For all the mean things that border control agents get away with every day, I personally enjoy "Returning From Thailand" as my little opportunity to even the score a bit.
"How long have you been gone?"
"I don't know. A year, give or take? Who keeps track?"
"Which countries did you visit while you were away? Your landing card just says 'most of them'"
"Well probably not most of them really, but definitely enough not to fit in that space. Let's see... [followed by a complete list]
"What's your occupation?"
"I own a software company. It pretty much runs itself these days, and I just check in every once in a while to see how things are going."
"Is this bag your only luggage?"
"Yeah. I was only gone a year, remember. I find you don't really need much stuff in the tropics. I've worn this shirt 40 days running now. I think I'll buy a new one now that I'm home"
Basically, it's your opportunity to remind them that their job is to sit in a little cube talking to people who are actually out there leading exciting lives. And that their attempts to make other people's lives worse is not really doing a very good job of making their own life any better.
One day they'll quit and go find a better job. Or give up trying to make other people's lives worse, thus making the world a slightly better place.
Seems to be working. These days at LAX, it seems that one in four of the people manning those desks is genuinely friendly. And the ones that need this sort of treatment are few and far between.
I don't think I've read a more privileged, arrogant, myopic comment in a very long time.
In what world is it your role to judge a person for going to work every day to feed their family?
"Basically, it's your opportunity to remind them that their job is to sit in a little cube talking to people who are actually out there leading exciting lives."
I'm trying not to read that sentence in the voice of a young English aristocrat from the 1920s, but that's how it sounds. Mocking the working class for the distasteful faux pas of needing a paycheck to survive?
You are blessed for having been able to find a way to live a life of travel and pleasure while others have to worry about which bills they can pay, hope they don't get sick, and dream of someday being able to take even one vacation. Does that mean you are better than them? You certainly seem to think so.
"One day they'll quit . . . the ones that need this sort of treatment . . ."
Honestly, listen to yourself. Are you some authority appointed to correct the misbehavior of your inferiors? No. You're a guy with talent who drew the right cards, played them well, and was rewarded with a life others would like to have. Learn a lesson about humility from my grandmother who grew up in the Great Depression, and reminded me always to tell myself "there, but for the grace of God, go I."
On a side note, I see that you are the founder of Twiddla. Not that the opinion of a single user matters, but as a user, I will now look for an alternative. I have no interest in supporting such arrogance.
I realize that Jason Kester believes the customs officials are offended when he gloats about his globetrotting, but you know, they probably aren't. The likelihood is that they hear stuff like this dozens of times a day from happy, excited people who have just come home from extended travels. "Oh, yeah," they think, "that's nice."
They're probably a little annoyed that Mr Kester has negligently not bothered to retain the first half of his ticket, failed to deep track of when he left or what countries he visited, and was too stupid to fill out the paperwork properly. They may even roll their eyes thinking he's a bit of a smelly pig not to have changed his shirt in over a month and wonder why he couldn't afford to have more than one.
I'm pretty sure they don't give a crap about his software company, or have any use for his product, either. They're probably pretty content in knowing they have the federally mandated power to just just glance over at the big guy off to the side and within three minutes, Mr Kester will be bent over a table in another room with a couple of rubberized fingers up his ass.
If Mr Kester thinks he's making customs officials feel small and unimportant because he has such an "exciting life", or that he's in some way "evening the score" by bragging about having been in the Far East for over a year, I must say that "this sort of treatment" is rather too subtle for thick-skinned customs staffers. They really couldn't care less where he's been or where he's going, as long as he isn't carrying any contraband.
If he really wanted to make them feel that they're so much worse off than he is, he'd have to add, "... unlike you, with your shitty, dead-end job, sitting in a little cube," or some similar direct comparison. But that would probably get him taken into the other room.
Finally, I'm willing to bet that the agents aren't regular readers of Hacker News, so they haven't seen Mr Kester's post. In this case, ignorance is bliss.
