I  was floundering—there was no question about it. I was standing in the main train station in Frankfurt, Germany and although the posted schedule was a true masterpiece of Teutonic organization and precision, I was still completely lost. This was my first time in Europe and even though as a military pilot I had just flown in the day before and thus had proven my air navigational skills, I was now struggling with ground navigation in getting back to the airport hotel.

Apropos the railroad platform, it was there that I vowed that one day I would learn German. Call it a foxhole conversion if you will, but I was rather ashamed of monoglot status. While I had taken Latin in college to fulfill the language requirement and found it enjoyable, it was not helping much with catching the train.

Over the years I would find myself in similar situations in a hundred different countries and always with the same question: “Do you happen to speak English?” I was lucky that day in Frankfurt as the first person I asked, a woman, not only spoke English but spoke it better than me. Needless to say, I was soon on the subway (not a train after all) and headed in the right direction.

Unlike many a foxhole conversions however, I kept to my vow of not having to go cap in hand, at least in Germany, to get directions. Back home in the States, I found a tutor and got to work. That was almost 30 years ago and while I, as an average gent, was far from linguistically gifted, the journey of learning another tongue opened a new world for me. It was one of the greatest Germans ever, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who said that one ends up learning more about oneself through the experience.

Language skills atrophy quickly though, and so when in Germany in my duty as a pilot I try to pick up enough reading material to stay in practice. It was on one of these recent newspaper foraging expeditions that I had the good fortune to experience a real subtle bit of human interaction. It was in the airport bookstore nonetheless and so skilled was the acting surrounding it, that it will remain one of my more memorable “flying” experiences.

One day, after our usual pre-flight briefing to check the weather, route, and fuel load, I had an extra few minutes to browse through the bookstore in the main terminal. For some reason though I could not find what I wanted and so I walked over to ask the clerk for help. Just as I was starting to speak however, a woman of the obvious wealthy classes stepped right in front of me and, in a demanding voice, asked the young woman working as the cashier to find a certain book for her. Asked? Demanded? To this woman there seemed to be no difference.

We Americans think that the United States is a country free of class divisions. Err, ok…I don’t believe it for a moment. Instead, we just happen to mark out our class territory differently than other cultures do. Not of course that any one class is better or worse than any other—for even to try to explain what “better” or “worse” means is futile. Against what standard is one being measured? Better or worse at what? Yet human nature is the same and thus we struggle in the most ridiculous, vain, and self-centered ways to separate ourselves from others. It is the same basic ingroup versus outgroup thing at play except we happen to take a different tack. 

I tell you nothing new of course in mentioning that Europe is well known in the various ways that it highlights social and wealth differences. These ways can be quite sharp, or “finely shaded” if you wish to put it more mildly, and can come as a real shock to us “egalitarian” Americans.

As an aside, it seems that many of the societies that that are known for strict class divisions can also have the most vibrant democracies—something for a later topic perhaps. Nevertheless, this talk of class distinction can fill volumes as it seems to always be hanging out ever so slightly in the background—one only need to look at modern England to see the extraordinary and even rigid class structures that are still in place. In fact, the English seem to have made a national pastime out of the 1001 various cultural and social “markers” to divide up the population. This is not only limited to the emphasis put on accents and speech such as with the famous Received Pronunciation, but also includes, believe it or not, how one opens a packet of sugar and pours it into a cup of tea.

Well, no matter where this German woman stood on the high society ladder, she was obviously a person to be reckoned with. She was not just your usual Botox special by any means. Around 55, she was very well-scrubbed and gussied up—Jil Sander jacket and slacks (Jil with only one “L” mind you!), gold bangles—a woman who enjoyed a certain presumption of standing as the old saying goes. It was clear that she was used to giving the orders and having others obey them. A head-on attack on this woman would be a very foolish choice indeed—very unwise as our aforementioned British friends would say.

We as Americans say that we are not intimidated by such people. Nonsense—we are human and  of course, we can be intimidated. I recall a U.S. senator telling the story about how he and his colleagues were prepping for a meeting with the President. They were ready to “spit nails” and tell the President exactly what to do and how to do it…except that is not how it always works. He finished his story by telling what it was like to be ushered into the President’s Oval Office and to sit before the most powerful man in the world. Suddenly all the bravado melted away and it was he and his chums who did the listening and not the talking.

Such was the case with this woman. Since we were in an airport and I was in uniform, I would have gladly stepped to the side. I know that people are in a hurry and frequently walking around in a twilight zone of jetlag. We all enjoy civility, but this ideal can falter a bit in an airport–even if not on purpose. Yet the young cashier noticed the impertinence of the woman, the cutting in line, and the assumption that everyone would pause to let her to the front. Yes, the cashier had indeed noticed this and she was having none of it—not a bit.

Deftly ignoring the woman, the cashier stepped from behind the counter and told me, ever so politely, that she would show me what I was looking for. Not just tell me where it was but instead take the time to show me, to lead me to the very shelf! Maybe she noticed (of course) that I was not a native German speaker. Maybe though there was a little bit more going on. Hmmm…

As we made our way back to the counter and she rang up my purchase, I embarrassingly realized that I was 30 cents too shy. This meant that I needed to dig in my suitcase for the change—a task that was made all the more difficult as my coin stash (an old 35mm film canister) was buried among all the other detritus of a life on the road—passport, phone charger, and the rest. The woman of high social standing fumed and fidgeted while I did my best to hurry. The cashier? Why she stood looking on with the most angelic of faces. I finally found enough coins to pay and as I prepared to stuff the magazines into the back of the suitcase, a voice sounded out over the counter as to whether, just perhaps, I might need a plastic bag for my purchases? Oh, yes. Now that you mention it, that would be a splendid idea.

As you can imagine, as I walked out of the bookstore the wealthy woman was giving me a look that was intended to kill. Fortunately however, it did not slay me on the spot. The planeload of passengers waiting to be flown back to the States would have been most unhappy about that. 

T

wo weeks later I happened to be flying the same trip and again, with the regularity of a clock striking noon, I stopped at the same bookstore to buy more magazines. Perhaps by fate the same young woman was working behind the cash register. She was chatting amiably with her colleague and as I placed my purchases on the check-out counter I caught her attention with the words “you might not remember me, but…” She did not hesitate to finish my sentence. “Oh, yes, you were here when that woman so rudely cut in front of you.” “Yes, it was me” I said, “and I just wanted you to know how well you played that situation.” “If only she had asked” I added, “I would have been more than happy to have stepped aside—after all, she might have been one of my passengers!”

With these words the angelic look returned to the cashier’s face. “If only she had asked…” she said with the very slightest twinkle in her eye. Ah, that was it! If she had only shown a bit of consideration in the matter. Good manners should stretch across all classes after all! I feasted on the subtlety of it all—surely this young woman must have been studying acting in her free time.

As her colleague looked on in amazement, I paid my bill and started to walk away. I could not help but pause for a moment and tell her again how it had all been so very well played. So very well played indeed.

I savor these shared experiences of travel. They are fleeting in time but eternal in their lessons of what can make life enjoyable when far from home.

Stay average!