The Morris Family Holiday Part 2 – The Airport
This entry about our family holiday starts and finishes before the end of the last post. Which means that we are all still talking as no one has left the lift passes at home.
We are all in the car heading for the airport and the time is four am. We are five minutes into the journey and the excitement of going on holiday has already subsided. Reality has dawned on the family as my wife has accidently leaked the travel itinerary.
“Three hours before the flight! The Check in won’t even be open”
“Three hours allowed for a 2 hour car journey!”
“Can I have some sweets?”
The reason for my annoyance stems from my time spent in airports before I had the fortune of becoming a parent. If a place was represented by the free shot that is given away, then an airport, like a Mint Baileys, is bland with a hint of disappointment. It is far away from the Tequila slammer of a destination you are headed to. It was this that made me think that children shouldn’t be exposed to airports with their giant extractor fans that seem to only extract the excitement of going on holiday.
As I had been resolved of all responsibility for the holiday, including the driving, I have been given the job of entertainments manager, or EM as we call it in the business. This is a role that I am not very keen to embrace. I start by turning Radio Three on and start to read my holiday book. No one else finds this fun, so I try Radio One. I don’t find this fun. I suggest a game of eye spy. After two disputed rounds there is coup from the back seat. There is only one thing worse than being given the position or EM and that’s loosing the position as EM.
I am asked to present my manifesto to the family, they will then vote to see if I am allowed to keep my job as EM.
“Many years ago I thought that airports and travelling to a destination was not something for families. It was my belief that it was too miserable for children to go through. But my pledge to you is to make the travelling to the destination part of the holiday”. The next few hours flew by as I demonstrated exactly how good an Entertainment Manager I could be.
We arrived at the airport 2 hours before the desk was due to open. It was clear that I would have to take my role as EM
up a gear. Over the next 2 hours we would be told off by 12 officials and 3 other tourists. Here is a list of the things that we got told off for: Playing football in the car park; playing football in the drop of area, playing football on a moving walk way; inappropriate language; impersonating passport control; playing hide and seek around the check in desks; trolley stunt display and wheelchair racing. It was during the last event that a security guard decided he had had enough. He called the airport manager.
“Do you want to go on holiday?”
“Yes…I was…”
“An Airport is a place you come to before the holiday. It is not the destination.”
We queued at the check in desk in silence and under supervision. Once checked in and doubting that our bags would make the journey we were about to, we made our way to passport control. We finally made it through to air side after a very thorough security check.
“Would you like to sample a Mint Baileys Sir?
“I’ll take a bottle”