Are you some authority appointed to correct the misbehavior of your inferiors?
No. If you came away with that impression then you may have misread my intent.
My stance is that mean people deserve to live an unhappy life. No more. Nice people, as noted in the comment you responded to, receive no such treatment from me. Mean people get a fictionalized account of a person leading a much better life than themselves, delivered by a person who in actual fact is not likely leading a much more interesting life at all.
As a mean person, the theory goes, one can continue being mean and thus unhappy. Or they can start being nice and be treated nicely. Notice how class does not enter into it at all.
Do you think for a moment about what that person had to put up with for the hours before you arrived that day, or will continue to deal with after you leave?
Is it not enough that you've managed to retire as a young man and lounge on the beaches of Thailand, do you also need to be treated with smiles and deference by people who still have to go to work every day? They have a job to do, and your abuse isn't going to help anything. At best, it'll just make the experience that much worse for the person in line behind you.
Empathy is not something that can be forced on a person, and a comment on a web page isn't going to make you change your attitude or think about anyone else's life, but then again, being a dick to customs agents isn't going to help, either, so I guess we're both wasting our breath.
"I'm rude because I've had a shitty day" isn't a good excuse.
I think Jason made the mistake of not clarifying in his comment that he only does this to agents who are rude to him first. Now his comment has turned into a new story by itself with a lot of angry comments.
I feel sorry for Jason because he seems like a nice guy who just didn't properly proofread his comment before posting and he's now getting a huge ass kicking as a result.
I've had these same people greet me with a big smile, ask me how well I'll do in a race (they had already met many people doing the same race) and wish me good luck.
Airports are stressful places and traveling in general can also be stressful. My opinion?
Being rude is not your privilege. It won't fix a broken system. It just makes you personally feel better, at the expense of another. We're all much better than that - or so I should hope.
> Basically, it's your opportunity to remind them that their job is to sit in a little cube talking to people who are actually out there leading exciting lives. And that their attempts to make other people's lives worse is not really doing a very good job of making their own life any better.
The assumption that those who aren't out traveling are beneath him and deserve the ill treatment that he's intending (whether they realize he's intending to be abusive or not).
I interpreted it as him being encouraging and reminding people that there's a bigger, brighter world out there full of possibility—if they want it. Someone that's not interested in his kind of lifestyle won't be inspired, and his example would wash over them unnoticed. But for everyone else trapped in a life they never really wanted it's a gentle nudge and reminder to not waste time living a suboptimal life, doing a lot of things they don't want to be doing. It's a prod to take risks, start again, and make things better in whatever way is appropriate.
There have been people like jasonkester that have appeared in my life before. When times have been good they didn't inspire me, but were just good fun. When times have been bad, their example pushed and motivated me to get my life back on track. They may never have known what kind of good they did for me, and they may have even departed from my life, but I'm extremely grateful for the time they spent with me.
I really don't want to wear the same t-shirt for 40 days in a rainforest, and I really don't want to emulate jasonkester's travel plans; I'm allergic to spiders and nature! However, if I got stuck stamping passports or asking whether you'd like fries with that, I'm quite sure his passion would be quite invaluable as a reminder to sort my life out.
What jasonkester did can be done unpleasantly. Nobody likes people that say "nah nah nah nah boo boo my life is better than yours!", but I just don't get the feeling that's how it went down in this instance.
I like your optimism, sadly most people I've seen doing stuff like he describes do it in a distasteful and rude manner. Perhaps he's better than that, I don't know him, and I certainly hope so.
I've worked in service industries (of which I'll lump in TSA and Customs officials for now) and have been on the receiving end of it, polite or cordial people are welcome to talk about their experience, but then you get people like a friend of mine that would rather make them feel miserable about what they do for a living (the reason I can only take him in small doses these days).
Oh so have I, and I'm specifically excluding the "nah nah nah nah boo boo" folks. The only thing those people do is encourage me to pay no attention to them. I was really talking about those that are able to just go live life, have a great time, and somehow seem to serve as a shining beacon for those lost at sea! It's even better when they have a sense of humor as well as passion. (Writing "most of them" on a landing card that has insufficient space is as creative as it is hilarious!)
