I mention in each travel day post that I dislike air travel. It feels chaotic and uncivil in ways other forms of transport avoid. Each airport and airline has its own system that you can’t know if you have not been there before. Sometimes your experience is different due to the people you encounter. Add in tight time constraints, and I have a recipe for stress.

To combat my airport anxiety, we usually leave earlier than we need. This is especially true if we are staying in a residential neighborhood and we don’t speak the language. Thankfully, my Uber app works in Norway. An actual taxi shows up in under five minutes (I no longer have to think about bus routes ….and back up plans…..check).

I relax as we pull into the small airport. We have more than enough time. Too much time. That makes me happy. There are no workers visible as we make our way to baggage drop. We realize that we have to get our own baggage tags, but we aren’t sure where. We find the self service kiosks after wandering around. There are literally no workers helping anyone. The lines are long. An elderly woman asks for our help. I help her get her documents and we wait for our turn. I put in our information and we get a boarding pass ….but no luggage tag. I try again and again on a different machine… no tags.

Now what? I go to the only human that looks official, standing alone, and looking at her phone. She tells me she only works for her airline ……not ours. Find your sign she says. I look everywhere and see a board with dozens of small emblems. A worker pushes past me in the crowd, I try to ask…she keeps walking. I notice that several other passengers are in the same situation.

Finally a worker that I track down as she races away from me tells me to get in line for counter three. We do, and are 8th in line. The line for counter four is 30 people deep. We wait. Twenty minutes go by and the worker is still assisting the same family. The crowd grows restless. I try a ticket machine again. Still not working… I ask for help from a passing person in an airport jacket, and am ignored. Someone appears and is randomly helping people in the back of our line. We wait. Forty minutes and the line finally moves.

Two from the front of the line now and an agent appears and moves the people in front of us over behind a tape barrier. She asks why we are in line. I tell her we were unable to get baggage tags. She tells me I have to go to a machine. I tell her I have. She gets mad and tells us to come with her to a machine. My husband stays in line, we are giving up our place as there are now dozens of people in line.

I follow her back to a kiosk. She tells me how to work the machine. I tell her I have already done the things she suggests multiple times and was able to help others successfully. She yells, “I am trying to explain to you.” I say okay. She tries again. It doesn’t work…again. She says “maybe it was out of paper the first time, lots of people have this problem, I need to understand what is happening to help.”

I get sent back to the line and we get moved behind the tape barrier. She then turns and proceeds to tell the many people in line behind us that they have to move to the end of an even longer line four. This is when the mutiny happens.

People who have been standing in line for almost an hour with no movement and no assistance are being told to move into a line that doesn’t even show they service the correct airline. They refuse to move. The airline agent tells them she needs to clear the aisle for safety. They refuse. She tells them they have to listen, that she is in charge. They refuse. She keeps saying I understand……I know it is unfair ……but you have to do as I say. They refuse.

I honestly don’t know what happens next. It takes all of two minutes to print our baggage tags. I suspect if she spent as much time opening a new computer as she spent yelling at passengers who could not navigate faulty self service equipment she could have cleared the ticketing area in short order. There are only two counter agents in an entire airport trying to cover passages for over a dozen airlines. Welcome to the post technology hellscape of travel.

Security lines are long but moving. For whatever reason everyone with a camera is being detained and having a residue check. So I wait. There was no room to wait so I shield my belongings and dodge passengers dashing to their planes. Eventually my coat and very old camera are released.

Finally, a few hours after we get to the airport, we are able to sit and have a croissant. The view from the airport windows of snow on the fjord makes the Tromso waiting areas among the most beautiful I have ever seen. Unfortunately the inside of this airport is chaos. The tagline for tourism social media here is Tromso love. My hot take on the airport is Tromso hate.

It all becomes a little clearer when the same counter agents from downstairs appeared to check in passengers for at least three flights. So it appears that three, maybe four, people are providing check in service and boarding services for a dozen airlines! I predict in the next iteration of cost cutting we will be self serving snacks (which you have to pay for on a domestic flight) and possibly serving as co-pilot.