By Dani Nuchereno
“Hi Honey, Sending you some spending $. We hope you have a very memorable holiday season in Germany. We will miss you! Love you lots, aunt Deb and uncle Den.”
– Note received just before departure
A winter storm and a Meat Loaf concert landed me in Swiss immigration purgatory on Christmas Eve. I was trying to return home to Germany from what was meant to be a quick trip to Dublin. This makes my life sound glamorous, but my days were spent meticulously cataloguing spare parts for recycling machines while barely getting by with elementary German. Getting away for a few days sounded like heaven, and who would pass up a 63-year-old belting out “Bat Out of Hell” to a packed house in Dublin?
But the storm stretched three days into ten, and rerouted my flight through Switzerland, where immigration officers deemed me an “inadmissible passenger,” a scarlet letter for everyone else in the airport to scrutinize. Other travelers stared as I was turned away at customs, wondering what crime I’d committed to be so summarily rejected from entering the rest of the airport, and consequently the country. In a sea of people pushing to get to immigration control, I was the only one moving in the other direction.
There’s a particular heat associated with the humiliation of being stared at by strangers, and I felt it as my blood pounded in my ears. When I asked the immigration agent who refused my entry, “what do I do now?” I received a bureaucratic shrug that signaled the universal “not my problem.” In crisp English, he informed me I could return to Ireland or fly to the United States, but I wasn’t welcome to re-enter Schengen Europe.
And so I found myself stranded in the non-Schengen terminal with a laptop I couldn’t plug in anywhere, a cellphone with rapidly dwindling prepaid minutes, and clothes for three days that had become indefinite.
The airport’s amenities were many. Looking at the terminal map, I saw a whole host of wonderful shops and restaurants I could access if only they’d let me into the main terminal. Unfortunately, I was limited to the non-Schengen terminal. Food was scarce: one place served pasta and sandwiches but closed early for the holiday. Otherwise, my options were souvenir Swiss chocolate from gift shops or a few small snack foods. The chocolate was, at least, of the finest quality. I’ve had worse Christmas dinners.
A key discovery was a Swiss Gear shop with a life-saving universal travel adapter hidden alongside backpacks and luggage. Without it, my laptop, my only connection to the outside world, would have been a paperweight.
I reported my situation to my family with relentless cheerfulness inversely proportional to my inner despair. Without a working phone, I resorted to internet calling, holding my laptop up to my face while trying to stay out of other travelers’ way. One woman, with perfectly coiffed gray hair, stylish glasses, and matching luggage, seemed to follow me everywhere with judgmental eyebrows. It’s a hallmark of 19th-century novels that some stern matron will ‘sniff’ her disapproval. I’d thought that was dramatic license until I was on the wrong end of it.
Eventually, she caught a flight, along with a steady stream of others. Remaining travelers moved with the particular energy of the holiday rush; some excited to get home, others dreading contentious family dinners at journey’s end. Everyone moved along, part of the current, except me.
I spent Christmas Eve folded across two chairs, trying unsuccessfully to sleep. After a few hours, I gave up and polished off my gift shop chocolate while watching The Muppet Christmas Carol, Home Alone, and Christmas in Connecticut on my laptop. I’d downloaded American holiday specials to share with my German roommates, both spending the holidays in our small apartment. Obviously, I wouldn’t be making it back in time to celebrate.
From the terminal windows, I watched the gradual shift from night to day. It was my first ever Christmas morning alone. I’d spent holidays away from home before, but always with friends or chosen family. Since the time difference meant I couldn’t call home, I focused on securing a flight back to Ireland. Nothing. Not a seat, not a standby slot, not even a maybe. Best case was Boxing Day, but no promises.
Packed light for Ireland, I wandered the now-empty terminal. One particularly obnoxious man with a button-down shirt and the long tan coat sported by wealthy businessmen everywhere spent his entire stay loudly complaining about airline incompetence on his phone in a mix of three languages. He was delayed one day due to weather, would be home for Christmas dinner in a matter of hours. I wanted to shake him.
As I tried to outrun his voice, I stumbled on an odd discovery. All the seats in the terminal were the same at every gate, except one. Tucked away near the end of a gate, almost hidden, one had a high back and footrest while the others were short and uncomfortable. I claimed it, convincing myself things weren’t so bad. I had a perfect view of the runway, watching all the planes I wasn’t on shuttle people where they wanted to go.
A nearby television shared mass in a language I didn’t speak but felt I could almost understand when caught from the corner of my ear. Maybe Latin. It made me think of my dad, who in the flurry of communications shared his engagement to his longtime girlfriend. When lunchtime came and went, marked by more gift shop chocolate (this time with nuts, for the protein), I knew they’d be heading to church. Though I hadn’t attended in years, and had no desire to start, watching that unintelligible mass stirred nostalgic longing.
My laptop kept me sane, providing connection to the outside world. I was a compulsive blogger, and having chronicled my airport stay, messages of support popped up from unexpected sources. My ex-boyfriend, whom I hadn’t spoken to in months, sent an Amazon gift card. “Here’s a little something for your Swiss Christmas. Go get yourself a good book to help pass the time that you’re stuck in customs limbo. Merry Xmas. -Bill”
I emailed my boss to explain my pending absence, and his reply came in perfect understatement: “It sounds for me that the last days are not the best in your life.” He offered assistance, anything he could do, which was unfortunately not much at that point.
Later, I finally reached my mom, holding my laptop to my ear while she managed Christmas dinner prep and fretted that I was alone. I could hear kids shrieking with laughter in the background, adults warning them away from the basement stairs, the clatter of pans and clink of glasses a familiar soundtrack even through tinny laptop speakers.
After tearfully hanging up with my mom, terminal staff took pity and told me about a small hotel, barely worthy of the name. Tucked in an unremarkable hallway, it had small rooms with beds and showers for people without proper visas to leave the airport. The prices were outrageous, but worth avoiding another night trying to sleep in the terminal.
I hunkered down to watch the Doctor Who holiday special, freshly downloaded on my indispensable laptop. Despite my outward optimism, around 10pm when I’d run out of media and passed the exhaustion where sleep might be possible, I shared my desolation with a close friend:
“I’m trying not to be melodramatic, but I can’t sleep in this miserable little room and I just want to cry. This is really just horrible and I’ve never felt so alone in my life. I can’t stop thinking about what’ll happen if they don’t let me back in [to Germany]. My room is a disaster, how could I possibly ask someone to pack up my apartment?”
After two days of indignities, I couldn’t help but dwell on those still ahead. But something shifted in that sterile little room. Perhaps it was the exhaustion, or the chocolate catching up to me, or simply the human capacity to adapt. I stopped endlessly refreshing flight listings and just listened to the hum of the vents, the muffled footsteps outside, the occasional announcement echoing down the hall. It wasn’t peace, not exactly, but for the first time in nearly two days, I slept.
I still keep that power adapter in my travel bag. I wish I could say it was because I learned some grand lesson about resilience or, well, adaptability. But really, it’s because you never know when three days will stretch into ten. The next time the universe decides to make my holiday season memorable, at least my laptop will work.
