Trials and Tribulations of Wheelchairs, Airports and Travels

Dr. Roopali walks down the memory lane and tells us what it is to be on wheelchairs in airports. Replete with details, her narrative is laced with wit. An exclusive for Different Truths.

My good friend – a sprightly 80 something, has been using a wheelchair at airports ever since she turned 58!  A legitimate Senior Citizen in India at that ripe old age (!!)

She had chanced upon a comfortable way to negotiate the miles inside airports. Discovered, of course, legitimately, when she had badly sprained her right ankle.

Wheelchair passengers, she learned, her ankle throbbing, get fast track entry into the airplane. They get to the head of long immigration and security queues. The efficiency of it all was worth a million bucks, she figured!

For the past 25 years or so she has recommended the airport wheelchair experience to everyone. It’s free! That’s the best part, she chuckles. “And you can carry extra luggage on your lap without huffing and puffing through the terminal!” And what about the person pushing the wheelchair, you ask?  “Oh, well, that’s their career choice!” She brushes aside any sympathy.

I find there are so many who think like my friend. Some airlines have caught on and ask for a medical necessity note when you reserve an airport wheelchair. Of course, there are also genuine security concerns.

Truth be told, the sly wheelchair passenger is somewhat of a VIP and a bully. Riding around inside the airport in their own private chauffeur driven gadi (vehicle). They make stops at the duty-free shop. There, they leap out of the wheelchair, and buy as much as they can fit on their laps. They then leap back onto the wheelchair and ride off into the airplane with their duty-free purchases.

The fun seems to stop there, though. Wheelchair passengers are not eligible to sit in exit row seats. There is no hope of additional leg space. Afterall, it is assumed you couldn’t help in an emergency. So much for being clever! 

Ignoring my enterprising friend’s advice, for years I had walk-dragged myself and my heavy cabin baggage. I had lugged it past fragrance shops and high-end clothing.

Until one ominous day, a freak accident broke most of my bones. I could no longer walk those many miles inside modern airports. Not even our very own Delhi Airport, voted the best in the world!

The wheelchair politely awaited me. 

All airlines are extra courteous to wheelchair-using passengers. Lest somebody create a scene and there is litigation. 

The wheelchair pushing staff at Indian airports are normally grumpy daily-wage earners. They come to Delhi as migrant labour from the neighbouring states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. The despise the uniform they are forced to wear. On it, boldly emblazoned, “No Tips Please!”

We Indians follow rules when they are to our advantage. So, we never tip the wheelchair pushing staff. It doesn’t matter they have been pushing our ample self with our heavy cabin baggage and other packages strung up on the wheelchair.

Oh, please do not misunderstand me. There are those with genuine requirements. I am talking about those who can easily walk the fragrant mile but choose not to. Somebody started this ‘age is only a number’ stuff, and now everyone is off on package tours to Europe. 

Nike tennis shoes are a massive red flag! These long queues of wheelchair joyriders are big time morning walkers. But at airports, they take a free ride. 

If boarding is delayed, the ‘pusher’ vanishes, promising to return when it’s time to board. This can be quite disconcerting, I have learned. You are left high and dry. You can’t even jump out and go window shopping. What if someone ran off with your stuff?!  

One such time before I became a legitimate wheelchair passenger myself, I watched an elderly woman being wheeled in and unceremoniously left in a corner. Thirsting for some tea, I took off in search of a hot cuppa.

Something made me ask the elderly woman if she would like some tea. 

She looked grateful. “Haanji puttar,” (Yes, child), she nodded in Punjabi.  

When I returned with the tea there were six more elderly ladies on wheelchairs. All from Punjab. Seeing me bringing tea to the forlorn one, they requested some as well. So, there I was running up and down, ferrying tea to the aunties at 2 a.m.! The flight was delayed.  

