Jill Murray
inauspiciously stealing airport hydro
Here I am at my gate at Trudeau International Airport in Montreal, waiting for my flight to Miami, to connect to Panama City, inauspiciously curled up on the floor, stealing electricity for my laptop & phone. I’ve got my coffee and all the Just For Laughs Gags I could possibly desire on the gate TV. (OK, I don’t really desire that, but it seems to be totally inescapable when flying these days.)
There has been a lot of mad crazy hysteria in the media lately about security and carry-on items when traveling to, through or over the USA, so I thought it might be helpful if I shared some genuine details about my passage through the airport in Montreal with any readers who may be traveling soon.
First, I found this helpful PDF from the Canadian Air Transport Security Agency, definitively detailing, with photos, what you can and can’t carry-on.
I checked one bag on arrival, and carried with me, through security and customs, just my laptop bag and the clothes I was wearing. In my bag was my laptop & charger, phone & charger, camera, cold meds & lip gloss in a ziplock bag, travel docs, one small journal (wee moleskin-sized), two pens, one cookie, and a tofu-omelette sandwich. (Tofu omelette courtesy Vegan Brunch.)
I was going to bring a book, but then I decided that if I want to one day write a book that can be sold in airports worldwide, maybe I should occasionally read books that are sold in airports worldwide, so after clearing security, I picked up a copy of Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist. Not too shabby!
The airport is pretty quiet at 10am on a Monday, and so from scanning my own passport to check in and get my boarding pass, checking my bag, passing through security, US customs, and then pat-down security, to get to my gate, the whole process took just 40 minutes! Not 3 hours. 40 minutes. And my name isn’t even Halle Berry. Everyone I encountered at security stations were reassuring and courteous.
My observation was that the new carry-on rules can actually make traveling more comfortable in that they prevent you overpacking and burdening yourself with layers of bags and coats and objects just-in-case, that probably aren’t even necessary. I had so little with me, there wasn’t much to keep track of, and my lone bag passed through the scanner easily, affording me a fun opportunity to observe my iphone and sandwich in glorious x-ray detail.
The only serious snag I encountered resulted from the positioning of the pat-down station after duty free, between The Second Cup and Starbucks. My gate was on the Second Cup side, cutting me off permanently from Starbucks and its ubiquitous supply of soy milk for lattes. (I don’t know why no other chain can get it together and consistently carry soy milk!)
My drama-queen-like horror was mitigated by the discovery that those tempting-looking airport chair massages are covered by my health insurance. The massage left me so relaxed, I could hardly get up after, and it occurred to me that if they put the massage station before security and made everyone get one, everyone would be too relaxed to cause problems and they could eliminate the pat-down station.
And that brings me to this floor, beside this wall outlet, updating my blog. All in all, not a bad morning at all!
So to review, my happy travel tips in handy list format are:
- Travel in off-peak times
- adjust your expectations so you don’t get annoyed with numerous new procedures
- arrive early, just in case
- Consult the carry-on list from Canadian Air Transport Security Agency
Minimize your carry-on, but don’t go nuts - Be courteous to security. The new rules weren’t the agents’ ideas!
*and always carry a towel!
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