I Thought I Could Handle Anything. Then My Flight Got Delayed 24 Hours

It started off as the perfect end to a great holiday in Türkiye with my best friend.

I had an aisle seat with extra leg room (yassssss) and my husband said he was going to come and meet me at Changi for breakfast. I was seriously looking forward to some kopi c gao siew dai after two weeks of not having any.

Flying from Istanbul, I landed in Abu Dhabi for my connecting flight home. I said buh-bye to my bff (she was heading back to Kuala Lumpur) and strolled to find my boarding gate. I was feeling smugly comfortable, blissfully unaware that my flight home was about to become a 24-hour ultimate test of my patience.

Just me enjoying my dinner in the lounge, not knowing that in 2 hours I’m going to have a 24-hour ordeal. | IMAGE: GWEN TAY

How the nightmare unfolded

I was relaxing at the airport lounge in Abu Dhabi airport when I decided to check my email and delete some spam (as always). What caught me off guard was an email titled “Important information on your flight from Abu Dhabi”.

The news hit me like a wall of bricks. My flight has been delayed to the next morning due to “operational reasons”.

How can dis b allowed????

My initial reaction? Rage. I had already applied for an additional day of leave just so I can have extra time to wind down from my long trip. Now I’m gonna be landing in Singapore at night, which puts a spanner in the works.

If only I knew it was only gonna go downhill from there on.

Now what?

After I shot off a bunch of ranting texts to my husband in quick succession, I knew it was time to calm down and assess the situation. So, allow me to introduce you to Gwen’s makeshift 5-step guide to keeping your cool amidst a flight delay.

Step 1: Know your rights

The first thing I did was to search for the airline’s compensation policy when it comes to flight delays. This led me to a section on their website that addresses passenger rights when flying out of certain countries, such as the EU, US, Canada, Israel and even Thailand. No mention of UAE though. Hmph.

Ok, moving on.

Step 2: Check for alternative flight arrangements

If money is not an issue and your primary concern is to arrive home as soon as possible, you may want to check for alternative flights on other airlines, and seek recourse from the original airline you’re flying with subsequently.

In my case, there were no other flights departing the same night to Singapore, and choosing another flight that would just depart in the morning would not make any difference. (Like I said, blissfully unaware that it’s gonna be more waiting from there on).

Step 3: Seek help from customer service

After exhausting Step 1 and 2 without any success, I went looking for the airline’s customer service counter to check what sort of compensation I can get for this inconvenience.

The indifferent (but sufficiently polite) customer service officer offered me a dining voucher to be utilised at selective restaurants in the airport. Amazing.

I countered that the airline had only notified passengers at the very last minute of this delay, even though the reasons are not technical or safety-related. I mean, operational reasons? We were left to fend for ourselves and stay overnight in an airport.

At this point, she brought out the airline’s compensation policy which stated the airline has a right not to offer any compensation for any delay below 8 consecutive hours. Mine was just short of a whopping 10 minutes under that threshold. Whoop-dee-doo.

I had two choices: 1) stand in the queue and argue with airline staff who definitely didn’t make the rules, or 2) pay up, find a bed, and save my energy. Which leads me to step 4.

IMAGE: UNSPLASH

Step 4: Think of how to spend the night in an airport

If you’re like me and not having quality sleep turns you into a cranky queen, it’s best to find a hotel within the airport and spend the night there. Yes, it’s gonna cost more money - but it’s not like you get flight delays all the time. Don’t stress about costs that are out of your control. Besides, I also had travel insurance, which would help to mitigate the cost of the hotel.

But if the hotels have reached their full capacity or are just plainly charging an extortionate rate (mine was a decent $150 per night), you can try and get some shut-eye by using an airport lounge (which are either complimentary via selective credit cards, or you can pay a fee that’s still cheaper than a capsule hotel). Some of these lounges have private pods where you can rest your weary traveller bones for the night. Do check if there’s a limitation on how many hours you are entitled to in the lounge.

Step 5: Assess what is required for your travel delay insurance claim

After checking into my abode for the night and a de-stressing shower, I plopped down on the bed and started searching for the list of documents that my travel insurer would require for this travel delay claim. It’s essential to check this before you fly out, because it would be challenging to ask the airline for any extra documentation later. Save yourself the agony of getting your claim denied just because you don’t have the right documentation.

Round 2: Bargaining with the travel gods

The next morning, I dragged myself back to the departure gate, determined that this would finally be the day.

I had a new plan: manifest positivity. I even bought an overpriced Arabica coffee and told myself, “Everything’s going to be ok.”

As I approached the departure gate, there was some weird buzz of activity and noise around it. People gesticulating wildly. Uncertainty etched on the faces of many fellow passengers. Please don’t tell me…

Yep, it’s another delay. This time due to technical reasons. I wanted to almost throw my head back and laugh at the absurdity of the situation.

The ground staff promised an update once every hour, but the same reason came back every time - the technicians are still working on the plane. This was my second lesson in keeping calm: find small comforts and lower your expectations.

If you’re expecting a nightmare, you’ll at least be mentally prepared. I stopped checking the time and started focusing on what I could do. I utilised the dining voucher that they gave the day before and caught up on The Ed Gein Story on Netflix. Nothing like learning about psychopathic serial killers to pass the time, eh?

Finally, after 3 hours, the airline announced that the flight was cancelled and everyone would be rebooked on another flight and given hotel accommodation for the day.

Acceptance of the situation

By the time the second delay rolled into another hotel stay (this time paid for by the airline, with a buffet lunch) I had reached a strange state of calm. The kind where you’ve been so frustrated for so long that your brain just… shuts down from giving up.

That’s when I realised another secret to staying cool: lean into the absurdity.

It sounds weird, but once I started treating the situation like a ridiculous travel comedy, you know, the kind where the main character keeps missing flights and mutters “of course this would happen,” I actually felt lighter. I started laughing at how ridiculous it all was. Like, at least this would make a great story later, right? I’m writing it now!

Humour, I learned, is a powerful coping mechanism. It’s hard to stay angry when you’re busy mocking the situation. I sent multiple memes that encapsulated my situation to my husband, my best friend and even a colleague at work whom I was supposed to meet in person the next day before this whole delay fiasco.

IMAGE: UNSPLASH

Finally, home

When I finally boarded the plane the next day, over 24 hours later, I didn’t care about the extra leg room anymore. I didn’t even care about the meal choices. I just wanted the wheels to leave the ground.

When the plane finally landed in Singapore, I texted my husband: “Just landed.” I’ve never been so relieved to type two words in my life.

The real takeaway

I wish I could say I discovered inner peace or a newfound love for mindfulness.

But really, all I learned was that sometimes keeping your cool just means not losing it completely.

Because here’s the truth: delays happen, and you can’t always control them. But you can control how much space you let frustration take up in your head. Sometimes that means lowering your expectations. Sometimes it means laughing through the chaos. And sometimes it just means taking a deep breath, buying that overpriced latte, and reminding yourself — you’ll get home eventually.

Would I ever fly that airline again? Absolutely not. But at least now, I know I can survive 24 hours of travel hell without turning into the person screaming at the counter.

And that, I suppose, counts as growth.

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