Fractured Soul - "Welcome To Wherever We'll Be"

Welcome To Wherever We'll Be

© 2006

"Welcome to New Zealand", announces the sign at the gate outside Auckland Airport. It doesn't need to welcome me. I was born here. Not right here at the gate, of course, but in this country. I came in screaming. And in three years' time I'll fly away dreaming. Gets quite isolated living at the bottom of Down Under. Quite a bottlenecked existence, when you think about it. And the flightless Kiwi must spread her wings sometime.

I wonder where you are, somewhere in the sky above me. Today you've left your sunburnt country to spend two weeks living through our eyes. To be one of four million and not twenty million. Under a red-starred flag, and not one where the stars are white and have seven points. A land of three islands instead of seven states. Where rumour has it that the people say "sux" instead of six.
Welcome to New Zealand, my Australian friend.

Right now, though, you aren't here yet and I'm circling the carpark, feeling ostracised because everyone but me seems to have a parking space. I can hear the drone of planes circling overhead. Wonder if one of them's yours? I check my watch. Twenty minutes to go. Can't be yours then. But I know you’re out there, somewhere...somewhere. Like a bird trying to find her place among the flock, I continue the search. A space must open sometime.

I tap my fingers on the steering wheel in a lame impersonation of a drummer without any sticks. I can imagine you, fresh off the plane, waiting and thinking that I've forgotten today is the day. But I've waited for today for over three years. God knows we've been planning the moment in meticulous fashion, embroidering the details more and more every time we speak. I can't forget. Not now. And why would I even want to?

I change the CD in my car, singing along off-key as I go – and hey presto, there's a space. Things are starting to go right. And I don't just mean my car, as it swings to the right and into the empty space. First mission accomplished – now I must go! Run! Now! There's only fifteen minutes until you land, and I know you'll have to go through Customs and Immigration and all that stuff before I finally get to see you, but right now it doesn't matter.

I just want to be there when QF258 arrives from Brisbane.

I run towards International Arrivals as though my life depends on it. It's like I'm being chased, the speed I'm going at. Is that a baggage trolley I'm about to crash into? No time to look twice – stealthily I dodge the obstacle. I know I must look a right idiot, running helter-skelter through Auckland Airport at a million miles an hour, but I'm going to feel a right idiot if I don't find that arrivals screen. I feel lost, and it's no surprise. After all, it's been a while since I ever had the need to come here.

Clock on the wall says ten minutes to go. Shit! Why don't they have a map of this place so I can see if I'm even going in the right direction? A pungent odour wafts in my direction from the duty-free shop and I almost choke on its strength. Chanel No. 5, they call this stuff?! Chanel Barely Alive, more like it. Just one whiff of it is lethal – it slowly takes over my head and sends my thoughts into a place beyond sanity. Intoxicating? Yes. Intolerable? Definitely.

I lose more breath with each passing second, not just because of the perfume, but because of my dash against time in this crowded airport. "Welcome to New Zealand"? With what's going on here at the moment, they should rename the sign "Welcome to Chaos"! I bet life's a lot easier for you right now at 37,000 feet. Just sit back, relax and enjoy the ride. Better you than me, though – I'm scared of flying. Maybe it's because Kiwis have always been flightless? Who knows.

What can this be in front of me? Ah, this is more like it! A Qantas INFORMATION desk! If they can't tell me where the info screen is, then no one can. I screech to a halt in front of the desk, almost out of breath. A young guy in a suit looks up from his typing. "Can I help you?"
"Hopefully...I'm trying to find out when flight QF258 from Brisbane lands."
"I can check that for you...lands in 5 minutes. Gate 14A."

It becomes my mantra. Gate 14A, gate 14A...do you remember the night when we first put the plan in motion, and we didn't know where we'd meet? Looks like this is it, my friend. Three years of waiting will culminate in a happy reunion at Gate 14A, Auckland Airport, New Zealand. "I'll see you wherever we'll be," you said. "And wear your Australia shirt so I can see you easily!" Well, here I am, resplendent in my beautiful adidas Australia cricket shirt, my prized possession.

Not long now.

I reach Gate 14A and my heart is doing the quickstep. Deep breaths, deep breaths. Oh God, why am I so nervous? It's a moment I've rehearsed, imagined a million times in my head. We both have. And there's going to be many more moments after this one...we've spent many a long night laughing our heads off about what hi-jinks we're going to get up to. What's the first thing I'm going to say to you?
Maybe I should let the smile on my face say it all.

Then I see it. Like a majestic streamlined eagle, a plane with the red and white Qantas logo that I know so well makes its entrance onto the Auckland runway. The TV screen on the wall starts to flash. QF258, BRISBANE – LANDED 1531. You're here. Good thing they've got those tunnels connecting the plane to the terminal, because New Zealand in late summer is nothing like what you're used to. Well, mate, you're just going to have to acclimatise.

I sit down on what must be the world's hardest plastic chair, in order to gather my thoughts. I hope the Customs officers are efficient today. Better not have been any drug dealers on your flight, or I might be here a while. I've seen them on that show Border Patrol, the one that's called Border Emergency where you come from. The Customs officers, I mean. Not the drug dealers, although there's been a few of them too. Bloody hell, is the waiting ever going to end?

The minutes tick by and I resort to staring aimlessly into space, wishing that the next baggage trolley to come my way would have you pushing it. A crowd of Japanese tourists passes me, gabbling nineteen to the dozen in their own little world. I look away and study the big screen high on the wall of the arrivals hall, looking for no one in particular. I'm snapped out of my reverie by the sight of someone looking as disoriented as I feel. Their eyes are searching the crowd, and come to rest on...me.

It's you. No more dreaming, no more rehearsing now – this is reality. You're as casual as you always are, in jeans and that bloody Queensland shirt I keep giving you stick about, because I'm a diehard New South Wales supporter. And on your feet? Well, I call them jandals. You call them pluggers. Three years since the first argument we had about what they're really called, we still beg to differ. We'll probably still be arguing when we're sixty. But that's a long way away.

And this is the here and now.

The smile on your face grows wider and wider as you come towards me. By the sight of the pile you've got on that baggage trolley you're pushing, you could be coming for two months, not two weeks! The trolley and its massive load come to a stop, you let go of its handle – but you say nothing. You just step closer and throw your arms around me in a massive bear hug. I can feel myself being lifted off the ground and not for the first time today, I start to feel breathless.

You gently lower me to the ground and we face each other, not having to say a thing. I don't even have to ask you if you’re happy to be here – I can see it by the way your eyes are sparkling. It's as if they are filled with tiny stars; your own perfect universe.
"Hey," I finally manage to say. "Welcome to New Zealand...mate, I'm surprised Customs let you in, with that shirt." You just grin, and say what you've said to me countless times when I've gone too far with my dry wit. "Smart-arse."

We stroll through the airport, me asking you random questions about the flight, what the food was like, blah blah blah; you pushing the trolley one-handed, the other arm around my waist as I give you directions. Arriving at the car, we dump your gear in the boot. Then, with The Living End – your favourite – pumping through the speakers, we make our exit, singing our heads off like two old drinking buddies on a karaoke night at the pub.

Just outside the airport gates, we pass the sign I saw on the way in. "Welcome to New Zealand." It doesn’t need to welcome me. I'm a native of this land, after all. But the country I've spent my life in is foreign to you; it's people like you that the sign is here to welcome. We're inviting you to become one of us, if only for a short time. Three years ago you said to me, "I'll see you wherever we'll be." Well, looks like this is it, my friend. Welcome to wherever we'll be.

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