Air Babylon

by Imogen Edwards-Jones

  ‘They’re probably all clogging up an engine somewhere.’ I laugh.

  ‘Don’t say that,’ says Don. ‘It’s not their fault someone built an airport here.’

  ‘Suppose not,’ I say, slightly embarrassed. I should really pick my audience if I’m going to come out with dead swan jokes. ‘Um, seen any more of those cheeky parakeets recently?’

  The green ring-necked parakeets that live around Don’s house in Shepperton are one of his favourite subjects. There is a rather aggressive flock of them, and they’ve been on the rampage since the seventies. On a summer evening, just as the sun is setting, you can hear and see them squawk past in a green flash anywhere in an area as wide as Esher, Reigate and the North Downs. With no natural predators, these natives to India are doing very nicely thank you, helping themselves to crops from the local fruit farms. No-one knows exactly where they came from. Some say they escaped during the filming of some buccaneering blockbuster at Shepperton Studios; others say – and Don’s in agreement with this – that they escaped from Heathrow. They were said to be stowaways on a jet. Don’s seen so many animals make a break for it as soon as they land here, he thinks the Heathrow theory is the most viable.

  ‘Unbelievable,’ he says. ‘I saw a flock of about fifty of them fly past just the other day.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘They’re a right load of vandals. Stripped next door’s apple tree of all its fruit. Well, what little there was left at this time of year.’

  Don and I sit and drink our teas while I wait for the Thai translator to turn up. Don tells me that earlier last week he was flown up to Glasgow where he was met by a Customs officer and together they boarded a Russian ship. There he found, identified and confiscated seventeen cockatoos that were being smuggled into the country. He looks rather proud of himself as he tells the story, and I can’t help but think how great it must be to get that much job satisfaction.

  He seems to have had quite a busy ten days. He’s had an escaped seal that was so aggressive both he and Jeremy, plus another bloke at the centre called Chris, had to go after it with broom handles and dustbin lids. After a good two hours’ running around, they eventually managed to corral the thing back into its cage. Today, it is entertaining the troops at either London Zoo or Longleat, he can’t remember which. They also had a tapir escape from its box. Somehow it got out of its crate and made its way to the staff kitchens. Don spent the whole afternoon trying to tempt it out of the cold store with a handful of ants. But the most complicated saga involved an eighteen-and-a-half-foot-long anaconda that came in from the States.

  ‘It was going to be a pet for a member of some Middle Eastern royal family,’ Don explains, ‘but the thing had no paperwork so we had to impound it.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah. There was a helluva lot of fuss about it. Apparently the member of the royal family was pissed off we’d impounded it. The Americans had wanted to get rid of it, and had given it retrospective papers. Tony Blair then got involved. He was having a meeting with the king of the country in question, and he didn’t want anything to get in the way of their “amicable agreement”.’ Don does the quotes-in-the-air thing with his red hands. ‘So some Middle Eastern bigwig flew over in a private jet, paid the pathetic three-hundred-pound fine and collected the snake so that there was no hitch in diplomatic relations!’ He starts to laugh. ‘Stick around here, mate, we’re right at the sharp end of it, I tell you!’

  ‘Sounds like it.’

  ‘Oh,’ he adds, ‘and we had a couple of stuffed armadillos. They were stuffed post-1980, so they were confiscated.’

  ‘How can you tell?’

  ‘It’s all in the stitching,’ Don replies tapping the side of his nose.

  ‘Sounds like you’ve had a busy time of it,’ I say, finishing my tea.

  ‘Well, if you’re open twenty-four hours a day three hundred and sixty-five days a year, something’s got to happen eventually.’ He grins, and gets out of his seat. ‘Looks like your interpreter has turned up,’ he says, nodding towards the door. ‘I’d better get on. Will you be at the canteen at lunch?’

  ‘I am aiming to be,’ I say, ‘but you can never tell.’

  ‘See you there. If not, see you soon.’

