“To be very honest, law doesn’t work, it may work when you bring your case in a court of law but not at an airport check in counter.”
By: Aalam Singh Batth.
I told her I was a law student, I showed her my college ID, I showed her the voluminous editions of the Constitution, Civil Procedure Code and the 3 books of the newly enacted criminal law books (I was carrying old books home). Nothing sufficed, I told her, “I genuinely thought I had booked a student ticket. You take my college ID, allow me the 25kg checkin, don’t give me the 10% student discount and please let me fly home in peace.” Her answer was a definitive, “No sir, I can’t help you, on a normal ticket you’re only allowed 15kg.” Then I did what every frugal Indian would do, I picked up 7kg worth of books in one hand and begged her for mercy. I told her that when I become a lawyer I would fight her case for free, she gave me a look and said, “you gotta pay extra man.” So, I paid her the extra 1.4k, and then I started laughing, she asked me why I was laughing, well it was pretty self explanatory; she printed the bill on a separate boarding pass.
So, with the pseudo power of the law in one hand, and my electronics in another, I carried my trays to the security check. Waves of sympathetic and confused looks were thrown at me, as if I was a soldier returning from the trenches after liberating Europe from the Axis Powers. There was sympathy and empathy but no real help. I stood in the security line for what felt like 30 minutes but was actually 15 mins, balancing approximately 9kg (books + electronics) on one hand with my carry bag and bottle on another. It was for the first time in 2 years that I was thankful for my rigorous gym days ever since my disc injury diagnosis. Like a saying that is hopefully soon to be popularised, ‘Lift heavy weight, it may fuck up your disc, but at least you’ll carry your law books when they’re overweight.” The security guy saw my books and said that he was also once a law student but due to the increasingly high influx of law graduates in the country, he had no option but to be a security guy at the Pune International Airport. Obviously he didn’t say that he has probable seen more fucked up shit than this but this imagination did bring out my biggest fear, I don’t want to be a security guy at the Pune International Airport, at least let it be Chandigarh so I am close to home.
Step 2 put of 3 complete, 1 being get pass check in counter, step 2 being get pass the security check and now step 3 buy a carry bag. Buying a carry bag seemed the difficult of the aforementioned 2 tasks. Why? You may ask, well cause Indian Airports are notorious for selling stuff at twice or more than twice the maximum retail price. Is that against the law? I don’t know, I haven’t studied that yet. But yeah, I finally found a tote bag costing 600 which is a lot but when your biceps and forearms are burning hotter than a forest wildfire, you’ll act pregnant even if you carry XY chromosomes it doesn’t matter. So, as I was screaming for help, as my water broke, no lol, would have been funny though. So, I got the tote bag, I had 2 options of tote bag designs, one being some crazy universe shit and the other being a cat on top of books. Obviously, I chose the cat on top of books, Lil sis will probably annex the bag, but whatever. I called back home telling my dad that I just spent 2000 bucks on a blog, he was like, “C’mom man, I know your blog is struggling but at least don’t spend money trying to promote it.” (He didn’t)
To be very honest, law doesn’t work, it may work when you bring your case in a court of law, not at an airport check in counter. So, even though as much as I hate to say it, that day the weight of the law was on my shoulders.