The tea did its thing. One of the ladies wanted to use the restroom. There was no pusher in sight. I became the pusher. That’s when I discovered you need great skills to manoeuvre a wheelchair. I almost turned the lady over on to the floor! Her dreams of Keneda (Canada) would have ended right here. 

Memories of the tough business of pushing a wheelchair made me sneak generous tips to the pusher. It did not matter where in the world I was. This I knew was certainly no easy job. 

I must confess, even as a card-carrying airport wheelchair user, using one makes me feel awkward and guilty.

In the United States, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Indonesia, women pushers and porters are common. In fact, once at Heathrow Airport, the lady pusher turned out to be from Gujarat on the west coast of India. She was visibly thrilled to chat with me about her home in Bhavnagar. I remembered reading that Bhavnagar railway station has all women porters. 

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Security personnel at airports are very suspicious of wheelchair-using passengers. The officers are poker faced, harsh and commanding. Your fractured leg, your ortho belt, your beeping metal knee, your creaking neck, your recent tooth implant could all carry hidden explosives. You, my dear could be a human bomb! If you are looking for sympathy, you can forget it! 

The hijab-wearing security official at Penang airport was not at all convinced I was a genuine medical case. She called my daughter-in-law aside and began to question her. Things got a bit sticky because my daughter-in-law was a new bride and didn’t know much about my condition.

In Kuala Lumpur, the pusher was particularly sulky. He had no idea whether it was worthwhile to push me along because he didn’t predict a tip. So, he just stopped midway, and took off, saying he had other work. I had to ease myself off the wheelchair. At 3 a.m. the airport was lonely.

At an airport in the United States, they wheeled me away to a separate room. The 21 titanium nails in my leg had started a cacophony of beeping. Experts were called in to examine me thoroughly.

I pretended I was okay with it because it was for everyone’s safety. I managed a smile here and there. My smiles were received by stern, cold looks. Every bit of me was prodded and poked. It was late now, and I would miss my flight back to India. Where on earth was my spouse? Anxiety overtook me. 

When finally let off by the security people, I hobbled with my stick looking for the spouse and the wheelchair guy. They had both vanished. The companion spouse had been whisked off for questioning. They had seen him loitering around, looking bewildered as he searched for me.  

Oh, so he was with that lady in the wheelchair? When he tried telling them he was a military guy, they got hysterical. These military fellows, they knew turn rogue and use their weapons knowledge. 

So, there he was with all kinds of hands moving over his body.  Skin pinching included to ascertain presence of gunpowder or other explosives. Could it be we were being racially profiled? There were human rights lawyers sitting in a row to take complaints. We had a flight to board. The pusher never returned, and I hobbled all the way.

Furious with me for getting him into this spot, the spouse exclaimed, “It’s your attire! All this lehenga long skirt and tunic stuff you wear! And that big bindi on your forehead!”

Another time at Heathrow, the pusher just plain abandoned me in a crowded waiting room. After some time, a brusque, rude, platinum-haired lady yanked me off the wheelchair and stuffed a protesting me into a crowded golf cart.

I protested because the spouse who had strolled off sniffing Starbucks had not returned. She was not going to wait.  And off she drove through miles and miles of corridors and tunnels into elevators that took us to different floors, buildings, tunnel like corridors dropping off passengers. 

Finally, she dropped me off on a floor near a boarding bay. I was about to start wailing overcome by separation anxiety. Boarding had started and I didn’t have the slightest idea what I was supposed to do. I didn’t have my boarding pass or my passport on me.  

It’s only when I saw the tall figure with a Starbucks Coffee cup in his hand coolly strolling toward me that I realised how helpless I had been as a wheelchair user.  

A story I often tell is of Dubai airport. A renowned airline had charged us $40 per passenger to give us royal treatment when we got off at Dubai for a flight-change. An escort, and a comfy golf car would take us to the connecting flight in another terminal. It was all confirmed.

Oh well, thanks to their imagined hospitality, we almost missed the flight. There was no comfy golf cart. No chaperone. That’s when two wheelchair pushers turned up! They bundled me and my nearly 80-year-old brother-in-law into wheelchairs and took off like the wind!