What specifically does your friend do to piss you off?
He can be belligerent and totally unsympathetic to most people in any sort of customer or human facing role. He's a better tipper now than he used to be, but can still be rude to harried waitstaff (i.e., when it's clear they have a lot of customers to handle he would get annoyed at having to wait for a refill). He dislikes companies/businesses charging him more than he thinks things are worth, while simultaneously being one of the strongest free-market capitalist supporters in my social circle. And he'll let their employees know he's upset. The irony is apparently lost on him.
With the TSA he likes to derail the process (unless he's short on time). Not just asking for a pat down rather than the scanner (if I gave myself more time at the airport I'd likely do the same), but to the point of abusing the worker rather than making the system itself slow down. Also, he has little regard for those behind him in line, and doesn't mind delaying them a few minutes so he can feel better about himself.
As I haven't spent much time with him (physically parted ways after college) the past few years I can't really recall any more specific incidents, but it was a reason that, in college, it took us about 6 months to become friends. I thought he was a jerk, and I was right, he just happens to be a good friend as well.
I'm Australian and come in and out of the US quite often. I've spent many years of my life traveling around doing what I want, including 2 years driving from Alaska to Argentina.
> Basically, it's your opportunity to remind them that their job is to sit in a little cube talking to people who are actually out there leading exciting lives
As a foreigner, this is exactly what you don't want to do. Pissing them off is a very, very bad idea. I've had many things said and done to me at the entrance to the US that I'd rather avoid in the future.
I'm the same in at the immigration for my own country (UK) but as soon as I set foot in the line-up for any other country, it's "yes sir" and "no sir".
I'm not a tourist, it's my right to enter my own country.
I'm so sorry for not contributing anything of value to the conversation, but that's the funniest thing I've read all week! I've gotta try this next time I don't have a connecting flight!
Hehe, I think it works, it's making me seriously reconsider the life I'm living. Thanks for a good laugh and best of luck with your life-style. (to borrow a bit from DNA).
I have a friend in a similar situation to you (in terms of travelling/freedom/finances). It doesn't inspire me to "find a better job". Frankly, it makes me suicidal (I don't mean that in a hyperbole way). I look at how successful he is and I think; I could never be that successful. He will be cavorting around the world carefree for the rest of his life, and I will chained to a cube (whether at this job or another, doesn't really matter) until I'm unemployable and on the streets.
Getting a better job is nothing like what you and people like my friend have. You guys are in such a different realm, and although I enjoy following along with his adventures, it also hurts when he (and I hear a bit of this in your post too) can't understand that most of us will never and could never be in that position. 90% of new businesses fail. I barely have enough savings to last a month if I was out of a job, so the risk of trying to start and grow a business is much more likely to put me into poverty than it is to put me into financial freedom.
When I encounter a service worker, such a waiter, customs official, bus driver, etc who seems rude and snappy, I try (this is hard for me) to think about what they might be feeling. They could be having a bad day. Maybe someone yelled at them. Maybe their boss is cruel and belittling, but they can't find another job. Maybe their kids or spouse is trouble. Maybe the table before me left a religious tract instead of a monetary tip.
I realize your post is tongue-in-cheek, and intended to be funny (and it is). But it's also a bit hurtful. I can imagine that exchange, and the customs official is completely demoralized. The question in your hypothetical dialogue are entirely legitimate: they need to know where you've been and what you're up to. Your responses, although accurate, are made in such a way as to say "I'm better than you." I know you don't mean it that way. The same as I have to spend time away from facebook just because the endless stream of travels of my friend depress me too much, I sometimes just need to not know about them.
I don't know if you've ever actually said that dialogue to a customs person, but I only request you think carefully. A lot of people struggle with self-deprecation and/or depression. And an exchange which it makes so clear that he/she/me are stuck trying to pay the bills and work two jobs while other people are free and have it all just drives the depression that much deeper.
