fergus O'Neill, Customer Relations.

The first paragraph was perfectly professional. The airline apologized for the inconvenience, confirmed that her expenses would be refunded in full and offered her a voucher for a future flight. But the second paragraph was different. "On a personal note," Fergus wrote, "I would like to say that I have never seen a complaint written so politely. Most people who write to me use a lot of capital letters. I hope your suitcase enjoyed its holiday. It saw a volcano, which is more than I have done."

Ana laughed out loud. She wrote back, this time in a very different style. "Hi Fergus, thanks for the refund, and for making me laugh. To be fair, the suitcase came back looking very relaxed. I, on the other hand, spent a week in boots that were two sizes too big. Have you really never been to Iceland? It's only a couple of hours away!"

His answer came a few days later. He had never been anywhere, he admitted. He had worked for the airline for nineteen years, helping thousands of people with their journeys, but he was afraid of flying. He lived in a small town near Cork with his elderly mother and spent his free time doing jigsaw puzzles and reading about places he would probably never visit. He asked her what the west coast was like. Had she seen the Cliffs of Moher?

So Ana told him. She sent him photos of her drawings, the cliffs, a pub in Dingle, a sheep that had followed her for half a mile. In return, he told her about his mother's garden, the gossip in his town and the strangest complaints he had received, without names, of course. Their messages became longer and more frequent. She corrected his Spanish, which he had started to learn from an app. He corrected the formal letters she had to write for her job, crossing out phrases like "I want" and replacing them with "I would appreciate".

Two years after the lost suitcase, Ana received an envelope with an Irish stamp. Inside there was a photograph of a middle-aged man standing in front of a large waterfall, looking pale but very pleased with himself. On the back, he had written: "Iceland. Three hours in the air and I didn't scream once. My mother says it's your fault. Next stop: Zaragoza?"

Ana wrote back immediately. She did not begin with "Dear Sir or Madam".