I spent the days leading up to my winter break trip to my hometown in India vibrating in excitement. I hadn’t been back in years, and I absolutely could not wait to see my family after all this time. As cliche as it sounds, my trip wasn’t all about the destination to me – it was also about the journey. My parents and I were taking multiple connecting flights, one of which was in Paris! While, realistically, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to spot the twinkling Eiffel Tower from inside Paris’s airport, Charles de Gaulle (CDG), I was still thrilled to be landing in the City of Love. I even giddily thought I might be able to use bits of the six years of French that I took over the course of middle school and high school. I just couldn’t wait.
Let’s fast forward to Atlanta when my parents and I were eagerly waiting for our next flight to CDG. I had set my alarm to 5:45 p.m., preparing myself to board for the 6:30 p.m. flight. But, then came an announcement. Then another. Slowly, we watched the monitors as they delayed the flight boarding time, again and again, until they changed the gate entirely. At this point, the flight was over three hours delayed, which meant that we would be missing our connecting flight in Paris. We didn’t worry, though, knowing we could just get the next available flight!
Finally, after hours of waiting for the plane, followed by nine hours of flying, we landed in Paris CDG at 12:30 p.m.. I breathed a sigh of relief once we landed, not knowing that this was when the nightmare would start.
The pilot announced over the intercom right before the seat belt signs turned off: “If you missed a connection due to the delay, an agent will meet you at the gate to ensure you’re transferred to another flight.” My parents and I de-boarded, joining a small crowd waiting for the agent who never came. Worried, we left the gate, looking for any staff who could point us in the right direction.
We came across one man in a small alcove who was surrounded by an audience of passengers frantically asking for directions. After waiting our turn, we only had to say “connecting” before the man swiftly pointed in a vague direction and told us to take the tram to Terminal 2K. Flustered, we walked in that direction until we managed to board the tram just in time. Once we reached Terminal 2K, we followed travelers and asked for directions until we reached the hour-long line for the Air France help desk.
Turns out, we were one of several who had missed their connecting flight. The worry started to set in. The next, and only, flight was set to leave at 1:35 p.m. At currently 1:05 p.m., there was no way we’d be able to make it given the line we were stuck in. I started just calling Air France and CDG while standing in line, hoping in vain that I could still make the flight.
Of course, the odds were not in my favor. Eventually, the help desk told us the next available flight was the morning after, to a completely different city in India. We’d have to take another connecting flight from there to our city. She printed us tickets, told us we’d be staying in Hotel Campanile for the night, handed us meal vouchers to use at the airport and sent us on our way. My parents and I, famished at this point, decided to use these meal vouchers. We asked different staff members for directions to a restaurant in the airport and were sent from Terminal 2L to 2M to 2K back to 2L. Finally, a staff member told us we had to go through security to eat!
As we were waiting in line to go through security, another tourist, a Black man traveling alone and in the same predicament as us, joined our group. Suddenly, a woman who worked at CDG came up to us, screaming. “Go, Go, GO!” she yelled, almost shoving us out of line. We tried to ask her what the issue was and told her that we’re just waiting to go get food. We got nothing but more yelling, this time followed by angry gestures, shouting that we should go back to 2K for food. The man with us started to match her energy, and the anger that her yelling sparked in me almost caused me to do the same. Eventually, my dad, realizing that this was a lost cause, gently escorted our group away from the worker. At that moment, I saw her turn away, only to completely change her demeanor when a white French traveler approached her, asking a question.
Rage bubbled in me, quickly overpowered by frustration and a feeling of powerlessness. Around 7 p.m., more than six hours later, we were still being bounced around from terminal to terminal, hungry and tired. At this point, we had to part ways with our new friend, resigning ourselves to just going to the hotel to get some rest. We battled our way to finding where immigration was, and finally got out from the other side, tossing our food vouchers away.
Now came the issue of finding the airport shuttle to the hotel. Again, we went through the cycle of asking for directions. I used my broken French to piece together questions whenever a worker didn’t speak English, sadly realizing that my expectations of Paris were so far from reality. After walking for 45 minutes to the beginning of Terminal 3– yes, that’s how long it takes to cross across Terminal 2– we finally reached the crowd waiting for the shuttle. More than an hour later, we boarded the shuttle. We silently traveled to Hotel Campanile, only to get off the shuttle and come across a long line of tourists extending from the front desk to outside and up the sidewalk. My mom hugged me as we waited in the cold, shivering and exhausted. Finally, finally, we reached the front, got our room key and promptly passed out in our respective, tiny beds. Come morning, we repeated the process once more, printing new boarding passes–they’d changed our flight overnight–going through immigration and bouncing between terminals until we stumbled to our gate. I checked my pedometer– I had walked 17,000 steps in the span of 24 hours, just in the airport. Looking back, I realize that I was on edge the entire time I was there, only breathing a sigh of relief the second we landed in India.
What was supposed to be a wondrous few hours in Paris CDG turned out to be the most horrible and tiring day of my life. Everywhere I went in the airport, I felt unwelcome and pushed out. Of course, there were some wonderful workers who tried their best to help us (notably, all but one was a person of color). Still, the air of otherness never left me until I was 30,000 feet in the air.
Even though I had such a difficult experience, my experience in CDG has taught me a lot. First of all, avoid CDG at all costs! Second of all, though, I truly came to understand how much I could withstand and still persevere. Every minute I was there, I was utterly grateful for my parents’ support. They endured the otherness even more than I did, but they never once lost their calm. They were my rock, and I tried to pay them back by taking charge, finding directions and figuring out the next steps. They helped me believe that even in this strange land, I could find solutions and lead, one problem at a time. While I never would have wanted to go through this, I can’t deny that I came out a stronger person on the other side. Next time, though, maybe I’ll choose a different international airport.