I don't say you should give up anything, or that you didn't work hard. I'm sure you deserve everything you have! Please just don't rub it in the face of a stranger who is lower class than you :(
It's rare to get to see, paired tightly together, such a vivid example of what's going on inside the heads of two participants in an otherwise ordinary and well-meaning conversation (even though it's hypothetical, in this case). Both the traveler and the agent are projecting certain beliefs upon the other, and feeling certain ways about themselves that the other doesn't realize.
I don't know why, but I found reading this exchange really powerful. I think because it happens all the time for many of us (playing both roles), but we never stop to think about what's going on inside the head of the other person.
As fate would have it, my job description is the same these days, but I am in fact doing much better, financially. Still, it's worth noting that travelling the world doesn't in any way require one to be wealthy.
Usually people of interest get whisked aside to a secondary screening area. They don't tend to hold up the queue that much, except for the fact the border agent has to temporarily close their desk for a few minutes while they escort that person to another room. In total you might face an extra 60-120 seconds in the line.
I think he was more worried about being vented on. It's hard to do much to a returning US citizen, so the guy in front would eventually be waved through (possibly without the friendly "welcome home" that they're supposed to say). Next guy in line, from anywhere else at all, would get the wrath of justice unleashed on him.
Yes, that is what I was thinking but someone else just reminded me that your line would be only US citizens. I'd be in the other one with all the other non-US people.
Therefore, if any wrath is unleashed on me it won't be because of you. Carry on!
This isnt true in my experience, I was on a watchlist type thing for a few years (dont lose your passport ever if you plan to visit the states :) and every time I got taken to secondary screening but only after a rather lengthy set of questions at the first screen, I think even once I interrupted them to ask just to send me to the secondary one.
It was pretty fustrating to have to wait sometimes up to hours (Dallas airport sucks) to know that I was going to get sent to another screen and wait anywhere between 15 minutes and 3 hours to get out, the people were also almost always overly aggressive.
One thing I will say though is there are huge differences in border culture. JFK is uniformly unpleasant to enter/ Houston is pretty bad too. I have rarely had unpleasantness in Seatac.
The last time back to Vancouver, the CBSA guy actually had to be convinced that I don’t have additional clothes… I showed him a hotel business card, then he postulated that I could have left clothes in a hotel!
(I got in.)
Another gem: “No way anybody takes a 75-day vacation, I don’t even take two weeks.”
I for one do not understand their obsession with clothes. It seems to me that they focus on people with very little luggage.
I imagine it's hard for you to see how arrogant and insensitive it is to rub your success and privilege in the face of the middle class. Think about that twice next time.
You have a great life. Appreciate it but also appreciate others. Being successful doesn't have to mean being a jerk.
For what it's worth, during the years I actually had these conversations, I doubt I ever made as much as a Customs clerk. I'd bring in maybe $20k in consulting and product income over the course of a year, which was enough to travel on but likely not enough to pay for, say, the apartment that the clerk lived in.
There's no requirement for privilege, or even "living wage" to lead such a lifestyle. As such, I appreciate that you thought I was somehow successful, but by most objective standards, I was just a homeless guy.
I need to remind you that you're using the fact that your financial situation isn't successful as a justification to being a jerk to another human being.
If a border officer was rude to you, then be a jerk to him, not some random stranger who just happened to be in same situation to him.
You're mistaken. I was correcting somebody who wrongly assumed I was using my high social status as a reason to be mean to somebody. And now I'm correcting somebody who wrongly assumed I was being mean because my social status was in fact low.
But in actual fact, I was doing that thing you describe in your second paragraph. As it states in my original comment.
Somewhat off-topic in this thread, but I'd like to ask: were you happy when you traveled? How did you deal with social alienation? And where were the best places you went? Are you still doing this?
