Many years ago, I was going through Dublin Airport security with my son, nephew and father. Like well-trained monkeys, we took off our belts and disgorged the contents of our bags. I passed through, but was suddenly alerted by my father’s voice behind me – which always became more distinctly Scottish when he was annoyed.
“What? I have to take off ma f**king shoes?”
I’d forgotten he hadn’t been on a plane since 9/11. This was all new to him.
Decades later, the trudge through security is something we all endure without thinking too much about it (though you’ll see the occasional traveller for whom it still seems to be a surprise). But while all airports are largely the same, it is the security and passport arrangements that distinguish one from the other.
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Just after the new year, we flew back from Toulouse Airport, where the security philosophy seemed to be one of: just put up with it. Passengers were slowly funnelled through 11 channels (I counted), passing the same people over and over; an experience that can become a little uncomfortable. The first couple of times, you can swap a resigned smile, but eventually you have to avoid eye contact so it doesn’t get weird.
Like in other airports, there was a member of staff calling out instructions on what to do when people reached the scanning machines. But these were in French, so I had no idea what she was saying. From her tone I inferred that she wasn’t really enjoying her work. But that changed dramatically when a rugby team joined the queue several lanes behind us.
Suddenly, she seemed to change from barking orders at everyone to calling out in a playful, almost flirtatious manner to the rugby players. Some of them smiled and replied, which only seemed to encourage the woman further. She moved from her position, began unbuckling some of the belts from the stanchion posts and invited the rugby team to jump the queue. Rather sheepishly, they complied.
I looked around to see if I could catch any other passengers tutting their disapproval at this preferential treatment, but no one seemed prepared to do so. Me included. Queuing to catch a plane is a cowing experience.
The security scanners were those where we had to take everything out of the bags and put everything in separate trays. Daughter Number Four’s carry-on bag – shaped like an owl and used to carry her Nintendo Switch and a copy of The Babysitters Club – had to go through the machine four times.
We couldn’t help but compare it to our experience passing through Dublin Airport when we had flown out. In fairness, Dublin is much larger than Toulouse and the equipment is more modern – you can leave electronics in your bag – yet the physical design and the attitude of the staff seems more focused on making the journey through security as painless as possible. The person calling out instructions invariably does it in a jolly way: like one of the hawkers on Moore Street.
[ Seán Moncrieff: Visiting from France, my daughter found Ireland hard to loveOpens in new window ]
Arriving at both airports was distinctly different too. Perhaps it was French egalitarianism, but in Toulouse, there was no separate passport control for EU citizens. Everyone stood in the same queue. Grim-faced immigration officers scanned the passports, checked the photographs and handed them back without a word.
In Dublin, the – admittedly much larger – queues branch off depending on citizenship; something that always gives me a slight zing of pride. And when you reach the booth, holding your harp-emblazoned passport, the officer will carry out the usual checks, but in my experience will always hand them back with the same words: welcome home.
Yes, it would be nice if travellers could then get a metro into the city centre. But let’s not let the bad overwhelm the good. There some things we do better than other countries. We should remember that.
