We Brits love to queue. If it’s not for TikTok-viral jacket potatoes, for day tickets to Wimbledon or not-so-secret Charli XCX gigs, we’ll be queuing for the joy of our European neighbours reminding us just how badly we mucked up by leaving them.
To celebrate 10 years of Brexit, the EU Entry/Exit System is delaying Britons’ trips across the continent even further this summer, with passengers missing planes, ferries and trains due to the faffy process of having to get their fingerprints scanned. But even before EES, we all know that the frustration begins far sooner.
From the moment we step through those rotating doors into the cavernous departure halls, through to the time we set foot in our accommodation, travel is one big test – tough for even us Brits.
You queue to drop bags, to go through security, to buy bits, to eat bits, to get to the shuttle, to get to the gate, to get on the plane – which is laid out like a queue! – to taxi, to take off, to land, to taxi, to passport control, to get your bags, to customs, to transport, to get to wherever you’re staying, and finally, step out of the queue.
All this, for what is meant to be a holiday, our valiantly fought-for right to explore the supposed beauty of this world and do things that are distinctly un-British!
Every time I take to the skies, some old adages do battle. In the one corner, I know, travel is the only thing that you can spend money on that makes you richer. In the other corner, though, is the fully evidenced argument that hell is other people.
We’ve all been chased around the baggage drop queue by grumpy families with no sense of personal space, jabbed by the errant limbs of children who interpret furniture as jungle gyms.
We’ve all been stuck behind some lumbering slowpokes in the glossy meandering capitalistic maze of duty-free.
We’ve all encountered the pillocks who somehow still don’t know that you can’t go through security with a belt, hat, sunglasses and three gallons of liquid. Is it your first day on Earth?
These same people then dawdle – wow, the walking really is slow – to meticulously browse the menu at Giraffe, or the sandwich cabinets of WHSmith, as if they’re diplomats signing a peace treaty, not just contemplating a sub-par lunch.
And these people aren’t just other families – they are your partner, your family, your pals – they are the people you’ve actually opted to spend time with. They are you! I’ve taken a small rainforest’s worth of flights over the years, most with partners, some with family, a few with friends. And I’ve been both a “Type A” and a “Type B” kind of traveler.
Some people, justifiably apprehensive about flying – the cabin swooping about and rattling like a box of Smarties during take off doesn’t help – try to take control. This means charging through the terminal with plastic sleeves of boarding passes, entry visa forms and car hire details, barking across the heads of Boots 3-for-2 shoppers to tell your travel companion(s) to “get a move on! The gate’s going to be announced in seven minutes!” and tetchily telling Wagamama staff to “bring the food quickly” because you “have a flight to catch” – as if they don’t know that?
Meanwhile, Type B travellers try to numb themselves with 8am pints, unnecessary shopping and pottering. Having made their peace with maybe not getting on the plane, they have no sense of urgency, no idea which gate to go to, but a great desire to try every amenity they see.
Luckily, in all my years of travel, I’ve learned some important ways of avoiding other people’s nonsense and smoothing the way for an actually alright holiday.
Firstly, try to accept that you’re a little afraid of flying and that what will be, will be, and that for the overwhelming majority of the time, you’ll be completely fine.
Second, maintain a decent sense of self. As someone who’s been both a Type A and a Type B traveller, I appreciate how bizarre each role is.
For the Type A’s, ask yourself – since when did you need to be this organised and uptight in your actual real life? You’ve caught other modes of transport without all this hassle, so there’s no need to get your pants in a twist right before you spend eight hours with your buttocks crammed into a tiny chair. Your stress changes nothing apart from other people’s enjoyment of the day.
Type B travellers – you could do with a little self-awareness. When you waft around shops – be it FatFace or Gucci – that you’d never blink twice at in the outside world, eye up 1kg bags of Toblerone or spritzing yourself in unaffordable perfumes, you become entirely unknowable to the people around you. No wonder they won’t trust you to get to the gate in time! Would you be this annoying at home? Clearly not, otherwise no one would’ve booked to go on holiday with you.
Third, if you have to be weird, do it on your own. I know it’s easy to get whipped up in all the excitement of travelling together, but you are about to spend however long together in a really nice place, why ruin it by bickering in what is essentially a crap Westfield?
If you don’t have children to deal with, go your separate ways then meet up later. Maybe at the gate, maybe at the seat, maybe at the tarmac of your destination. You wouldn’t normally commute as a pair, so why pay £15 extra to sit squished in with them for 90 minutes on this journey? Just because the destination is better than normal doesn’t mean any part of the transit will be.
Plus, if you sit separately, you can both get a window seat, from where you can peer through the clouds, and see, below you, snaking out of every airport and port-port and tunnel, all the fools still queuing for a chance to grab onto the glory of an actual holiday.
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