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Wednesday, Nov 4, 2009
Granted, I haven't flown through Lagos since about 1995, and I hear it's improved substantially since then, but the atmosphere of the time still lingers vividly in my mind.
Stepping from the plane to the jetway was like walking into a wall - from cool, dry, airplane to hot, muggy, west African night. The terminal building was dim and filthy, the baggage claim area was crowded with "drivers" (ostensibly there to meet their clients), and the customs officials habitually confiscated items from the bags they searched. The bathrooms were large enough, but filthy, overflowing, and occupied by women duct-taping contraband of some sort to their skin (don't look).
My favorite bit, though, was that British Airways had installed their own metal detector at their departure lounge - possibly the only one in the building. Luggage screening consisted of ticketed passengers walking down to the ramp to point out their bags, which were then loaded on the flight. Any bags not claimed were left behind.
Dear Mr. Smith:
Do you know if there is any correlation between bad airports and airplane crashes/malfunctions? It would seem logical that the more miserable and careless the airport workers are, the more problems will be encountered with the mechanics and others who ensure the safety of the planes themselves.
Incidentally, I second the LW who lauded Buffalo's airport. It's a wonderful airport.
Thanks.
January, 2001. There I was, in the Leopold Senghor airport, tearful and nervous. I'd just said goodbye to my Peace Corps volunteer sister after an intense three-week visit to the rural Senegal village where she was stationed. I was a New Yorker who had never been out of the country before, I hated to fly, and I hadn't taken a shower in over a week. Tense and confused, I tried to decipher enough French to tell which plane on the tarmac was headed to Kennedy--without my sister's fluent Wolof to help smooth the way, the guards at the gate were blank-faced and intimidating. I wiped my face and went over to the nice-looking backpacker guy sitting nearby. "Um...do you speak English?" I asked. "Sure do," he replied, in a friendly, Midwestern accent. We started talking about Africa (where he'd lived and worked), graduate school (we were both students), and books. On the packed flight, the seat next to him was somehow free. I moved my stuff over, we talked for the entire nine hours, and he let me grip his hand during the bumpy landing. We've been married for five years now, thanks to Air Afrique and the Leopold Senghor airport.
If you believe that Dakar boasts the world's worst airport, you have clearly never been to the Gbessia International Airport in Conakry, Guinea. Large airplanes do not stop over to "refuel" in Conakry, because there is no jet fuel. Many planes don't even turn off their engines while they're in Conakry, as if the act of doing so might endanger the possibility of ever leaving again.
As a passenger disembarking in Conakry, one is deposited unceremoniously onto the tarmac, and then must pray that Allah will direct you as to what to do next. Other than a few bedraggled soldiers standing around looking hungry, there are no people to direct you anywhere, and no signs pointing you to the terminal.
If you are lucky enough to determine which of the crumbling buildings you are supposed to go into, your fun has only just begun. The initial customs line is really more of a mob scene, with friends and relatives of the customs officials and guards being waved through at random while others clamor to press small bills into their hands .
Once past the checkpoint, one emerges into a tiny arrival hall that contains one small conveyor belt that seems to be missing a number of it's panels. The whole airport is open air, but instead of having breezeways, the "interior" of the airport instead swelters in its own haze of pungent humidity, and this room is the worst of all. The most effective way to successfully retrieve one's luggage is to leap upon the conveyor belt itself and heave your luggage over the top of the gathered throngs to an accomplice who is jockeying for position amongst the chaos. Given that no one will stop you from doing this, everyone else is doing it too.
If the fates have allowed you to come into possession of all of your own luggage (and believe me when I say that "lost" luggage here is really and truly lost forever), your most fervent hope becomes to leave this room as quickly as possible... but alas, you can't.
It is now time to have all of your bags opened and searched, your motives questioned, your finances ("How much money do you have in your pocket right now?") discussed, and your character maligned by a line of gendarmes who clearly believe that they have landed the most lucrative posting in all of Guinea. In order to leave this room, you may very well have to decide which of your belongings you wish to give to your new friends, and/or how much money you wish to part with.
When you are finally released, you must steel yourself to walk out into a frenzied gaggle of clutching, groping, and shouting taxi drivers (there would be touts, but Guinea doesn't have tourists) who desperately try to prevent you from leaving the airport and crossing the main highway from whence a taxi may be had for less than half the price.
While arriving in Conakry is always an adventure, leaving again is no less so, and the idea of spending the night in the Conakry airport is not an appealing one. Security is virtually non-existent, as random people wander across the tarmac at will, but bored functionaries still make a show of hassling you, making inappropriate comments towards your female companions, and running your carry on bags through an x-ray machine that apparently hasn't worked in at least 10 years.
There are no discernible boarding announcements, nor information of any other kind, but when an airline official appears at the one departure doorway, people run (literally) to the opening and jostle for position in case (as seems quite probable), there are not enough seats on the plane for the number of people who are waiting with boarding passes in hand.
Once on the tarmac, there is a basic security check, run by the airlines themselves, for European flights. Usually this consists of a table, a man, and a portable generator powering one overhead light. For inter-African flights, there is no pretension of security whatsoever. It does not inspire confidence, and most people appear only too happy to step into the plane itself and leave the Gbessia International Airport behind.
I, for one, kind of like bad airports, and for any other adventurous souls, I can whole heartedly recommend the Conakry airport as an experience not to be missed.
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