# Quote — Dave Barry, Big Trouble

> Even veteran air travelers find Miami International Airport disorienting. It's often crowded, and it seems to have been designed so that every passenger, no matter where he or she is coming from or going to has to jostle past every other passenger. The main concourse looks like a combination international bazaar and refugee camp. There are big clots of people everywhere: tour groups, school trips, salsa bands, soccer teams, vast extended families, all waiting for planes that will not leave for hours, maybe days. There aren't enough places to sit, so the clots plop down and sprawl on the mungy carpet, surrounded by Appalachian Foothill-sized mounds of luggage, including gigantic suitcases stuffed to bursting, as well as a vast array of consumer goods purchased in South Florida for transport back to Latin America, including TVs, stereos, toys, major appliances and complete sets of tires. Many of these items have been wrapped in thick cocoons of greenish stretch plastic to deter baggage theft, which is an important airport industry. Another one being the constant "improvements" to the airport, which seem to consist mainly of the installation of permanent-looking signs asking the public to excuse the inconvenience while the airport is being improved. The airport air smells of musty tropical rot, and it's filled with the sounds of various languages - Spanish predominantly, but also English, Creole, German, French, Italian, and perhaps most distinct of all, Cruise Ship Passenger. (Chapter 11)

- Author: [Dave Barry](https://www.leafyquotes.com/dave-barry.md)
- Book: [Big Trouble](https://www.leafyquotes.com/dave-barry/big-trouble.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dave_Barry#Big_Trouble_(1999)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Topics: [travel](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/travel.md)
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/dave-barry/big-trouble/even-veteran-air

## More from this book

> Arthur, compelled by masculine instinct, leaned over and frowned at the contents of the case, exactly the way countless males have frowned at household appliances, plumbing, car engines, and all manner of other mechanical objects that they did not begin to understand. (Chapter 5)

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/dave-barry/big-trouble/arthur-compelled-by-masculine.md)

> Inside the family room, Arthur Herk was methodically, relentlessly changing channels. He was doing this partly because the instinct to change channels is embedded deep in the male genetic code, and partly because he knew his wife and stepdaughter hated it. (Chapter 2)

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/dave-barry/big-trouble/inside-the-family.md)

Topics: [humor](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/humor.md)

> Miami turned out to be a great market: It seemed as if everybody here wanted things that went bang. You had your professional drug-cartel muscle people, who needed guns that shot thousands of rounds per minute to compensate for the fact that their aim was terrible. You had your basic local criminals, who wanted guns that would scare the hell out of civilians; and your civilians, trying to keep up with your local criminals. You had your hunters, who, to judge from the rifles they bought, were after deer that traveled inside armored personnel carriers. You had your "collectors" and your "enthusiasts," who lived in three-thousand-dollar trailers furnished with seven-thousand-dollar grenade launchers. You had an endless stream of shady characters representing a bewildering variety of revolutionary, counterrevolutionary, counter-counterrevolutionary and counter-counter-counterrevolutionary movements all over the Caribbean and Central and South America, who almost always wanted guns on credit. (Chapter 5)

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/dave-barry/big-trouble/miami-turned-out.md)

Topics: [humor](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/humor.md), [crime](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/crime.md)