Saturday morning thoughts about traveling and airports

Changing planes and waiting for the next flight became so familiar to me nowadays like waiting for the train used to be some years ago. I have been flying also before I moved to Finland, but since 2007 flying became a constant part of my life. It is funny, because after a while I already remember which shops to visit in which airport while waiting, have my favorite dishes at certain cafes and remember exactly where I can find plugs to charge my laptop or phone. My phone connects automatically to the wifi networks of the airports already, and sometimes I even discover new and new tricks. Like for example yesterday I discovered that at the Munich airport you can have actually 2x 30 minutes free wifi if you connect once from the laptop, and when it expires from the phone and register with two different email addresses.

At the airports, on the planes it is always different people who are my co-travelers, but somehow it feels always partly the same. For example any time when we fly from Finland people drink beer and wine on the plane, no matter if it is a morning flight or night flight. At the airports there are business men having conferences, families traveling with small children, lovers kissing, or crying, groups of guys and girls traveling somehwere, and dreamy-eyed strangers crossing with a mystical shine in their eyes.

If someone would ask me what I like the most about flying it would be two things: the relaxed feeling when you read your newspaper waiting for the service to start, and the sight of the clouds. No matter how many times I have seen it already, I always get amazed by those white fields of clouds when the plane rises above them. Peace and emptiness, missing qualities from the everyday from time to time.

Sometimes there are too many words, too many happenings, and it is a privilage to be able to pack your luggage, and leave the scene. Traveling is not just a discovery, it is also a retreat. Even if everything is fine, to be able to find yourself in a new context from time to time is a bit like being reborn hundreds of times during the one life you have.