On Airport Hugging

From New Zealand: as the pic of a Dunedin airport signboard, with a 3-minute ‘time limit’ on hugging, went viral, it seems that a number of people took it seriously, with some even expressing outrage over it.  So I thought it worth posting excerpts of what the airport’s CEO said, two weeks ago, in a radio interview (as accurately as I could transcribe).

We thought we’d have a bit of fun with this because often in the airport drop-off locations, the messaging can be quite intense. You know, you're going to get fined, you're going to get clamped, you need to move your car, go and park in the car park. Where's your time to have fun with it? And actually as an airport, those drop-off locations are common locations for those farewells. But actually, let's have a bit of fun with it. Let's talk about a time limit for your hugs. Three minutes. If you want a more fonder farewell, go to the car park. You know, park there, you get 15 minutes free in the car park anyway.

In fact, the whole ‘interview’ between RNZ’s Lisa Owen and the airport CEO Dan De Bono was largely like cheerful banter.  Consider this exchange;

Q: Right, so they get up to three minutes. I mean, what happens? Does someone come along and flash a badge and say, I'm with the hug police?

A: That would actually be quite fun. No, all our team do are ask them to politely move on to car park to create some space for others. So it's nothing more than that. We're not going to call the hug police. Yeah, that would be bonkers.

Q: I'm just wondering, Dan, this is like a confessional. Have some people been getting a bit amorous?

A: Sometimes, yeah. I don't want to confess on any of this, but I've certainly, you know, our team has seen interesting things go on in the car park over many years. And airports are those kind of hotbeds of emotion of people arriving and departing. But, you know, if you want a fonder farewell, feel free to use the car park.