HALIFAX, N.S. — Ah yes, the holidays — that magical season when students briefly escape the carefully managed chaos of student housing and return to their homeland for the year’s final, unavoidable family showdown. Fresh off exams, spirits are high. Everyone is thrilled to reconnect with their roots, eat free food and pretend adulthood is still a distant concept. But by week two, something shifts. The novelty wears off. Suddenly, your mom has decided you live there rent-free again, so resting turns into chores, and all you really want is to sit on the couch, unwrap gifts and drink something that isn’t judgment-flavoured.
At the same time, your dad initiates his annual “talk,” a carefully rehearsed monologue about jobs, life plans and what you’re doing after graduation, delivered as if LinkedIn personally asked him to intervene. You nod, smile and internally book a one-way flight back to campus. Eventually, you snap. You pack your bags, race to the airport and feel genuine joy at the thought of returning to your friends and independence. That joy lasts exactly until the baggage-drop screen flashes its cruel verdict: your bag is 0.2 kilograms overweight. “What the fuckkkk,” mutters a Dalhousie University student, spiritually and financially defeated.
The airline, demonstrating its commitment to fiscal responsibility, charged extra for luggage, carry-ons, a seat and — according to one confused commerce student — “the vibe.” These fees, passengers were assured, were essential to maintaining affordable airfare, a claim supported by the fact that the base ticket costs less than a night out in Halifax but everything else requires a small loan.
Flights to Halifax from nearly every airport in Canada are full of Dalhousie students during the holiday season. The students can be identified by three characteristics: oversized backpacks containing exactly one laptop charger, the wide-eyed optimism unique to those who still believe a boarding time is a legally binding agreement, and the quiet panic of realizing that tuition is already due, but whatever I need this overpriced burger in the airport.
The average flight to Halifax, initially advertised as “on time,” will be delayed 10 minutes due to maintenance. Airline representatives will later announce that the flight is delayed an hour because a new aircraft is needed. And as the delay stretches into its third hour, a snowstorm will magically appear to grant itself priority boarding.
Meanwhile, the gate evolves into a temporary Dalhousie campus. Students form study groups they later abandon, complain about the Howe Hall’s dining hall they aren’t currently experiencing and debate whether they’re about to miss the first week of classes due to this flight. As evening approaches, morale dips. Phones die. Chargers become currency. A student is seen trading half a granola bar for 10 per cent battery life. Another tries to sleep across three chairs, only to be gently nudged awake by the sound of yet another delay announcement.
This article may or may not be written by a frustrated Mackerel writer in the Toronto Pearson International Airport.
By Matt Macdonald