Sorry, OP, but I'm in the "not elitism" camp. At least in the U.S., there are only a few major airports that have obscure identifiers. These come to mind: MSY, MCO, ORD, CVG, ITO, OGG, and there may be others. Perhaps the most obscure of those listed here is CVG, but easy to remember if you know the airport is actually on Covington, KY, not Cincinnati! Likewise, the key to remembering that MSY is New Orleans is that the airport was originally named Moisant Intl. Airport. At least one airline (DAL) used to teach its flight attendants to remember OGG is Kahului, Maui by thinking of it as "oh gorgeous gorgeous".