Space travel

The flight from Boston starts calmly enough. The pilot tells us there may be “a little turbulence” along the way. It begins about five hours later, over the Atlantic. By then we’ve had our meal, chicken curry for Bins and vegetable kofta for me, so that we can share, cold pasta salad, chocolate dessert, crackers and cream cheese — and Bins is snoring.

It’s an intermittent bucking with occasional sideways jerks that goes on and on. And on and on. I’m by the window and I keep looking out for thunderbolts and angry gods but there’s nothing out there. We’re flying above an unbroken blanket of white clouds, the sky is blue-verging-on-indigo. It’s like we’re being buffeted by giant invisible popcorn. The flight map tells me that we’re over the Atlantic right now. So if we go down, it’ll be a watery end, wearing life jackets with a cheerful red light that goes on when it’s in contact with water. But there’s no solid land for hundreds of miles in every direction. Plus it’s winter, so we’ll be frozen solid while bobbing up and down in our bright yellow vests.

To quell the panic, I watch Interstellar , a film about the end of the world. It stars Matthew McConaughey as an astronaut who passes through a wormhole, searching for an alternative home for humanity. It’s a wonderful film, but not ideal for those who aren’t sure they’ll live long enough to see the end of it. We’re bouncing so much that I feel I’m fully integrated with the crew of that desperate mission. I wish I could watch something else, but the film suggests that time bends around in funny ways, particularly in times of stress. Which means the film may give me tips on how to survive a wormhole in case we suddenly encounter one before we reach Dubai.

By some miracle we arrive intact. The combination of space travel and turbulence produces a mild euphoria in me. The vast concourse of shops, with their glittering wares and even more glittering customers, makes me want to giggle hysterically. Everyone shopping with such serious expressions! Most of the travellers and all the staff in the shops are wearing “international” styles of dress: jeans, t-shirts, sneakers, jackets with hoods lined with fake fur.

Against this backdrop, the Afghan men strolling through the airport in their flowing robes, with thick beards and open-toed sandals, are like visitors from another dimension. I notice one guy with kohl-rimmed amber eyes and wild shoulder-length hair. He looks like a character out of Lawrence of Arabia . Half an hour later, we’re lining up for the flight. Amber-eyes is there too! He and a dozen other Afghans are lounging on seats frankly ogling the ladies passing in front of them, including 65-year-old me! Even Bins is impressed. “Shameless fellows! They’re really having a ball, huh?” Maybe I should be offended, but I’m too amused to care. Travelling through wormholes can have that effect.

Manjula Padmanabhan, author and artist, writes of her life in the fictional town of Elsewhere, US, in this weekly column

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