A Lesson in Selfless Kindness

I was at Cairo airport recently at the check-in desk queue on a work trip to Yemen. I had been there for at least fifty mins waiting as some people were continuously cutting the queue, trying to haggle their ten overweight suitcases and just stalling. At this point I am getting tired and increasingly impatient.

There’s just one couple in between myself and the desk when an old woman in a wheelchair is pushed into the line by an airport attendee. It crosses my mind that this is going to take even longer, but she was elderly so of course we let her in. But what I saw after that stuck with me for the rest of the day.

While some people had been trying to push in, others were resisting by moving their trolleys so people can’t cut in etc (the usual tricks of the trade to stop intruders!). But when this woman came, everyone, I mean ‘everyone’ within a three-metre radius from other queues just focused on her. People moved out the way, one guy is saying ‘come here, come here’ making space, whilst another one is trying to pull her to the front of the desk.

Now the staff member shouts to the desk ‘She’s on her own, please process her’. At this point, I thought OK, the staff member will take her ticket and take her through passport control and that’s it – the usual we see in UK airports. But the people in this queue took it personally!

Instead, one young guy who looks like a young cool rap artist, bends down and starts to speak to her seemingly worried and asking about her. two/three random guys crowd around her as if they were her bodyguards, giving her moral support. Then the husband of the couple in front of me gets involved, starts talking to her and gets his phone dialling the woman’s daughter on the phone to find out where she is going, what she’s doing etc.

As soon as he hangs up, he grabs the trolley from the assistant, tells the old woman ‘Do not worry’, takes her passport and pushes her to the front to help her get processed. In the meantime he says something to his wife, who nods approvingly.

Fast forward sixty mins, I am on the bus going to the plane and I notice the man’s wife sat there but I couldn’t see her husband. I’m thinking where is he – did he get stuck or have an issue?

While we are stationary on the bus watching, a vehicle with a tail lift drives up to the plane and as the doors are opening I see a load of wheel chairs and elderly people. In the middle of this entourage, I see this woman’s husband holding the old lady’s wheelchair, two passports in his hands with a beaming smile! I’m stunned for a moment, but then I realise… This man took it upon himself to take this old woman under his care right up all the way to the plane itself and not leave it to the airport staff.

As I boarded, I was reflecting on this scene and I can honestly say this man was happy. I could just tell that was the look. It wasn’t tiredness, regret or anger – it was a look of accomplishment. It was joy that I did it.