insert punchline here.

It's mostly just miserable. I have a standby ticket through my dad, who works for swissair but the flight is on lufthansa technically through code-sharing and business arrangements. I'm very used to doing this sort of thing in the States but here it's a trial. How do you say "list myself on a flight"? Or at least distinguish it from "buying a ticket" or "making a reservation"?

What's more is that Swiss is the only airline out of the two (Swiss and Lufthansa) that I can find a phone number for online and since the flight is Lufthansa the Swiss people can't help.

To complicate matters I have no idea when my retarded European cell phone is going to run out of minutes and just stop functioning. I'll have fun trying to find an open tabac on the day after freaking Paques.

Life...who can pretend to understand even one little minute of it?

"I'd like to reserve a seat" is just:
"Ich mochte ein Platz reservieren, bitte."
(Eesh mershta ein Platz reserveeren, bitta)

"My father works for SwissAir":
"Mein Vater ist bei SwissAir Angestellte."

"Who does one have to blow around here to get a fucking seat on that plane?"
"Welchen Schwanz muss meinem Mund besuchen um einen Platz auf den verdammten Flugzeug bekommen?!?" (literally "which cock must visit my mouth...")

Good luck. (viel gluck)

This leg was in French actually. Even though it was Lufthansa, it was at the Marseille airport so this one worked out. Your phrases will come in majorly handy in a few days though when I'm trying to figure out how to get back. Or hopefully someone will just speak English or French or Armenian or something.

All airline reservations offices have English speaking agents. Shouldn't be a problem.

You don't need to throw around your Dad's name--they'll know you're on an industry-reduced ticket by your reservation or your fare code.

yeah but when i'm on the phone trying to explain what i need to do and i don't know the word for it. it's just to explain that this is a ticket that is gotten through an employee. when i didn't adequately explain it the first time someone tried to sell me a ticket.

and it's not like it matters who my dad is. he's a flight dispatcher, not Swiss king or something. it's not to gain any favour, just the to make the situation easier to explain. they don't see what kind of ticket i have on the phone.

Tell that to the LanChile at the mall in Santiago.

The mall is a City Ticket Office, quite different from Reservations.