Most of us can spend only a couple of hours at a noisy and busy airport. Some may spend more time than most but no one can beat the Iranian man who spent 18 years in Paris airport. Mehran Karimi Nasseri who lived in Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport for 18 years and whose story loosely inspired the Steven Spielberg film ‘The Terminal’ died on Saturday in the same airport “that he long called home”, officials said. Nasseri died after a heart attack in the airport’s Terminal 2F around midday, according to an official with the Paris airport authority.
Nasseri started to live at the airport after the United Kingdom denied him political asylum and deported him to Paris. According to a report by Variety, the man then declared himself stateless and always had luggage by his side.
The airport celebrity
Nasseri lived in the airport’s Terminal 1 for 18 years, from 1988 until 2006; Initially it was due to the legal hassles and eventually by apparent choice. He made a small home at the airport or like some would say, he made the airport his home. According to AP, Nasseri slept on a red plastic bench, making friends with airport workers, showering in staff facilities, writing in his diary, reading magazines and surveying passing travellers. The airport staff even nicknamed him Lord Alfred, and he became a mini-celebrity among passengers.
Lived at airport in his final days
Born to an Iranian father and British mother in 1945, Nasseri apparently spent his childhood days in Soleiman. He later went to study in England in 1974. Upon returning to Iran, he was imprisoned for engaging in student protests and later expelled without a passport, AP reported. Nasseri was denied political asylum by several European countries The AP report further said that the UNHCR in Belgium gave him refugee credentials, but he said his briefcase containing the refugee certificate was stolen. Despite arresting him, French police could not deport him anywhere due to the lack of official documents. He later ended up at Charles de Gaulle in August 1988 and continued staying there for a long time of his life.
Nasseri was reportedly hesitant in leaving the airport even after his refugee papers were prepared years later. However, he had to leave the airport finally in 2006 owing to his health and later lived in a Paris shelter. The airport doctor in the 1990s described Nasseri as “fossilised here” and worried about his physical and mental health, report AP. “In the weeks before his death, Nasseri had been again living at Charles de Gaulle,” an airport official said.
