| MONDAY Location: Delhi Airport's Budget Airline Terminal. Time: Evening. Scene: Utter chaos. The inheritors of Delhi airport have begun renovating the concourse in earnest. A first step appears to be a clear segregation of budget airlines from the non-budget ones. I push my way into the budget terminal, and join a long line for baggage screening. |
| I encounter a liberal mix of bawling babies, stressed-out mothers, family members shouting at each other and constant bruising from baggage trollies brushing past me. The same principles of pedestrian traffic apply here, I note. Move out or get mowed down. |
| I reached the airport roughly an hour and ten minutes ago. I spend 20 minutes in the line for baggage screening, 40 minutes in the line (systems were down for 10 apparently) for check-in and another 15 or 20 minutes for security check. Not adding up? Of course not. The flight takes off late, not because of air traffic but airport congestion. There was no fog, yet. |
| TUESDAY Location: Hyderabad Airport. Time: Morning. Scene: Measured calm. Here too, the budget and the non-budget are separate at ingress but eventually, everyone unites. This time, I spend 2 minutes in line for baggage screening, 1.30 minutes at check-in (no one ahead of me) and 3 minutes at security check. In my spare time (since I have lots of it) I am trying to glean patterns and draw conclusions. Am not very successful though. The flight for Delhi takes off on time. |
| Delhi has been hit by fog. Twenty minutes before landing, the pilot brings us the good news. We are number 19 in the landing sequence. Excited chatter breaks out over the aircraft. A man behind me informs his aging mother or aunt solemnly about this development. |
| We orbit for 30 minutes and finally land. Lo and behold, there is no parking slot. So, we ruminate on the tarmac for another half an hour. Everyone on board is amazed. It's never happened before. Even the pilot keeps announcing this is the first time he has experienced such a delay. What an exciting time to be in the aviation business I note! |
| The baggage takes another half an hour to arrive. I am already summing the energy for my flight out tonight. |
| WEDNESDAY Arrived this morning in Mumbai at 2 am, having left New Delhi the previous night. It was the last flight out and my only option. The bus ride to the aircraft takes inordinately long. It must have been 10 or 15 minutes but I get the feeling we are driving all the way to Mumbai. |
| Who knows, maybe the newest low-cost carrier option. We realise the plane is parked at the international terminal. The aircraft is a wide body Airbus, typically used for long hauls. It felt nice inside. That helped a lot. Because after landing in Mumbai, we spent roughly 30 minutes on the tarmac waiting for a parking bay. This is after landing around 1.15 am or thereabouts. |
| I reach home at 3.15 am. |
| ALSO... I can't fly any more. I can't drive any more, either. The roughly 9.5 km drive from my office in central Mumbai to the suburb of Bandra takes one and a half hours. Usually, this is a 40-50 minute run. This time it's because of some festival at the suburb of Mahim, which falls on the way. Some days ago, it was the Ambedkar Jayanti. Before that, other festivals. And then bandhs and the possibility of riots. Even driving home is now an adventure of indeterminate length. I am trying to understand which is less taxing, being on the road or in the air. |
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