3) to be able to search/detain people without cause
I've yet to see a border that I liked. In plenty of countries this now extends to a certain distance away from the border (sometimes surprisingly large), even when you are not actively crossing or have not crossed.
Bizarrely enough at the Chinese border they only cared that the paperwork is in order. The last few times I went, everyone passed by the giant customs X-ray without even filling out a nothing-to-declare form. China's border crossing inspection for foreigners is far less invasive than the US's for citizens.
True, Chinese border control is way less intrusive. It has to be said though that China handles foreign policy differently, so the number of groups attempting terrorist attacks is comparatively low.
I'm not sure about the US, but they do have scanners in the subway and in train stations, but the scanning they do is lackluster at best. They did however once find a 6 inch knife in my bag (i forgot it in there) on my return trip from Wangfujing. If I truly wanted to get it across, I could have just hidden it in a pocket, as there are no metal detectors in the subway. I assume the xrays are simply there to detect larger, bag based bombs or to convince foreigners that there is actually security.
Assuming from your profile that, like myself, you live in the Netherlands, I'm pretty sure you have no objections to our land borders... Of course, yo have to pay attention to actually notice those as you cross them.
My point is, those borders are still very real, they have great social, cultural, legal and economic significance, yet they don't serve any of those three purposes.
Note that in the US, we have strict stop everyone controls at the border (with Canada no less, this isn't just a Mexican border thing), at which you need to show your passport, and we have mobile border controls up to 100 miles within the border.
I used to live near a place where they frequently put the "mobile" control on an interstate in Vermont about 80 miles from the border, so I got stopped by it a lot.
Of course, I've always wondered about how useful the mobile controls are, other than for getting people used to a police state. They are not allowed to ask any US citizens for passports or proof of US citizenship; so they always ask "is everyone in this car a US citizen" and then wave you on if you say yes. When my friend, who is Malaysian, answered "no, I'm not a US citizen", they thought based on his excellent American English accent that he was joking and waved him on anyhow.
And if you're a dirty foreigner you have to have your Iris scanned, a picture taken and your fingerprints taken.
I've lived on the US/Canadian border and if they make a flip-book of all the pictures they took of me over the years it would make for a neat animated study in aging.
Really? As a Canadian who crosses that border fairly regularly, the iris & fingerprint records are only for the "Enhanced Drivers License" as far as I knew, I've crossed the border dozens of times with just my passport
Note also that people who are in this country illegally may have come here legally, and then simply stayed beyond the point that they were allowed to. That has nothing to do with border patrols, but rather whether we feel it's appropriate to aggressively police inside the country for people who may have overstayed the amount of time they were supposed to.
I spent two years driving from Alaska to Argentina through 17 countries with my Jeep. The border that gave me the most trouble? Coming into the US in Washington (off the ferry from Victoria, Canada)
Also, see "Long Way Round" where Ewan and Charlie ride motorbikes from London to NYC, "around" the earth. Which border gave them the most problems? You guessed it.
I walked across the border from Vietnam to Laos, and accidentally walked the wrong way. Ended up walking straight into Laos, so we had to go all the way back and find the correct way.
At lest in Germany the police still uses them to justify random searches. I haven’t been affected by that since I’m quite white (even though I live in one of those zones where the police can more easily search me). In the train and train stations police seems always laser-focused on inconveniencing brown and other strange looking people. They are masters at racial profiling.
For white people those open borders are quite nice and quite open in every sense of the word. The outside borders of the EU are for aggressively and inhumanly keeping people out.
Ok, if you are young, alone and in a train from the Netherlands to Germany (or in similar suspicious places) you might get searched for drugs but that’s about it. And even then those searches are quite random and don’t happen very often.
But the rampant racial profiling sucks. (One example of why that is the case and obviously unfair: I can be lazy and late and show up at the train station three minutes before my train leaves. I do that regularly. No problem practically every time. The police never once in my life stopped me. And whenever I did see them stop someone in the train station those people had one thing in common: they were not white. If I were brown I would have to think twice about arriving so late and hope that the police doesn’t see me.)
