People often say it’s not the journey that matters, it’s the destination. I used to take that quite literally - which is probably why I traveled every single weekend for five months when I lived in Milan. Out of all those weekends, I took the 6 a.m. Ryanair flight a grand total of seven times - which also means I spent seven nights sleeping in either Milan Bergamo or Milan Malpensa airport.
Now, the question everyone asks: why? Well, Milan’s airports were clearly not designed with broke college travelers in mind. The earliest shuttles only start after 4 a.m., and the last ones leave around 11 p.m. Both airports are over an hour and a half away. And sure, an Uber was technically possible - if I wanted to donate 100 euros to Milan’s economy every week.
So, the only logical solution was to take the last shuttle of the night and simply spend the night at the airport until boarding time. It sounded easy the first time. But by the second, third, and seventh, I learned that airport nights have their own rhythm - fluorescent lights that never dim, chairs that somehow get colder by 2 a.m., and a symphony of luggage wheels and half-awake announcements.
Sometimes I’d find a seat in the far corner of the terminal; other times, I’d stretch out on the floor and use my backpack as a pillow. I’d wrap myself in my jacket, sip on vending-machine coffee, and watch the airport slowly wake up around me. It wasn’t glamorous. It was cold, loud, and sometimes unsettling. But it was also strangely peaceful - a kind of quiet pause between lives, between places.
Most of these nights were spent at Bergamo Airport, Ryanair’s favorite haunt. By my third overnight stay, I had developed a little routine - charge my phone, grab a panini from the same 24/7 café, and try to claim the least uncomfortable bench in the departures hall. One night, while ordering my usual panini, the man behind the counter suddenly smiled and said, “You again?” His name was Fernando. He’d noticed me from my previous overnight stays, always around the same hour, always with my backpack and sleepy eyes.
From then on, every time I returned to Bergamo for another early-morning flight, Fernando would wave when he saw me. Sometimes, he’d slip me a free cornetto with my sandwich, or just ask where I was off to this time. It was such a small thing - a stranger recognizing another stranger in the middle of an airport - but it made the fluorescent lights feel a little warmer.
By the end of my semester, I realized something. For months, I’d told myself that these nights were sacrifices - small prices to pay to reach the real adventure waiting at the destination. But somewhere between the cold benches and Fernando’s paninis, I started to see it differently. These moments were part of the story. The exhaustion, the quiet, the small kindnesses - they were all scenes from the same journey.
I thought I was enduring the nights just to get somewhere better. But maybe the truth is that all those nights at airports - the sleepless hours, the strange peace, the unexpected familiarity - were destinations of their own.
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