My wife and I honeymooned in England and Scotland, this is in 1999. When we returned at O'Hare Airport (Chicago's International Airport), they treated us like garbage: Why did you go there? What was the nature of your trip? How long did you stay there? What do you do for a living? Rapid fire personal questions. Then they pulled us aside, American citizens, and searched our stuff....THOROUGHLY! I'm talking my wife's silk panties and everything. Meanwhile, tons of tons of NON-Americans were waived by from all around the world, many were tourists or foreigners with Workvisas or Greencards, they had to stop the us. It wasn't enough to serve my country for 3 years, now I have to be treated like a terrorists suspect because THEY don't want to look racists! These guards were armed and needed backup to investigate our underwear. What did they think they were going to find?
Customs officers are trained to treat people like absolute crap. Its an unfortunate part of life, especially when you get the ones that treat you especially bad because they like to go on power trips. I'm in a particularly delicate position as a resident green card holder in the US... any customs official can revoke my status for virtually no reason... so I have to take the crap.
That bites. I'm sorry to hear it. I just think that people should treat each other with a little bit of dignity. I wasn't expecting special treatment, but I was decorated in the Army and you would think that means something, but oh yeah, I forgot where I was....in a country that tells people to go fight and then we give you nothing when you come home messed up, cut your benefits, and an enlisted military salary is below POVERTY!
My girlfriend and me got thoroughly searched at LAX. I guess these guys have got a job to do, but no sense of humour at all. Me: (with smile on my face,trying to break the ice after my extremely tightly packed suitcase had been searched), Good luck with getting all my stuff back in, dont worry about it, just ram it in anyway you can... Him: It's my job Sir, leave me to it. Okkaaayyy. They actually had a 'meeter and greeter' with a clipboard to explain about the searching, and to put a smile on the official face of the airport, and that it wasn't because they hated everyone being searched! The girl who made the joke about having a bomb in her suitcase a couple of years back who got arrested must have no common sense whatsoever...
aha..going through airports we are talking about at the moment.. thats one reason perhaps i would not want to go through the airports in the US, nowadays. since 2001, due to my company's work, i had to travel to some lovely places that are highly placed in american agendas and politics. you will find stamp of Iran, yemen, Pakistan and Sudan in my passport. i don't think they will let me off before some 'extensive' routine questions about those places
My older brother (a senior manager at ITT) has some very interesting places on his passport-and has gotten the royal treatment you describe at the age of 48... My wife's sister (a 40 year old Mexican) traveling on a tourist visa has also gotten the full Monty as well....thought she was a drug courier...
how about when i was dragging my big suitcase with me in london tubes trying to make it to airport on time. i don't think its advisable anymore to do such a thing you can't blame people for being paranoid due to all the madness around but some innocent person will be a victim of abuse, somewhere. I would hate to be on the recieving end. but when you hear of stuff like people refusing to travel on a plane(happened in the US on several occasions) because he has the middle eastern look, i think thats a bit being too carried away.. or when yousuf islam (formerly cat stevens) travelled ot the US and they had to force the airplane to land elsewhere and send him back, that was a bit messed up.
The security guys in the US are pretty clueless, but I guess I've been lucky. As a light-skinned Indian guy, I pretty much look like I'm from the middle east. I've flown abroad twice since 9/11 and never had a problem, though my bag was apparently searched by TSA as part of a "random inspection" when I flew to San Francisco. Oh well, only a matter of time before I come to one who pisses me off. I'm sure I'll have a few choice words for him, and bam! I'll end up all over the news as an "unruly potential terrorist" or something.
My brother-in-law, a dark skinned Mexican-American from Texas, gets pulled into a lot of "random" inspections everytime he goes to the airport. He's just glad that he doesn't have a job requiring frequent travel.
Yeah? I want customs officials who act like robots and conduct thorough searches in spite of whining tourists. If they stop looking in your wife's panties then your wife's panties will become a prime hiding spot. Timothy McVeigh had a similar complaint.... Were you drafted? We have a volunteer military and a fairly free press, so if you didn't sign up with your eyes open you have nobody but yourself to blame.
You guys are not that important and I have a very long list of other things to bitch about, thank you very much. KJ
Were you wearing your uniform? I mean I've never been able to look at someone and tell if they have received a award unless that award was something they were wearing at that moment. A better question is why do you expect people to automatically know that you were decorated in the Army unless you run around working it into every conversation.
That's because real, red blooded Americans never leave the country unless it's on a military transport, Eurosnob! KJ
Masuimi Max And damnit Claus, I'm not allowed to give you any positive rep for either of your previous posts. Stupid site.
I'll mod for the other side too ACtually I'm surprised the republican machine hasnt hit up bigsoccer yet with Karl Rove complaining of liberal bias... oh wait, he's busy these days, isnt he...