4:30 AM. Wake up call for the overnight crowd. They’ve been sleeping—napping?—since 1 AM, their heads resting on cardboard, to soften the blow of the metal grates. Cardboard, isn’t that for homeless people? These men have jobs.
There are maybe 2000 men, 50 women. Where are all the women? What happened to feminism? No women in this workforce. And the men, they aren’t meant to be like this. They aren’t meant to be treated like this.
Like a human cattle call, men are herded through the queue. The clock strikes 5 and the push begins. No room to breathe. Bodies stacked vertically, limbs contorted, sticking out of the metal bars that rein them in. The queue is like a long and twisted prison.
Bodies slam into the turnstile, which spins like a carousel, until it brakes, with a start, unpredictably. At the whim of a child—sometimes the soldier, he falls asleep. How can you blame him? The monotony is exhausting.
Awaiting the metal detector’s rejection, the men remove their belts, shoes, watches. Good thing the floor is clean. Mess would be bad for tourism.
The final step—the handprint. So if you blow something up, they’ll know it was you?
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