The terminal wait: Jomo Kenyatta airport, Nairobi

A familiar location for travellers today – the departures gate, this time at Jomo Kenyatta airport in Nairobi, recorded by Giulia Biasibetti.

You can hear among the normal sounds of bustle and shopping in the terminal the crackle of the security guards’ radios and the feedback as they stand too close together, and a conversation in an unidentified language, possibly Afrikaans.

Our reimagined sound is an ambient piece based around the experience of waiting in airport terminals, built from the field recording.

Just as in a “real” airport environment, sounds blend into an overall wash, which is punctuated every so often as a particular sound stands out and penetrates through to grab your attention.

Layers of electronics have been constructed from the feedback of the security guards’ walkie-talkies, while the snippets of security radio conversations pop up and grab our attention through the ambient haze.

City version:

Memory version: