Drollness

As I drove to the airport to pick up my father, I was very uneasy. I wasn’t sure if I would get there on time, because I had asked him to take a cab to a hotel close to the airport where I was relaxing because I got a little paranoid about a little chest pain that I had earlier in the day. The flight was scheduled to land at ten pm , but my call to the airline’s office disappointed me a little, by telling me that the flight was thirty minutes late.

I took a turn at the airports domestic terminal parking, and was stopped by a young lad who issued parking tickets. He yelled at me through my raised up window, “Sixty Rupees Only Sir” which tickled me enough to burst out laughing right in front of him. Only? Common, that’s thrice as much as I've paid anywhere in the city! After I paid him, he yelled again “turn right”. I was laughing so hard, he must have thought I'm retarded or something. Right was the only place I could turn, I didn’t see an alternative. I parked and got down to see this man backing his car, and had a ridiculous sound that shrieked out from his car every time he moved to the reverse gear. The man looked like a farmer, and the melody of ‘Old McDonald had farm’ had me in fits.

I walked straight to the pharmacy after that, and asked for a gelusil. Gelusil is a pill that is normally used for acidity, heart burn et al and does not need a doctor’s prescription. The guy looked at me and exclaimed that the Gelusil won’t do me any good if I had loose motions. I would have normally been really upset, as there was a group of other people also at the pharmacy there, but I didn’t. I giggled instead and asked him why he thought I had loose motion, he couldn’t give me an answer so I just took the pill and a bottle of water, paid and left still laughing.

I downed the pill and decided to take a walk as I had a lot of time to kill, while still convincing myself that I am not going to die of a heart attack. As I walked I noticed two kids, most likely brother and sister, playing with a luggage trolley. Another cute little girl nearby asked her father if she could play with them as well, to which he replied no. When she innocently asked him why not, he replied “because I am your father, and I say so. Don’t you know your father is as good as God?” I smiled at first, and then laughed; laughed at the inflated ego that man had inside him, and he had to show it off to his cute five year old daughter.

I walked up and down a few more times, until a security guard at an ATM asked me if I wanted to exchange ‘dollars’. I looked at him, no words coming out of my mouth. Did I look like I've just landed from foreign soil to him? Or did I look foreign to him? And what the hell was a security guy outside a cash machine doing running a currency conversion business on the side! As I looked at him, still speechless, he whispered to me, “best rate, forty-five rupees!” I didn’t know what to tell him, I just smiled when I wanted to laugh at him. What was the world coming to?

A group of cute airhostess and a Steward walked out of one of the reserved exists and walked straight to a cab waiting for them. The cab diver put the luggage in the boot and asked if they could leave to which the Steward said “We are waiting for pilot sir” pointing to a man standing and having a cup of coffee. The man was wearing a pair of red trousers and a pink full sleeved shirt, and looked like a little kid with no facial hair. Times may change, but standards must remain. A pilot should have long trousers; dark blue, a white shirt with half-sleeves, a packet of cigarettes showing through one of those two pockets on his shirt, a pair of aviator sun-glasses in the other, heavy arms and a mustache! This guy didn’t look like a pilot, but more like a clown. Oh, maybe he was part of the in-flight entertainment!

Now I had a little smirk on my face permanently, and was looking at the new domestic departure terminal with its fancy see through glasses. There was a man with a little baby in his arms, the baby was yelling “mummy mummy” and suddenly burst into tears. The mother was getting her luggage checked in, leaving the kid behind with what looked like the kids grandpa. The grandpa turned around and pointed out to a street dog on the pathway and said, “look! Doggy” at which the kid went quite and started smiling. But wait, what was a street dog doing on the marbonite pathway meant for humans at the ‘state-of-the-art’ airport? I guess they have dogs on the pathways so little babies don’t cry when their mothers leave!

The smirk just got wider; it was more of a grin by this time. I heard the announcement that the flight had landed. I walked a little fast and reached the arrivals section of the airport. I was leaning against a stainless steel railing when I saw a pretty lady, I think she was French cause she had an Air France sticker on her back-pack, walk up to this take away counter right in front of me. The place is called Sangeetha, and it’s a very popular vegetarian fast food joint with outlets all over the city. She leant forward towards the counter and asked if they had ‘Chicken Sandwiches”. The desk clerk replies in the negative and she leaves. A stout lady, who was standing there and eating something, leant forward and asked the clerk after the pretty French lady left, “DO YOU SERVE CHICKEN HERE?” A lot of Indians are purely vegetarian, and would not even eat vegetarian food from a place that also serves non-vegetarian food. Pretty French woman; can you not read? It says vegetarian there in big bold green letters! Stout Indian lady; Can you not hear? He did tell her that they didn’t serve chicken sandwiches there!

I was looking at the people that walked out with bags on their backs, some holding trolleys, seeing their loved ones and friends who had come to receive them, some people looking around at all the placards and then pointing a finger to the one that had their name on it. I noticed this one man; young, with bright clothes, looked as though he had flown into the city only to get himself into a discothèque. As he walked out, a lady waved to him, I can only presume that she was his wife. They walked straight to each other, and she asked him in a squeaky voice, speaking Hindi, “Do you remember what you promised me before you left?” To this he replied, “No, I don’t remember, what was it?” She asked, looking a little taken aback, “Don’t you remember, really?” He looked at her sternly and said, “I promise you a lot of things, but doesn’t mean I should remember all of them, should I?” I looked at them, and let out a loud “OUCH” with a grin on my face. They looked at me rather rudely and left!

As I waited there for my dad to pick his bags up and come out, two men walked towards me and stood on either side of me holding placards. Curiously, I read what the two placards had written on them. Weirdly enough, both the placards were for a Mr. Alan Smith, PLAMER. I looked at them both for a second, and then turned my attention to the passengers getting out of the airport. All of a sudden, the two men started yelling at each other while I was stuck in the middle. One was a driver from the hotel and the other was a company vehicle driver. In the middle of yelling and arguing with each other, they pulled out mobile phones, like as if they were signs of superiority, and called their respective bosses. Unfortunately for me, my dad walked out at the very moment and I had to leave. I can only imagine how that duel for that extra tip would have ended!

I have been to the airport a lot of times, I don’t think there’s ever been a week when I've not made at least one trip to the airport, but I've never noticed the humor all around me, maybe I wasn’t looking; maybe I was in a different world. But I realized one thing; that I am a happier man the last few weeks, and maybe that has opened my eyes and ears to the happenings around me. It feels good to be aware of my surroundings, to see humor in the little things in life, to smile and laugh when no ones looking and no one knows why. It feels good, life feels good…




Humor is the great thing, the saving thing. The minute it crops up, all our irritations and resentments slip away and a sunny spirit takes their place.