They rushed us off at such great speed through the silent airport. Miles of it, including two ghost trains, elevators, escalators and moving ramps. The spouse, an ex-commando and a fitness freak ran alongside. We heard no announcements.  It is a silent airport. We had no idea if there was a plane waiting. The two young men assured us we would be fine.

It was Ramzan (Ramadan), and they were fasting. Armaan was from Pakistan and Irfan from Bangladesh. Hungry, thirsty young men pushing, assuring, smiling. 

Not long after, we disembarked right at the door of the aircraft which was about to be slammed shut on our late arrival faces. I put my hand in blessing on the heads of these two young men as they bowed to touch my knee. Air space was shut off between our countries. Some political wrangling.

We were to take a longer route back to India. But the affection of these young men on the ground surpassed all political wrangling. The spouse had tipped them. A very generous amount. For their evening Iftar. The fast-breaking prayerful dinner.

My experiences should not stop you from using a wheelchair if you need to. But if you can walk without pain, do it. It is good exercise before getting cramped inside a long flight. 

And yes, always be kind. Tip your wheelchair pusher.

Transiting Passenger

“Can you stand up?” 
the security official looked 
at the wheelchair.
“If only I could,” I thought to myself.

She indicated I stand up and walk 
towards her to the checking booth. 
Perhaps she thought I was taking a free ride.

I had fallen like Icarus 
out of the grey sky.
The loose brick 
plummeted me to the 
stone strewn ground.

It’s been sometime since I 
surrendered myself to
a different life journey.
A winding alley where I can 
hear voices of concern  
and feel a closer companionship.
I am no longer alone 
nor left to fend for myself.
A more tactile world. 

I see more of others
I watch while waiting.
People hurried and harried
People lost and sad
People bidding goodbye
People smiling with joy.
kids running about 
Having a merry time.

I am a lone flower on a tall stalk. 
I have learned another path to walk.
What no eyes can 
see no muscles can feel
is my throbbing body pain prone?
And that is when I am alone. 

The jingling beads tied to my 
ortho stick took a merry ride with 
my passport, my purse, 
my phone, and my laptop.

They stood forlorn on the other side
waiting to be claimed. 
I was nobody without them. 

I am seized with panic  
at the sound of restless feet
and can feel the grumpy looks 
lining up behind me. 
A stiff official hand 
has waved 
for me to move. 

The wheelchair pusher 
Has helped me stand up. 
I hobble cobble those miles
as sweat pours down my neck. 
I can feel the heat of the sun 
My wings are dripping wax. 

Behind the curtain 
the booth is terrifying. 
The doctor’s certificate 
Ignored, abandoned and suspect.

My body beeped and beeped! 
The 21 throbbing titanium nails 
strung up an orchestra loud and clear.
They have surrounded and
cordoned me off.

During a long suffocating body inspection   
I was lifted, pressed, and tapped
and gloved hands had moved all over me. 
I had found the silence deafening.

I could be a human torpedo. 
I could just rip through the
aircraft splitting it into two.
I could be a hijacker!
Leaving me bruised in heart, 
With my body and mind in acute pain 
They let me go without a goodbye. 

For an infinite moment 
I had turned into a robot. 
Here I am still human, 
my pain is palpable.
The anxious pram pusher 
looks sadly at me
I think she understands my pain.

All day she pushes people like me 
up and down and down and up.
Pushing people into eerie silent elevators 
past the aroma of freshly ground coffee,
the fragrance of perfumes, 
those Cinderella gowns and pashmina scarves
and the smell of sandwiches and freshly 
baked bagel on a hungry stomach. 

Unseen her body must ache too.
A comradeship of pain holds us together. 
She is my witness. And I, hers.
 
We were both transiting passengers
Not everything in life is Duty Free.

Picture design by Anumita Roy, Different Truths