Around 8pm on our last night in Waikiki, we tried to return our rental car, but the place we needed to go was on fire. The streets were packed with diverted traffic, impatient police officers, fire trucks, and slews of slack-jawed tourists. There were lights and water and sirens everywhere as fire trucks attempted to manage the three alarm blaze. We circled a five block radius again and again, trying to find some back way in to the rental car place as though a hazard to health and safety could not prevent us from getting our car returned on time. Rental car companies, as you probably know, are notorious for sticking you with (among other things) fees for late returns or dropping the car at the wrong place.
Phone calls to the rental car HQ didn’t help. “We’re aware of the issue,” said the trying to be helpful person on the line. She instructed me to take the car to another rental car company nearby who’d agreed to help out. Except. “Oh, yeah, you’re in the right location,” said the valet in front of the hotel, “but that desk closed at three today. No one’s been here for hours and hours.”
Back at our hotel at the Kapiolani Park end of Waikiki, there was no traffic, no noise, no smoke. The rental car agent on the phone (this was call number four) finally conceded that yeah, it made sense for me to return the car to the airport the following day and he’d recommend – but could not guarantee – that the fees be waived. I took a deep breath. I turned on the TV to see if I could learn more about what happened, but the only local news I could find was a replay of the earlier 6pm news. In Korean.
The next morning, we drove to the airport where we could not find the rental car return place. We circled the airport three times and asked the guys at the suggested other company if they’d take our car because, hey, that’s what the trying to be helpful agent told us to do last night. “No, no, no, your place is over there, outside the airport. You gotta head out thataway, you’ll see it underneath the Nimitz, just past the gas station.” We’d given ourselves plenty of time, but truth be told, I was getting kind of tense. Rather, I had a tension hangover from last night.
The gal at the desk gave me the fisheye. “What fire?” she said. “I didn’t see a thing about it.” I picked up the newspaper that was on the desk in front of her and lo and behold, there was Not One Word about the fire on the front page. Not one. She gave me that teeth-gritting smile and asked me to wait while she whispered questions to her associate. Our paperwork was shuffled over to the office. We waited some more. A shuttle came, loaded up some passengers and left again. “She hates us,” I thought. It was early. I had not had coffee yet.
I’m sure it was not ten minutes before she came back out, but it seemed like much longer. I kept flipping through the newspaper, wondering why there was nothing on the fire that stalled the center of Waikiki’s tourist district last night. Nothing. I found this increasingly aggravating. “You’re all set,” she said, and handed me the receipt. “This is the same as if you’d returned the car downtown last night. Thanks – the shuttle should be along in about five minutes.”
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Here’s a report about the not imaginary fire on Oahu’s channel 9. And FYI, if you click through to the notorious rental car fee article, you’ll find one about “the needle not quite on F.” We got tagged for that by Dollar on Moloka’i , though the desk clerk immediately reversed the fee when we handed her the receipt for topping up the tank not 10 minutes before our arrival at the airport. Hold on to those gas receipts, comrades!