Good Jul-tide to all my RAWRtacular readers! (Or God Jul..tid…if you are of a Norwegian persuasion) However, this year I would like to add an extra special shout-out to all those who have gotten stuck in airports on their way home for the holidays.

I myself was heading back to Ireland for my holiday (I’m an ex-pat in Norway for the rest of the year), when I had myflight canceled on me. Dublin Airport got snowed in, and kept closing it’s runway. The airline were fairly cool to me, and didn’t keep me hanging around too long. Got my bags back quickly, and a booking for the next day sorted out in a couple of minutes. I was able to go back home, get some sleep and then try my luck on the next flight. It paid off, I got lucky, I got home, and I didn’t end up sleeping in the airport….this time.

You see…although my slightly troubled journey home was mostly painless this time for me, I know about the troubles that many others have faced, and I know all too well what it is like to sleep in an airport.

Ever notice that most airport seats are designed in a certain way, so that you cannot sleep on them? I’ve seen this in nearly every airport I have ever visited (the one rare exception was Oslo Airport, who had cool deck-chair things…which are alas now gone.) I’m guessing they’d prefer people to check in to the nearby hotels instead. Fair enough…but what if you’re stuck at a gate for 6 hours? Could do with a comfortable chair…

I’m reminded of one time I was stuck at London Stansted one night. I had travelled to this mecca of low-fares airlines to meet a connecting flight to Austria. However, thanks to snow, my flight was canceled until the following morning. I was a poor student back then, thus I had selected the luxurious Hotel Departures Hall to spend the night.

Trying to find an appropriate sleeping spot became a challenge. I had at first tried a spot on the ground, in a corner near a closed disabled-support agency. I had a sleeping bag with me, and used my coat as a pillow. However this didn’t work. Without proper padding, the cold and hard tile flooring, was still very cold and hard. So I needed to get a seat somewhere.

After a little searching, I found a very good corner seat not far from the main doors. Using some of my luggage, I constructed a fort around my corner, and was able to find an arm-rest I could fit my legs through. Success! I had found a comfy bed, which could be easily defended from all directions. Great!

So I settled into some sleep…for about 5 minutes. Not far from where I was sleeping, passengers were arriving from one of the last airport trains. Most were doing this quietly, having realised that people were sleeping. That was, except for a group of 5 young Spaniards. They came into the airport, literally screaming every word they said. It was then 01:00, and they had arrived hours early for their own flight. (All flights had ended by now).

I couldn’t even guess if they were drunk. They were simply wandering around the airport screaming Spanish at each other. And when I say screaming, I’m not saying they were arguing, or anything like that. They were having what seemed like a friendly chat…with screaming instead of talking.

I tried ignoring them, using headphones, reading, using mental power to block them out. Nothing worked, I was not getting any sleep. Eventually at 03:00, I gave up and started to pace around trying to kill time before my check-in. Most of that time involved plotting the cleverly planned murder of those Spanish students who kept me up. (However, the best I could come up with was forming a lynch-mob out of all the other people who got woken up, and then claiming that the murder was really a ‘Fun-run gone terribly wrong’.)

I finally got onto my flight. It was probably the first time I actually slept on a plane (I can never do it normally). I can only imagine the pain of all those who got trapped in London during the Christmas rush and those in the US who have been trapped by the snow storm.

My thoughts are with you all this holiday. Let’s hope we all survive them!

-Rawr