excerpts from Vancouver International

the well read traveller

Today while cleaning my room I came across a collection of notebooks that contained some random musings from the past few years. One such notebook (with Tintin and Snowy on the cover no less) featured a page of my observations written during a long stop over in Vancouver International airport. Reading what I had written quickly made me recall that particular stopover in Vancouver. I think I was on my way home from a training session in Kelowna and I had to wait many hours between my flight from Kelowna to Vancouver and my flight from Vancouver to Fort St. John.

Here it is for the archives...

How Best to Describe the Experience of Waiting

You sit and seats fill up next to you. Periodically annoucements come up over the loudspeaker and the bustle of activity increases as flight times comes and go.

Sit watch and experience the crowd.

Obscure characters weave their way through the crowd. Entertainers needing to move, needing to find an audience.

Snippets of conversations from loud cell phones... furtive glances between strangers... cramped muscles from uncomfortable seating... stretching for the experienced travellers... the eerie beeps of the airline courtesy cart... such is the experience of waiting.

Wander throughout the crowd with your juggling balls. Leave your bags unattended to prove a point that you trust. Try desperately to pass the time.

Oh the ever so painful wait. Forced to sit until the designated flight time. No friendly faces with which to converse. Nothing to occupy my mind... hours left.