This site is closed to new comments and posts.

Notice: This site uses cookies to function.
If you are not comfortable with cookies then please don't browse this website.

does anyone else make tons of friends at the airport? — Brooklynian

does anyone else make tons of friends at the airport?

alafairnadia
alafairnadia
edited November -1 in The Lounge / Random Stuff
I made like 10 new friends at the airport yesterday (trying to get to DC, trying to get back here from DC - stupid consular offices). this is a common issue for me. I make tons of new friends and end up with like a bunch of new cards, contacts on linkedin/facebook from sitting in an airport bar waiting for a flight or chatting with a cabbie or having lunch at some biz. lunch location, etc. hotel bars also great for this. does anyone else collect these almost collision friends? like, in 15 minutes or less, spill your life story and listen to someone spill theirs and decide that you two can't ever be out of touch since you're clearly besties?

I have an overrun (should I have a sale?) on spare pals.

Comments

  • alafairnadia
    alafairnadia
    I forgot about the nutbars that track me to ellejay. that's always a shocker.
  • anastasia beaverhausen
    anastasia beaverhausen
    I thought I was the only person who did this! I'm still friends with the cutest French painter (on his way to Las Vegas) that I met in an airport bar in Detroit way back in '97.
  • jaha127
    jaha127
    me too!!

    I make the most random friends... on a trip to the Seattle I met an awesome grandma who hooked me up with homemade cookies and a extra blanket!! It pays to look much younger than I actually am...

    Stuck in DFW airport, I made friends with one of the tv reporters from News 12 Brooklyn...

    And last weekend I met a girl from Brooklyn on the shuttle at ATL and we shared our mutual feeling about how a few days in Atlanta makes you miss and appreciate the uniqueness of Brooklyn :)
  • alafairnadia
    alafairnadia
    yay! I thought I was a complete freak! so glad to know I'm not the only one!
  • cabaki
    cabaki
    I made friends with a male supermodel who was sitting next to me on a flight, but unfortunately he already had a girlfriend.
  • landlord
    landlord
    Cabaki...that was you?!
  • jeffrey
    jeffrey
    Count me in on this one.

    It doesn't hurt either that cell phones (with cameras) have become modern day equivalents of endlessly unfurling wallet photo holders of years past.

    Totally facilitates the "instant besties" factor, as I quickly found out while getting a tour of a new chum's girlfriend, favorite tractor and snowmobile, maple syrup farm and fellow volunteer firefighter crew back up in rural northern Vermont as well while discussing the challenges and intricacies of the bale hay marketplace and how glacial movements of old really stacked the deck in favor of the darn Canadians north of the border, whose hay is far more rich in nutrients for your average heifer or other livestock than your garden variety Vermont hay.

    All this over beers awaiting my flight from Jacksonville back up to NYC.

    Cabaki - Did he at least shoot ya the Blue Steel?

    image

    :)
  • em26
    em26
    Hmm , yeah , I don't talk to anyone. I sit there waiting to board the plane with my ipod on and playing my hand held tetris game. When I get bored with those I usually read a book or I watch tv.
  • alafairnadia
    alafairnadia
    em! you're missing out on people collection? no fun!

    amusingly, one of the more hilarious people I met was some guy on a flight to detroit (no shit) -- we were in first class and convinced the flight attendant to just leave us the plastic cups and bottle of wine. we killed it a little quickly. he told me about the charter flights from japan to detroit re: auto shows.
  • darla
    darla
    I'm with em, I don't like to talk to people at airports either. I think it's the New Yorker in me.

    But I made a friend on the Heathrow express a few years ago. He had just gotten off the train and I saw that he had left a bag on the train and I mentioned it to him. He ran back onto the train to retrieve it while I watched his suitcase. He was so grateful since the bag had his ticket and passport. And then the unexpected, he hugged me. Yuck!

    But we talked while waiting for our respective flights and I found out he was my cousin's roomate in college (in Australia). What a small world!
  • alafairnadia
    alafairnadia
    good story, darla!

    when I flew to madrid, also for work and in biz class, my seat mate was this older guy who was totally horrified to watch me pulling out piles of reading material and biz papers -- he had his feet up and was relaxing with a big glass of wine. anyway, when he found out where I worked, he told me that he worked for [insert global corporation that sells makeup via catalogs and secretaries here]. I knew their counsel and asked how said person was doing - found out he died of a fast moving cancer a few months before. freaky. we quickly changed topics and had a great conversation about who-knows-what once I got my greedy little hands on a glass of bubbly.
  • cabaki
    cabaki
    Yeah I used to be all keep-to-myself miss new york too, but i realized how cool of an opportunity it is to make friends in other places and where else are you gonna get that chance if you don't travel much.

    Once you get out of new york (and any extension of ny like florida) its amazing how easy it is to talk to others. I can make friends so easily the minute i leave the city its unbelievable. Besides the supermodel i sat next to, i got the business card of a potential new client, got career advice from a contemporary in a similar industry as mine, and almost landed a date on a flight to london via air india, except that i had a boyfriend at the time...
  • hamilton
    hamilton
    Sen. Larry Craig meets all his new friends in Airports.
  • lo kee
    lo kee
    yeah but usually it involves a cavity search
  • hamilton
    hamilton
    i thought he had dentures
  • alafairnadia
    alafairnadia
    Hamilton wrote: i thought he had dentures
    he hides them. you know.
  • hamilton
    hamilton
    alafairnadia wrote: [quote=Hamilton]i thought he had dentures
    he hides them. you know.


    ****************************************
    so that's why they search him.
  • andypern
    andypern
    Cabaki wrote: Yeah I used to be all keep-to-myself miss new york too, but i realized how cool of an opportunity it is to make friends in other places and where else are you gonna get that chance if you don't travel much.

    Once you get out of new york (and any extension of ny like florida) its amazing how easy it is to talk to others. I can make friends so easily the minute i leave the city its unbelievable. Besides the supermodel i sat next to, i got the business card of a potential new client, got career advice from a contemporary in a similar industry as mine, and almost landed a date on a flight to london via air india, except that i had a boyfriend at the time...
    You feel like its easier to meet people once you leave NY? i find the opposite is true. Maybe you just feel that way about a place you've been so long (i'm originally from Seattle, and I find meeting people there to be damn near impossible unless you have some prior connection with them).

    All that said, airports, airplanes, trains/stations : great places to meet people of all walks of life. I fly a lot so without this interaction i'd have a pretty lonely existance. It is scary when the flight attendants remember your name and what you drink though....
Sign In or Register to comment.

Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!

Sign In

Categories