Still excited about my next airport of call...
Dipping into The Best of AA Gill last weekend, I was really taken with the late writer’s piece on airports – largely, I suppose, because I agree with him. ‘Airports,’ he wrote. ‘You’ve got to love them. No, really. You have got to love them. At least you must learn to appreciate them. If you don’t, life will be a constant dung sarnie of places you want to be, sandwiched between termini of frustration and worry, boredom and fury.’ How right he was. Most people I know hate airports. All those queues, the hassle, the overpriced food, the scramble at the departure gates, the eejits ahead of you in the security queue who only start taking off their coats and their belts and stuffing their liquids into a bag when they get to the actual security table.
Me? I love airports, and even if the experience isn’t always ideal, I still feel excited once I walk through the terminal doors, be that in Dublin to take off to somewhere, or in a foreign airport, either to come home, or to transit to somewhere further flung.
It’s all part and parcel, I suppose, of that old Robert Louis Stevenson dictum that it is better to travel hopefully than to arrive. I don’t quite agree with that, mind you – arriving somewhere new, after all, is such a wonderful experience. But I also value the getting there, and that, of course, means that the airport experience is crucial.
I’ve written a paean to Dublin Airport here before, so I’m not going to repeat myself, except to say that I still rate it highly – both in how it functions so efficiently (from parking your car to stepping onto the aircraft), and also in terms of the quality and attitude of the staff. (They should send the staff from Stansted and Israel’s Ben Gurion for a few lessons under the auspices of the DAA. God knows both those airports are sorely lacking in the courtesy department.)
I can’t really explain why I don’t get stressed going through airports, but I just don’t. I love the hustle and bustle and the people-watching. I love buying newspapers and pottering around the shops. I love arriving at the gate and seeing the destination on the board, confirming that, yes, in just a few hours I will be in Madrid or Chicago or Abu Dhabi or wherever.
Although I have travelled through countless airports in my time, I can still picture the layout of many of them and still have memories that are specific to particular times in those specific spaces.
It’s like a word association game.
Say Milan-Malpensa to me and I say AC Milan. For while waiting there for a domestic Italian flight late at night a couple of days before Christmas in 1995, the famous soccer team were also waiting for their delayed flight. They certainly added a touch of glamour to the proceedings – especially, I seem to recall, in the specific shapes of Roberto Baggio and Tomas Locatelli!
Say Helsinki and I think of my first time there and my introduction to the experience of the Perspex smoking box, an extraordinary sight in the midst of the most pristine of airports, with transit passengers all displayed for all to see, puffing furiously and filling the box-like room with smoke.
Say Mumbai and it’s the shedlike structure and the antiquated baggage carousel that springs to mind – and the lovely airport staff who couldn’t have been more helpful when I landed after one in the morning.
Some airports simply offer a more pleasant environment than others but all, to me, have an individuality that makes them appealing. In Charles de Gaulle you might well have to walk for miles to get anywhere but there’s still something special about being in one of the most famous airports in the world.
In Venice Treviso, the airport itself is somewhat lacking in Italian style, but you walk off the plane, through the baggage area, out the door and onto the bus – five minutes does it. Definitely a plus.
Dubai airport is like a shopping centre and, like the place itself, all a bit much for my taste, but still a fascinating airport and one that functions really well. I can still picture one of the bars there, so opulent and spacious that you almost forgot that you were in an airport at all.
On Mahé in the Seychelles, meanwhile, the international airport is relatively small and not particularly interesting but its location is wonderful – right on the edge of the sea. So say Mahé airport to me and I say Indian Ocean. It’s what defines it.
It’s not just about the buildings, of course. Airports are about people. All those people heading, at a precise time, to myriad destinations, for countless different reasons, speaking different languages, and all with their own stories.
I always make a beeline for the departures board – all those places, some you’ve seen, some you haven’t. And there they all are, temptingly displayed before your very eyes.
Sometimes if I’m flying to one place, I suddenly wish that I was going to another. It’s all about that itch you know will one day simply have to be scratched. That’s what airports mean to me.
So now, with 2018 stretching ahead, let’s bring them on!