  ‘Absolutely. And thanks for the tea.’

  It takes me another ten minutes to sort out Mr Narkpreecha with the help of Kelvin, a half English, half Thai student in his twenties who is studying mathematics at the LSE and translates in his spare time. Together we explain to Mr Narkpreecha that although his snake does have the correct papers, as confirmed by Jeremy, it should not have been travelling in the aircraft. We take his name and address in Bangkok and details of where he is staying in the UK, and explain that the airline will be levying a fine, as they themselves might well be fined. As Kelvin escorts him off towards the terminal and transport into town, I can’t help but hope the bloke takes a cab. The idea that Mr Narkpreecha might mislay his albino friend halfway to Piccadilly would stop me from using the Tube for months.

  I thank Jeremy for all his help and turn around to leave. Surely things are going to get a little quieter? I’ve landed my two flights so I’ve only departures to go. Things should really start looking up from now on.

  10–11 AM

  I CATCH A lift back to the terminal on the BA livestock vehicle, which has been commandeered by Qantas to collect a couple of show poodles off its Melbourne flight. BA is the only airline that actually owns a livestock vehicle to ferry animals back and forth from the centre, but it makes sure that the vehicle more than pays for itself in rental. Jeremy and another young bloke from the centre, Paul, are laughing away as we drive along.

  ‘If the owners only knew what sort of conditions their prize pooches were flying in,’ says Jeremy, ‘they’d never let them out of their sight.’

  ‘They’re all the same,’ says Paul. ‘The heated hold is just a hot pipe from the engine running through the plane. I’ve seen so many dogs arrive with ice on their bowls I’m amazed they survived.’

  ‘Do you remember that consignment of birds we had the other day that arrived dead as dodos?’

  ‘What happens then?’ I ask, staring out of a grey, drizzly window. It has started to rain again.

  ‘Well, someone like Don or me checks them to see if they’ve been packed properly or look diseased. If not, we shove a thermometer up their backsides, and if they’re stone cold we advise prosecution of the airline.’

  ‘Wasn’t Qantas sued a few years back for killing a whole load of Rusa deer?’ asks Paul.

  ‘Yeah,’ Jeremy confirms. ‘On a Brisbane to Bangkok flight. A hundred and fourteen of them were flown out for some breeding programme, and sixty-eight died.’

  ‘Here’s hoping the poodles are show-ground perfect,’ says Paul, blowing on his hands.

  ‘This you here?’ asks Jeremy, as the van pulls up outside the terminal.

  ‘Yeah, thanks,’ I say, getting out. ‘And thanks again for all your help today.’

  ‘Pleasure.’ He smiles. ‘I really enjoyed it.’

  ‘Good. Next time I get another big snake I’ll be sure to call on you.’

  ‘Do. Don’s birds, and I’m snakes!’

  ‘What am I?’ asks Paul.

  ‘Small rodents,’ says Jeremy.

  ‘See you.’ I smile and shut the door.

  I check my watch. It’s just gone ten. There’s time for me to have a quick fag and possibly even a cup of coffee. I stand outside the door to the terminal, light up, take a drag and inhale deeply. I know I shouldn’t, but it’s a habit born of trying to get maximum pleasure in as few drags as possible. It hits the spot. As I exhale, even the drizzle can’t dampen my enjoyment.

  I can’t believe I bumped into Susan today. Of all the days for it to happen it would have to be when I was hot, sweaty and stressed. I couldn’t even think of anything amusing or witty to say to her. She must think I am some boring moron. And I could have done without Rachel. I take another drag on my ciga
rette. She is always bad for my confidence, and now she is going to go around telling everyone that I’m frightened of snakes. Although she was hardly Wonder Woman herself, slowly backing into the toilet. But no-one minds if women don’t like snakes; it’s not a good look for a bloke, is it? I bet she tells Sue. Like Sue’s ever going to look at me anyway. Flight attendants don’t go out with ground staff. We’re hardly why they joined up, are we? No-one dreams of having an affair with a duty airport manager, do they? It’s pilots in their dashing uniforms that girls dream of.

