Anyway we got to talking about the famine in Somalia which is of course terrible and I sure worthy of it's own blog post entirely, but this posting isn't about that. It made me think of the Somali's I had dealt with at the airport and one guy in particular.....
I was taking a smoke break in the staff area when I got a call asking me to check on a situation at the gate, there were problems with a Somali passenger....
The agent working the flight was originally from Pakistan and he was one of the nicest, calmest, politest people you could meet, really a charming guy, we will call him Khan as I have terribly forgotten this nice mans name.
So I stubbed out my cigarette, left my coffee standing and ran to the gate expecting to find a forged passport or an impostor (Someone using another person's passport), what i found was a very angry looking Somali guy and a very stressed looking Khan. I spoke to Khan quickly to check the situation, the guy had a British refugee travel document and Khan had simply asked him about his trip, how long he had been out of the UK and a bit about his life in the UK, now it might sound strange that we ask this but we really needed to ascertain that the guy in front of us really was the one in the passport, and we needed to be sure that he really did live in the UK and know about general life there. We have to do this because so many Somali's send their travel documents to Somalia for their (Very similar looking) family members to use, so normally a few simple questions about the UK have to be asked in order to make us feel that the Doc is in the right hands. Anyway so as I was saying Khan was basically doing his job and doing so in an incredibly cool and polite way. The Somali guy was waving his hands around and screaming "I am a British Citizen" (he wasn't as I mentioned he was an official refugee with the right to stay in the UK).
So here's where it gets good.... the guy turns to me whilst pointing at Khan and yells "THIS FUCKING PAKI IS A RACIALIST!!!!" I wasn't sure if I correctly heard and asked him to repeat himself "I SAID THIS FUCKING PAKI IS A RACIALIST!!" Wow he really did just make one of the most contradictory and wrong sentences I have heard in my life! I stopped myself from laughing and put on my best snooty voice "Sir if it is racist you mean, I can assure you that the only person I can hear being racist at present is you" he carried on with his tirade and I then went on to tell him we were calling the police to make a report about his insults (don't you just love Germany, you can make reports about EVERYTHING) and that he wouldn't be flying tonight, I then walked over to the desk to inform the airline of the decision and while I was on my way the Somali guy rolled up his newspaper and smacked Khan over the head with it!!!!!!!!!!!! Now when I think about it I have to laugh like hell but back then it was serious and it almost escalated,Khan finally lost his cool and went to push the guy, which is of course a huge no, no so I ran and get between them and stayed between them until the police showed up and arrested the crazy Somali guy!!
Wonderful days at the airport really
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