In my suitcase: On my love for airports

Hello, everyone!

If I have to define my life with one word, this would be "roller coaster" (ok, 2 words). I grew up moving in between addresses. My family never really had a plan, so we'd move to a different city (or an entirelly different country) virtually every year. One outcome: there is no place under the sun, which I can truly call home. Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining here. If I could go back, I wouldn't change a thing (well...maybe just a few things). However, I feel most at home while travelling. I'd prefer a hotel room before a cozy house any time. I am a bit afraid of permanent responsibilities, of settling down, of boredom. So wherever I go, I find comfort in the thought that sooner or later I'll be leaving.

Hence, my love for airports. Most people find them noisy, related to too much hustle and bustle. You have to wait in cues, very often they'd dare to make you take off your shoes, the food is not great and smoking is prohibited (yes, I've started smoking again). All this is true. Yet airports are so much more than that. Just last week I was flying out of Schiphol Amsterdam. I said goodbye to my mother and as we were both weeping, I had a sort of an epiphany. It got me thinking that airports are a truly liberating place - a place where the boundaries of normal social interaction disintegrate. People here laugh, cry, scream...We have learned to live in a society where showing emotions is a sign of weakness. We've learned to be politely silent but this doesn't really apply to airports, does it?

Airports all over Europe have witnessed the saddest and the happiest moments of my life. Therefore, as an outcast teenager, living in the Netherlands, I'd often go the terrace of Schiphol Airport to watch the planes take off. I was imagining all these lucky people who were...leaving. Obviously, I am afraid of the unknown, but the comfort of the familiar has always been a lot scarier.