  I stub out my cigarette. I’ve only smoked half of it but old habits die hard. I make my way back inside the terminal.

  I walk back through duty free, and the place is packed. There are signs and offers everywhere, and in order to encourage spending they seem to have hung out last year’s faded Christmas decorations, despite the fact that it’s only the beginning of October. To the looped tune of ‘Jingle Bells’ and various other festive hits, holidaymakers, travellers and businessmen are parting with their hard-earned cash. And they’ve got plenty of outlets to choose from: Paul Smith, Harrods, Thomas Pink, Pringle, Bulgari, Gucci, Burberry, and Smythsons. The place looks like Bond Street, and it has rents to match. In fact, the ground rent in this place is one of the highest in the UK, with enclaves closer to the first-class lounges commanding the highest prices. In 2002, BAA earned £479 million from retail alone. It’s a wonder some of the shops here actually make any money. Actually, quite a few of them don’t. Some of the stores are loss leaders. For some reason, there is a certain amount of kudos attached to having your brand in the airport. With 170,000 passengers coming through a day, I suppose it’s partly to do with the advertising potential, but it’s also a lot to do with being part of UK plc. It’s like being part of some glamorous club. Somehow, showing your face in the airport means that you are a big player in the high street. But boy, do they pay for this pleasure.

  The BAA, or Build Another Aisle as it is more commonly known around here, not only charges the shops for the pleasure of being inside the terminal but also coins a percentage of turnover. So they have a vested interest in what you are doing. A mate of mine who runs a WHSmith in another airport says it’s a nightmare. ‘If the BAA see empty shelves, they want to know why. They are always encouraging competition between shops and challenging our performance. It’s exhausting. We have to work hard for our money; we have to rely on thousands and thousands of transactions to make anything.’ If we make 10p on a newspaper, he says, we have to pay the BAA 8p. That’s part of the reason why no-one at the airport operates the National Lottery. The retailer makes 5 per cent on the lottery and would have to pay the BAA 4½ per cent. ‘Last year,’ my mate concluded, ‘the BAA made a hell of a lot more money from the shop than we did.’

  But the retailers are not the only ones to dislike their landlords. The ground staff hate them as well. Not only is the airport so packed with shops it’s like Bluewater with a couple of planes parked outside, but BAA have also started to ask passengers to check in two, sometimes three hours before their flights. An unexpected bonus of these longer check-ins for increased security is that we all have to spend more time and money in the shops. The few clocks in the terminals mean that passengers lose track of time, buy more, miss their flights and delay the plane as we have to take their luggage off. It has been estimated that delays cost airlines £1,000 a minute, but they are impossible to quantify. But so long as the profits are up in Gucci, who cares? Another result of the three-hour check-in is that we have to rent our desks for longer as we have to open up earlier. And when one check-in desk costs around £50,000 a year to rent, you can see why we would want to hot-desk it with a little bit more speed. The last airline I worked for is now paying £10m a year for check-in desks alone. The BAA also have ultimate power, so when you have delayed passengers who are going nowhere, a child who has lost its mother and a man who has left his coat on the flight, they still walk up and say, ‘Your check-in queue’s a bit long – can you sort it out, please.’

  The BAA’s greatest detractors are the airlines. They pay so much money for landing rights that they tend to begrudge the 40 per cent annual price hikes they have to pay to finance Heathrow’s new Terminal 5, or an extra runway at Stansted. The company’s monopoly on all the airports in south-east England also gets up the airlines’ noses. The relationship between Ryanair and BAA reached rock bottom at Stansted last year when, after disputes about fuel prices and wheelchair charges, BAA opened a mobile sandwich shop at one of their gates, thereby affecting Ryanair’s onboard profits. So Ryanair banned all sandwiches from being brought onto the plane, saying that anything bought in the airport had to be put in the hold. These things sound petty, but when the BAA are making something like £286m a year in profit and plenty of airlines are close to the wall, any way to get back at them is to be applauded.

