Life of an Airport

Ivan Makarov

Text By Greg Fallis

It's like a small town, except nobody lives there. In the airport, everybody is just passing through. The workers put in their time and go home; the pilots and flight crews slide through on their way to their real worksite, the travelers are all on their way to or from someplace. Like every small town there is a police force, there are places to eat and drink, there are shops and shoppers, there are cultural norms and social pressure to follow them.

It's like a small town whose main industry is waiting. Everything that happens in an airport revolves around that long pause between arrival and departure. The food you buy, the magazines you thumb through, the chairs in which you sit, the garbled announcements you can't understand...they're all based on the concept of keeping you docile while you wait to go somewhere else.

It's like a small town you never want to visit and can't wait to leave. And yet almost every long trip requires you to go there. It's like a small town populated by strangers, all of whom are engaged in waiting. Twenty-four, seven, three-sixty-five and no holidays. It's like a small town where nobody has a permanent address, and nobody wants one. It's like a small town in purgatory, and you never really know how long you'll be staying.

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