With our freshly stamped passports and hand luggage in toe, we followed the signs towards the baggage carousel, snaking around a series of corridors until the mouth of the tunnel eventually opened out into a gargantuan hall filled with humming machinery and jostling passengers.
I found the nearest television screen and scanned its flight numbers with a nodding approval.
(I had no idea what I was looking at. In fact, it had taken me nearly 40 years to learn the language of English so there was no hope of me understanding any of the Thai letters and words that stood before me. But, when one knows not where they are or what they are doing, one should always nod in approval. And if you can tip your imaginary hat with a wink and a smile in the process, it adds to the entire facade).
A facade it was.
I found our flight number just as it was about to peel itself off the bottom of the screen as it stood out of the way for an incoming round of new cargo.
Our little immigration debacle had cost us precious time it seemed.
The language on the screen quickly flickered to English before translating back again but it was enough time for me to locate our designated luggage area.
the smell in the air seemed fresh and fragrant, not bloodied and foul.
“BELT 4!!”, I yelled aloud for all to hear as I leaned into my sleepy stride and pushed forwards across the crowded hall towards our bags and the ultimate homeward stretch.
We reached the belt but something seemed ‘off’.
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There was no moving machinery, no sounds of revolutions or restless passengers fighting for their prized possessions.
I had expected to witness a bloodbath filled with tired souls wrestling for their lives, using women and children as human shields as each party staked their ground for all to see. Hand luggage transformed into battering rams, children’s prams morphed into deadly pikes. Previous escapades had taught me that the baggage hall in an airport was really the place where international wars were instigated, fought and ultimately won.
The ground felt slick with disinfectant, not stickied from curdled blood and clumps of flesh and hair.
But, as I looked at the motionless carousel and then up towards the screen that was perched atop its lifeless body, I saw no signs of a battle, I witnessed no scars from a war.
Indeed, the smell in the air seemed fresh and fragrant, not bloodied and foul.
There were no severed heads mounted on luggage trolleys, no triumphant bellows or flags ablaze. The ground felt slick with disinfectant, not stickied from curdled blood and clumps of flesh and hair.
If there had been a battle, it had long been overcome, its tales of victory and strife lost to the passages of time.
“It says this is our flight!”, I mumbled in anguish to Steffany as I paced backwards and forth, droplets of salted water beginning to appear across my dishevelled brow.
“Where are our bags??!”, I said a little louder, the pitch of my voice beginning to increase as it crackled and broke through compounded years of puberty.
I marched up and down the carousel, inspecting every nook and cranny for any sign of life but none was to be found.
our bags sat to the side waiting for their guardians to eventually arrive.
We were too late. Our bags had come and gone in the blink of an eye. They were only new, barely scathed or scratched and this had been their first trip. We hadn’t had a chance to properly acquaint ourselves and I was certain that if we were to be put into a lineup of people for our bags to identify, they wouldn’t choose us. A factory may have brought them into this world but it had been our job to shepherd and lead them. And we had failed.
I was about to kneel and pray for forgiveness but Steffany tapped me firmly on my left shoulder, interrupting my holy plea as she pointed towards the left side of the hall.
There, propped up against each other were our bags.
Like children forgotten to be collected at the close of school, our bags sat to the side waiting for their guardians to eventually arrive.
And arrive we had.
I ran to my bag with opened arms, hoisting it up into the air as I twirled around and around for all to see, apologising profusely in the process as I whispered future travel promises into its ear.
My bag looked back at me the way it always had…..inanimately, but I didn’t care.
We were reunited and were about to embark on a wondrous trip together.
We strapped our bags to our backs and exited the hall towards the bus, shuttle and transfer area.
As we approached an official taxi booth, an astute Thai gentleman appeared with a glassy grin from ear to ear.
We were about to witness our first con.
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