  I walk past the Bally shoe shop and notice one of the girls changing the shoes in the window. I’ve heard they are supposed to do this four times a day depending on who is travelling through in order to maximize their sales potential. They put high golden sandals out for the Arabs in the afternoon and keep the sensible blue shoes for the Europeans in the morning. Well, I suppose that is one way of keeping the BAA off your back.

  I carry on towards the baggage check. There’s a couple having a fight outside Boots. He’s shouting and she’s crying. It looks like a good beginning to a relaxing holiday. There’s a family being equally fractious in the entrance to WHSmith.

  ‘I want another cartoon book!’ the child is shouting as he throws his red and yellow rucksack on the floor.

  ‘They’ve run out,’ says the mother, sounding exasperated.

  On towards the X-ray machines, and there’s a huge queue. But then there’s always a huge queue. These guys are supposed to be at the frontline of airport security, and they spend most of their time confiscating nail scissors and tweezers, or telling people to take their mobile phones or keys out of their pockets. Although they do now also sponge your bags for nitrates, just to see if you’ve been handling explosives. Unfortunately, these are also the same nitrates that are found in plant fertilizers that as a nation of Monty Dons and Alan Titchmarshes we put on our gardens every weekend. So come Monday morning the queue can be terrible, as anyone who has so much as communed with nature over the weekend gets pulled over as a potential al-Qaeda operative. Today, it’s just a lot of slow-moving tourists who are taking an age to get their coats off and walk through the metal detector.

  I finally make it back to our check-in area and the small office at the back. I find Andy in there standing by the kettle, waiting for it to boil.

  ‘Hello there,’ he says. ‘You all right?’

  ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘Why don’t you forget that and I’ll buy you a proper coffee?’

  ‘Cheers, mate.’

  ‘It is your birthday after all.’

  ‘You really know how to spoil a man, don’t you?’ He smiles, raising his possibly plucked eyebrows.

  We both instinctively take off our yellow vests and airside passes, leaving them in the backroom. Wear anything official in an airport and you become a magnet for moronic questions. The number of times people have asked me where the toilets are when I am standing right next to them is enough to turn a saint to sinning. There’s a saying at the airport that passengers pack their brains in their suitcases before they arrive; they are always disorientated, distracted and seemingly incapable of looking after themselves. ‘Airport brain’ is an official phenomenon. It is the only way to explain why perfectly normal people suddenly become useless as soon as they set foot inside a terminal. They seem to renege on any commitment to personal responsibility. They can lose their passport, their ticket, their luggage, their husband and their mind, all between check-in and the gate. Since we are sneaking off for a cheeky coffee when we should be doing something a whole lot more constructive, the last thing we want, or need, is to be disturbed.

  We choose a table that is not too conspicuous
from the main drag. I don’t want any of my staff to see me sneaking off. I get Andy’s skinny cappuccino with extra chocolate and my double espresso and sit down.

  ‘Did you sort the snake?’ he asks, blowing his foam.

  ‘Yeah,’ I nod. ‘Thanks for organizing the translator, by the way.’

  ‘That’s OK.’

  ‘God, I hate snakes.’

  ‘I know.’ He smiles. ‘Rachel came through and said you were bricking it.’

  ‘I thought she might.’

  ‘Yeah, well, Sue stuck up for you.’

  ‘She did?’ I try not to sound too interested. But Andy’s relationship radar is razor sharp.

  ‘Oooh,’ he says, giving my shoulder a little push. ‘She did indeed.’

  ‘That’s nice of her.’

  ‘“That’s nice of her.” “That’s nice of her.” What sort of response is that? You want her. You lurve her. I know you do.’ He laughs. ‘It’s pretty bloody obvious.’

  ‘Shut up.’