Observation #4

Observation #4

My observation this week took place at the Honolulu Airport. As I’ve stated before, I enjoy people watching, and the airport is a great place to do this. When I first arrived at the airport, the most common looks on people’s faces seemed to be fatigue and confusion. Fatigue from having traveled on a plane for several hours, and confusion from not knowing where they are supposed to be going. When my family and I went through security, the TSA agent stopped my oldest son because the scanner showed that he had something in his back pocket. He asked my son if there was anything there and when my son said no, he told him he would need to do a physical search to check for himself. My 20 year old son was asked to raise his arms while the older man used the back of his hands to feel his pockets. The agent was very professional, but the look on my son’s face was one of discomfort and embarrassment.

Once we reached the gate where our plane would board, I was able to sit and watch the other potential passengers. The airline had apparently scheduled the same gate for two different flights departing very close to the same time, so there were a lot of people to observe. Those that were not on my flight seemed to be confused and upset at the ticket agents tried to explain that these passengers would have to walk to a different gate, further down the terminal. I observed several of them using a lot of hand gestures to express there frustration, and even saw one man slam his fist on the counter. For the most part, however, the majority of the people I observed had a very content look on their faces.   

During the flight I sat next to a woman and her young, eighteen month old, son. At first I was concern that the boy was going to make my five hour flight very unpleasant, but as I visited with the mother and sweet boy, I could see that my initial perception was wrong. The boy was well behaved for his age and sat, for the most part, contently on his mother’s lap. At one part during the flight, his mother turned on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on the plane’s video screen. They didn’t have any headphones so that the boy could listen to it, but that didn’t seem to matter to him. The look on his face was one of pure joy as he watched Mickey and his friends on the screen. I was also able to observe the look of sadness that came over him when the episode ended and the screen went blank. No tears, just the sad eyes and pouting bottom lip. He was full of expressions and fun to watch.

Location: Honolulu Airport

Fatigue

Confusion

Embarrassment

Discomfort

Anger

Frustration

Sadness

Joy