Jill Rees: Welcome Press

Travelling isn’t what it used to be. In fact, it isn’t ANYTHNG like what it used to be

A hundred years ago, the poet Lord Byron set out from Dover without a passport. Like all good Englishmen (and adoptive Englishmen), his word was his bond.   In Turkey, he became an expert in Armenian history and culture, and fought for their independence against the Ottomans. He then went on to Greece, where he became a national hero leading the Resistance Army against the Ottomans. In Greece, he is remembered and adored to this day, despite being a pariah of immorality in his adoptive homeland, the UK.  Even as an Enemy of the State, and known rebel, he passed unimpeded at the frontiers.

Today we are all treated like, not even common criminals, but potential terrorists. I am getting fed up with having to half-undress before increasingly rude airport staff. Of course I realise that it is worse for them than it is for my poor naked self.

If you suggest any objection to this sort of treatment of course you are automatically branded as a terrorist sympathiser by the officials, police and your fellow passengers. As an enemy of the US and a threat to all mankind, life can only get harder for you.  You are regarded as a threat to liberty, when surely the threat to liberty is this very treatment you are being indiscriminately meted out with? Indeed, it is liberty that the whinger is defending.

It’s not the actual checking I object to. Obviously, as has so often been pointed out to me along my travels by shameless fellow travellers with their trousers hanging around their bottoms and no shoes, but holding their belts in their left hand, ‘It’s better that being blown up’, but why do they have to be so rude?

When a woman of a certain age, in possession of what can only be termed a ‘muffin’ waist, is obliged to lift up her top, revealing her worst attribute to a line of impatient businessmen, singularly yet suddenly aware that her belly button hasn’t been visible since the birth of her third child and probably wasn’t cleared of fluff in the morning rush to get ready either, she feels vulnerable. This is not the moment to slap a box in front of her face and demand that she puts all her keys, mobile phone, jewellery etc into it. You have to do all this standing on one leg, because you have to take your shoes off, but not every time, so do you wait to be asked or get them off ready? And what about when it is raining and the airport floor is all muddy?

Next the laptop computer, which is potentially a terrorist tool, apparently, and they now tell me has to be sent through the laser machine separately. I have to go back.  Several police with guns are now shouting at me, and I have to keep repeating to myself the British Empire mantra we use for such circumstances, ‘They are only Johnny Foreigner, remember they are only Johnny Foreigner’, the idea being to maintain one’s appearance of superiority at all costs. This is when my trousers fall down.

This may be a suitable juncture to bring up the subject of middle-aged women’s underwear, a subject I have been hoping to discuss in my article for some time but am usually unable to find a relevant spot for it. I have been travelling for a long time, and all the items I possess are quite old, including my underwear. This morning, having given some serious thought for several days and nights a to the ageing process and what it means to women, especially in terms of what it is reasonable for us to wear and how we should present ourselves to the world, I decided to put on my most shabby, short-like, thick cotton dark maroon-and-grey underwear, whose colours, originally quite dull, had become most unremarkable.  Although from the well-respected purveyor of serious and aged people’s undies, Marks and Spencers, they didn’t look like the kind of public image I wanted to project at that moment, when I was trying to appear in control of my destiny and humour.

There was a time only black people got treated like this. How often had I in the past walked by while my darker-skinned brothers (but never sisters, why is that?) were subjected to ritual humiliation and body searches, so I suppose it is a good thing that we are all equally disdained nowadays.

However while waiting in this airport lounge as my flight is delayed further and further because of the sunny clear weather conditions in the UK which caught everyone by surprise, I have thought of another solution. While agreeing that we all have to be body-searched etc to save us all from evil terrorists, why don’t we decide to treat each other with respect and politeness? It wouldn’t cost anything to just relax people, already nervous and tired, by a pleasant and calming word. Something along the lines of,

‘Don’t worry.  Take your time, Madam, we appreciate your efforts to co-operate,’ or

‘Thank you so much for taking such care to help us maintain everyone’s safety and security for the flight.’

Everyone knows that when you shout at a child, they become inept and clumsy and start dropping things. It’s the same with adults, especially in the position of inferiority to all-powerful officials who, let’s remember, have been known to imprison, torture and release without charge innocent people in recent times. This means that we too, who after all are only trying to go on holiday or help the cause of  international trade with our companies, tend to drop things when we become frightened, not least our trousers. Let’s keep everyone calm and feeling in control by a change of attitude.

Thinking about this, it would be nice if we expanded it outside airports too. Imagine a world where everyone was calm, polite, respectful, helpful and caring. How well we would act, how wonderfully we would feel able to try harder and fulfil our potential, how hard we would work for a boss who treated us like this. A boss who says thank you, maybe occasionally even please, it doesn’t bear dreaming of, so far is it from the much less pleasant reality of our daily lives.

As I took back my laptop with one hand, holding onto my trousers with the other, the airport guy laughed and thanked me.

‘It’s not easy‘, I laughed back,’ When your trousers are falling down’.  There was a moment of relaxedness, and even the nasty woman (for there is always a nasty woman behind these things) almost smiled.  So to anyone travelling this week I wish you bon voyage, and an elasticated waistband.

1,148 words

Jill Rees

© 13 September 2008

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Tags: air travel, airport security, departure checks, respect, Travel, treatment at airports