Mr. John

My plans made, I prepared for my shortest flight in years. For the last few years, getting there, wherever there was, tended to be a two-day affair, with lengthy stops between flights, some as short as five hours, some as long as eighteen, or even twenty-four when the plane didn’t arrive. The six and a half hours to Quito seemed a puddle jump by comparison.

I’d been lax. I’d done little to no research on Quito, only considering it a waystation between actual trips, someplace to sleep. I should have taken note of the amount of time I’d spend there between the legs of this adventure.

Landing in Quito was an adventure. The airport, indeed, the landing strip, was pressed in upon by the city, its buildings within hailing distance and very little space between. It is also bounded by mountains. That leaves little room for a leisurely descent. One moment the airliner was gliding along, the next it sped forward and plunged downward, its nose diving down perceptively from within. My stomach lurched with it. I felt the need to brace my feet and lean back into my seat as we dove into the airfield. The city lights drew up fast, transforming from a sheet to pin lamps. Cars raced us, falling behind quickly.

We landed, the wheels slamming into the ground. The flaps fell, the brakes engaged (are there breaks on a plane), and I felt myself flung into my belt, my spine weightless against my seat. When we turned to taxi, I noticed how close the buildings were. They were right there! I’d never landed at an airport what wasn’t conveniently way over there, miles from the city they reputedly sought to serve. Quito’s airport was actually IN the city!

I disembarked it a cool damp night, the city’s altitude making it feel autumnal despite its straddling the equator. I collected my bags, got my passport stamped, and consulted my itinerary. I was to be shuttled to my hotel, but I’d seen nobody I would have recognized as expecting me. There were few in the airport proper at the outside edge of Arrivals. I followed the flow, passing more than a few tour groups clustered around someone in a brightly coloured golf shirt, holding aloft a sign, a clip board in the other hand, mentally checking off the people around them. I kept looking up at their signs, looking for a match to my own itinerary, my anxiety growing as I eliminated one after another. Before I knew it, I was outside, under glaring incandescent lights dappled with flurries of moths. I saw a phalanx of expectant faces three deep, most of them obviously family members in no need of signs. My fellow passengers rushed toward them, embraced and kissed and scooped up, broadcasting their love for one another with the brightest of smiles.

There was a number of signs held up out there, as well. Most bore the name of companies, tour groups and such, a few bore names. I scanned them, not seeing mine, my name or my tour company. I glanced back at my itinerary, searching for a name, then back at the signs, looking for a match or a clue and finding none. I became a little concerned. Did no one come to collect me? I paid for a transfer from the airport to my hotel and was a little annoyed that there was no one there. That wouldn’t have been the end of the world; there are cabs, after all; but I had no idea where my hotel was in relation to the airport and what the ride might cost. It was late. And I was tired after a day of travel. I was in a country that was by no means English-speaking. Was English even common in Quito? I was growing a little anxious, my stomach twisting into what would eventually become a knot. I decided to ask for help before hiring one of the cabs that were in plain sight just past the greeting masses.

I re-entered the airport proper, weaving between those streaming past me into the night. I approached a tour guide, obviously a tour guide, a woman in a crimson red golf shirt with a company logo stitched into its breast, Quito Tours, or some such. She looked at my sheets, asked another tour guide, this one in a blue golf shirt. They gestured to another to come over. Not one of them recognized my tour company. My gut was clenching. They called out to airport security employee who also looked at my itinerary.
She asked, “Did you look outside?”

I had. She decided that maybe if we looked together, we might find my ride.

She scanned the signs much as I did earlier and pointed one out: MR JOHN. She drew me towards the man displaying it before his chest.

“Are you looking for…” she asked, her question directed at the face above the sign, glanced at my papers again, “Leonard, David John?”

He looked from my papers to his. “Mr. John,” he said, nodding, obviously pleased to have found the eponymous Mr. John.

I too looked, comparing his blurry fax to my sheet. I began to feel my anxiousness ease away. He pointed from one sheet to the other, from one name to the matching other: “Leonard David John?” he said. “Mr. John?”

“Is that you?” the girl asked.

“I think so,” I said. I suppressed the urge to giggle. Mr. John. I was Mr. John. They thought my name was Leonard David John.

“That’s not my name,” I said, thoroughly confusing him. My middle name is John.”

“This way, please, Mr. John,” he said, leading me to the car that would take me and my pack to my hotel.

No matter how many times I tried to tell him that my name was not Mr. John, I could not for the life of me convince him otherwise.