[Read]...Airports

‘I don’t like airports. They take people away’. So said a young boy in the book, ‘Two Weeks in another Town’. I am on all fours with this boy who had seen his loved ones depart via the airports. (Although it can be argued that airports also bring people home).
I envy my friends who look forward to trips outside the country and count the days in anticipation. Even the dreary chores of checking in, going through immigration and boarding, can not take away the pleasure they derive from meeting new and old faces, and window shopping in between flights.
A friend told me that his feet become lighter as soon as he knows he is due to travel. But the peak of it according to him, is when the plane taxies off and begins to gain height. It is as if he has left all his burdens behind. The sigh that escapes from his lips is that of relief and anticipatory pleasure.
While I also count the days before a trip, it is in the hope that the cup will quickly pass away. Yet, for all my reluctance, I have indeed clocked more than decent air miles, starting from my reportorial days when I travelled extensively in the line of work.

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The airport is the first contact a traveller makes with a country, and it is possible for me to differentiate a third world country from a developed one, or a country struggling with its economy just by passing through the airport. I am sure other people have their barometers but for me, the air seems heavier and warmer, some fittings in the arrival halls are out of place or missing, and the officers are more lethargic. They are also either belligerent or obsequious.
Recently, I have had to visit more than ten international airports in as many weeks — not a small feat for someone who likes to stay at home. One thing is clear. More efforts are being made in many airports to satisfy travellers like me who are uncomfortable at airports. Checking in is quicker and friendlier with little or no waiting time. Same thing with immigration and baggage claim where you hardly ever stop for more than ten minutes at any point. Long walks at huge airports have also been minimised with trains that take you from point A to B. And the changes are sometimes fast and furious. At an airport I visited last year, the self-check in computer was optional. This year, it was mandatory. More automation.
It is with this in mind that I welcome the changes at our airports, especially the Murtala Mohammed International Airport with which I am familiar. But the upgrading I see does not even take us near where the others were some 20 years ago. A lot still needs to be done to create the ambience that other airports take for granted. It is still hot, claustrophobic and dishevelled. Directions are also lacking — a black foreigner had once lined up with Nigerians only to find out after 30minutes, that he was on the wrong queue.
And why the queue for Nigerians? Why can’t there be more officers treating Nigerians so they don’t have to wait to enter their own country? How come countries where planes take off and land every two seconds have faster immigration and custom services than we do? And why do we still have two officers seating together to treat the same passport? This was the practice I met some 40 years ago when I made my maiden foreign trip. And why do we have to wait for over an hour to collect our luggages even when only one flight has landed?
I brought in a golf bag a month ago and had to wait until all the luggages had come out before I was told it would not come through the belt. Again, I had to ask around before I found it — with other similar luggages — in a locked room. The owners huddled together, waiting for the person with the key to saunter in. A traveller had to wonder why they were treating the luggages as illegal or contaminated items to be locked away without any information.
Clearly the upgrading at our airports must go beyond brick and mortar.
Still on air travel, I was just a few hours to a trip to the UK last year June 3, when a distress call came in that a plane had crashed and some people could still be saved if help came quickly. I spent the next couple of hours in a blur, making phone calls and packing until confirmation came that no life was saved. I was about to board when an email came in with the list of those who died. It was all I could do not to scream when I saw names of people I knew.
I can only imagine what their families had gone through during the past year and how the incident would have affected their relationship with God and humanity.
It is disheartening therefore, a year later, that these people had not been paid their due and the official report of the crash, not published.
Dana, Federal Government or whoever, please do what is right and let these people have some closure.

-Muyiwa Adetiba

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