Airports, Security, and EasyJet

This past weekend a group of seven of us went to Istanbul, Turkey. To get to any of the airports here, you have to take an hour train ride that costs anywhere from 16 pounds to 25 pounds depending on if you can get a round trip discount or not. Then sometimes, depending on what airport, you have to take a bus from one terminal to the next then walk anywhere from 10 minutes to 25 minutes to get to your gate. Gatwick especially is huge. It is quite the process to even get to the airport—I miss being able to just drive to the airport and twenty minutes later you’re through security.

We flew out of Luton, my first time at that airport. It’s always a toss-up how strict security will be on liquids, but the security agents at Luton were quite stringent about the rules. I went through with my little bag of 100ml or less liquids and got selected for a random test to make sure my lotion wasn’t really an explosive. As my friend Megan was behind me and did not follow the rules about the 100ml or less, I was concentrated on her trying to sweet talk to the agent to let her keep her facewash while my test was going on. All I heard was the guard say, “Put a little on,” so I put as miniscule amount as possible on my hand (I am running out of my precious Jergen’s lotion…only 10 more days before I can replenish my supply in the States). As I was rubbing the lotion in, I looked back at the guard and realized he wanted me to put a dab on a little piece of paper. He looked at me like I was an idiot and we both started laughing. He asked me what kind of test putting lotion on myself would be and I replied that maybe if I actually used the lotion it would mean it wasn’t an explosive? I then had to waste another precious dab of lotion on the paper.

Usually when I go on these weekend trips I fly EasyJet, which is one of the most popular low-cost carriers here. Take Southwest and strip it down even further and you have EasyJet. The thing I hate most about it is that there are no assigned seats. I usually sleep on planes and I have to have a window seat or else I’m uncomfortable the whole time. I have devised a strategy for making sure I get one. First, I try to check in early so I get in Boarding Group A. Upon arrival at the gate, I assess the situation and sit as close to the place where will the lines will form as possible (if I am in a country where there will be lines). There are no Disneyworld barriers in Europe, the gates are just wide open expanses. Otherwise I just stand as close to the entrance door as possible while attempting look like there’s no real reason why I’m standing there. As soon as I see a flight attendant at the counter, I maintain a constant state of awareness and as soon as the first person walks to get into line (or a giant herd of people as is usually turns out to be) I quickly walk into my position. It helps that I usually have a stuffed backpack on my back, as this allows for extra space around me and an “accidental” method for knocking people out of my way. “Oh, I hit you with my backpack, I’m so sorry…there’s just so many people pushing me….” I then shove my way forward and force my ticket into the flight attendant’s hand, securing my place as one of the first people on the plane. My strategy has yet to fail me, as I have had a window seat on every EasyJet flight I have taken. I now need to revise my strategy to make sure the middle seat is unoccupied—I only have a 50/50 success rate on that.