New appreciations

My original plan for the short layover in Toronto was to exit the airport, meet up with family and share a meal before continuing on for the transatlantic flight, but thanks to the delay in the first leg of the trip, we did not arrive in Toronto until 3:00 pm, sufficiently delayed as to cause us to annul the plan for lunch. This meant that I had to forego the opportunity of meeting up with family, but there was yet another adventure awaiting.

Conscious of time constraints and the demands of airport protocols, we chose to remain in the secure area while awaiting the departure for Zurich. Thankfully, my friends are frequent flyers who have also qualified for access to the special lounges which are set aside for travellers who must endure more than their fair share of airports. As a result, I was granted my very first visit to the Maple Leaf Lounges which are found at Lester B. Pearson International Airport. As with any new adventure, there was lots to discover and even more to explore. These little hives of activity are inconspicuous to the otherwise common traveller who can easily pass through the airport without any knowledge of such attention to service.

Two and a half hours of waiting absolutely flew by, and before we knew it, we had left the luxury of one lounge and walked smack into an absolute torrent of humanity, all in various manner of dress, most of which painted a foretaste of the adventure which will unfold in the next few days. Gone were the majority of western-styles of clothing, replaced rather by sari and flowing robes that speak these days more of those who are from the Middle East or perhaps from the Indian sub-continent.

People of all ages moved in a steady undulating stream toward the ticket counter, paying little or no heed to the invitations of the airline personnel to board the waiting aircraft by seat and row number. In the midst of the throng, there was a whisp of dark cloth which seemed to move between the people, making its way toward the ticket counters. As I looked closely, I discovered that there was indeed an aged woman beneath a vast expanse of cloth. Her body had been worn and twisted with age and who knows what kinds of experience.

As the lines snaked onto the waiting aircraft, the sights and sounds disappeared from the boarding lounge, leaving it in apparent peace and quiet, the hubub having been transformed into neat rows within the waiting jet. Thus began the second leg of this journey, an eight-hour overnight flight which has brought us to the city of Zurich.

It is Sunday morning, and all is quiet. We have managed to find the Business Lounge here as well, complete with a variety of pastries and chocolate (yes, the world-famous Swiss chocolate which one eats for breakfast, lunch and dinner in these parts) all waiting to bid us Wilkomen. Here we wait for the next leg of the trip. In a matter of hours, this brief stop in the midst of the Alps will be over, and we will once again be streaking across the skies. After yet another eight-hour flight, we will finally have reached our destination.

What awaits us there, only time will tell. It will be just after midnight on Monday morning by the time we greet the land of the Tomistic Christians, and the adventure will continue.