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Around Town

A rainy outing

By Dave Faries
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
October 3rd, 2007 issue

Despite the apparent wisdom and popular acceptance of biblical advice to put away childish things, baby boomers — and those who came after — still harbor a hidden capacity for unadulterated joy.

This was evident one afternoon during last week’s incessant rain when a group of well-heeled travel professionals gathered at Ruzyně Airport for a behind-the-scenes tour. Everyone wore fitted suits and bright ties, designer boots and stylish jackets bearing, I’m sure, nameplates such as Hugo Boss, Donald Pliner or Salvatore Ferragamo.
These folks belong to a group called SKAL, and they’re a serious bunch, asking pointed questions and trading insights, purposefully gathering contact information.
If you weren’t aware, SKAL is an international organization gathering leaders in the tourism industry together to discuss issues of common interest and unify travel professionals, hotel managers, and so on — a good organization.
Not a hard-partying crowd, at least not in the middle of a workday.
What brought out a spate of juvenile giddiness was a brief peek inside the airport’s fire station. Rain drowned out several planned stops and brought much of the normal tarmac action to a standstill. Sure, we wandered through the plush (in a ’70s sense of the word) VIP departure lounge, the place where Mick Jagger, nouveau riche Russians and others of worth watch TV and order sushi and skirt public awe.
Actually, few people were aware of this little perk. Traveling diplomats usually receive special treatment, of course. Not many airports, it seems, provide completely separate facilities — including a private security station and vehicle to bus them out to their plane — for all the swells with the means and willingness to book space.
But that’s an aside.
The seldom-seen fire station probably doesn’t make the tour list too often. It has a roof, however, so we shuffled off the bus into a functional, boxlike structure.
Men in the group were immediately frozen by a display case full of plastic aircraft models.
They — I should say we — elbowed for glimpses of scaled down Spitfires, B-17s, 747s, Sopwith Camels, ME 109s, DC-3s, SR-71s … a crowd of men in business dress craning to identify hand-painted mock-ups on plain glass shelves. One pointed at a four-inch Boeing airliner with a slightly smaller space shuttle glued to its back and, sporting a broad smile, recounted the time he saw the real combination zoom overhead. I once watched a Flying Fortress roar into the sky and babbled about that moment.
We were reluctant to move until finally ushered on by tour directors.
Inside, our hosts improvised an impressive show: Firefighters slid down a pole, one after another in rapid succession, drawing wondrous laughter and backslapping; one donned his suit and gear as professionals gawked, pointed and poked at the stuff; finally, they started up one of the chunky 90 million Kč ($4.6 million) fire suppression trucks, taking a short spin in front of the building then letting fly with its water cannons.
As geysers shot into the dripping air, we gestured and edged forward for better views. Sophisticated men and women with years of travel industry experience blurted things like “cool” and “awesome.”
Our tour ended there, although a second bottleneck at the display case delayed things just a bit. We finally made it to the new Marriott Courtyard hotel for a buffet lunch. The excitement over, men straightened ties, women tugged at blouses, smiles became guarded and functional, conversation settled.
It was all business, once again.
None of that mattered, though, when I returned to the office. Right off I told my editor about the firemen sliding down the pole and firing water cannons. His response? “Ooh, that’s cool.”

Dave Faries can be reached at dfaries@praguepost.com


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