The Chinese Fly
Over the past three weeks I spent some time on the road, visiting first Shanghai and then Chongqing. Unavoidably, this meant a lot of time in airports, the truest indication that in the words of Thomas Friedman, the world is indeed flat.
I've been to airports in probably 25 different countries, and what strikes me is how remarkably similar they all are. It's as if airports exist as a country unto themselves, peaceful enclaves surrounded by an often hostile world. The prices, too, seem to have little relation to how much things cost elsewhere, a point most humorously made by Jerry Seinfeild. "Tuna sandwiches, 14 dollars. Tuna's very rare here,".
In China, the verisimilitude of airports is even more striking, as China itself is so vastly different from everywhere else. For those who haven't had the chance to visit our lovely Middle Kingdom, China is a smash of sights, noise, attitude, excitement, and hustle.
So airports here provide a respite from the madness, an oasis of order, sanity, and direction. Nevertheless, differences in the flying habits do persist.
Over the course of my lifetime airports in the United States have become progressively less pleasant. This is of course a consequence of our idiotic 'homeland security' regime, in which airports enact inept and reactionary policies in a futile attempt to ward off terrorism. The security check at American airports is particularly galling. Uniformed officials herd us together like cattle, barking orders like kindergarten teachers on a school field trip. Once the passenger approaches the magic security point, he's ordered to remove all clothing that might remotely trigger the ire of the metal detection machine. Should he neglect to remove a coin, or a belt, or some other harmless item, he's forced to try again, keeping the queue from progressing smoothly.
In China, on the other hand, the system is far more laid back. For some reason, I set off the metal detector each and every time I walk through it. No problem. I merely step on a platform, have a polite official scan my body with a wand, and then am sent through. Far more humane and pleasant.
The Chinese though are rather impatient when it comes to getting on and off the plane itself. People hover around the gate anxiously, trying to block others from marching into the passageway first. When the gate opens, people hurry through in a desperate attempt to sit still in their uncomfortable seat before all others. I've had little old grannies slip past me so slyly I thought I'd been caught in a basketball-style pick'n'roll. In the end, though, we all end up tied- sitting still in our seats, breathing recycling air, ready for the ritual of the flight.
The flights themselves are mostly unremarkable, though is it just me or do the Chinese seem unnaturally eager to announce the onset of turbulence? On the one-hour flight from Chongqing to Kunming, the stewardess announced that we'd encountered turbulence no fewer than five times, so much so that I became irritated by the constant 'fasten your seatbelts' bell sound.
Then there's the landing, which is so ordinarily so rough you might as well have parachuted in. While the plane taxies around the airport at high speeds, Chinese passengers are fond of standing up, switching on their phones, and organizing their luggage. The young, pettite stewardesses try in vain to get everyone to calm down to no avail. Again, all the rush is for no apparent benefit. We all end up having to stand in a straight, orderly line anyway before disembarking.
Finally, there's the baggage claim. The Chinese have turned jockeying for position at baggage claim terminals into something of a contact sport. At the airport last week I counted no fewer than five people literally poking their heads into the space where the bags come out from, as if to call for the bags to arrive sooner. Of course, this is again a waste of time. All the movement, pushing, shouting, and frayed nerve do not make the slightest bit of difference into when we actually get to arrive at our eventual destination.
That last bit depends on the taxi. So once you've miraculously gotten off the plane, found your way into baggage claim, fought successfully for your suitcase, navigated the crush of people in the terminal, and gotten outside, you're faced with an even bigger challenge: China itself. And there, as if they'd been waiting for you all along, stand a group of men and women who'd love to take you to your hotel if you'd just be willing to pay three times the meter price.
So maybe the flying experience in China isn't like it is everywhere else, after all. Yet like airports and airplanes all around the world, China's are possessed by ritual and habit and arcane rules and a million other little things that are uncannily part of the process of moving, very quickly through air, from point A to point B.