"white" people are stopped as well, albeit most likely not as often. I have a friend who's more German than the Bundestag, who was once stopped and screened randombly by a customs official whilst he was running to catch his bus. Tough luck.
Yeah, it’s possible, obviously. Especially if you are young and alone and look a certain way – but the way the German police does racial profiling is very obvious. And since I’m white and apparently look harmless to the police they just completely ignore me. I just don’t really have to worry about this. Ok, maybe the police will stop me the next time I’m in a train station and I will miss my train – but who cares? That would still be a very rare event for me. In practice I don’t even have to think about it. Something I’m pretty sure wouldn’t be the case if I looked differently.
During the last 25 years of my life I had exactly two run-ins with the police, one traffic stop (all I had to say that I didn’t drink any alcohol and they let me drive on – I didn’t even have to leave the car) and one time I was jaywalking (the police was hiding right at the pedestrian crossing, I had to pay a €5 fine).
The police are not allowed to only check people that meet a certain racial pattern, so they usually add some white people in the mix just to give the appearance of randomness.
Mind you, though, I find that the security checks at a German aiport are heaps more comfortable and relaxed than anything I've experienced at any American aiport I've been.
Between a Schengen country and a non-Schengen country?
What kind?
On an airfield, a shipping port or a land border?
How are you moving?
With a vehicle or just you?
Who are you?
A Citizen of a Schengen country?
A Citizen of the EU?
A Citizen of the United States, Canada, Japan, Australia or New-Zealand?
A Citizen of another country?
What do you look like?
All have different rules governing what border patrols can/may/must do and the other variables determine what you're up against depending on the can/may bit. Hard to know your rights (sometimes the guards don't even know...), and your obligations.
Amongst what you could encounter:
- fixed stop-all checks
- mobile checks
- abandoned borders
- randomly manned borders
- nothing at all
EU border strategy is pretty messy. Even on the outside borders of the EU it is very much dependent on where you are what you'll encounter.
Some borders are so porous they might as well not exist, others are so locked up that even though technically cross border traffic is open in practice it's just like it was before or worse.
If you want to know about borders in the EU: become a trucker for a few years.
I remember cycling across the border from France to Italy once. Just a deserted alpine road, it was beautiful...
Also, come to think of it, the sleeper train from Paris to Munich last summer didn't ask me for any ID at all...
The time we drove from Croatia to Italy was a different story though (come to think of it, that was before it joined the EU a month ago, so probably not relevant.)
As an example of a really porous border, the German/Swiss border. I used to live right at it (there are 3 bridges in my town leading into switzerland). There's one which you can only walk/bike over which used to have a border control which is now deserted. The other 2 ones have border controls, but they seem to be solely tasked with checking whether cars are allowed to drive in switzerland (road fees), whether swiss people are buying more stuff in Germany than they're allowed to (the price differences are immense, so we've got people comming from as far as Zurich to shop here), and sales tax refunds (Swiss people buying in Germany don't have to pay the Mehrwertsteuer of 19%, but the significantly lower Swiss sales tax. As the MwS. is factored into the purchase price, it's centrally refunded at the border).
It's more of a tollbooth/administrativa affair, really.
There are no borders. You just drive along and next thing you'll get is a text message that you are in a different country informing you about roaming prices for your cell phone.
If you happen to use a navigation system, it might say something like "Welcome to Italy". But that's it.
However, if you do Ireland -> UK -> EU, you'll most likely only see passport control between UK & EU.
Passport controls aren't technically necessary between the UK & Ireland, but few airports in Ireland are architected to treat ingress differently. (I suspect in at least one case, they've actually gone backwards, as the domestic channel was repurposed for the US "ingress before you fly" method.)
If you do the same trip in reverse, you're less likely to see passport controls entering the UK, as most larger airports are architected around domestic & International travel - Irish flights are usually landed as domestic.
As a dual-citizen I still find it mind-boggling that a US border guard asks me questions about my private life. It still isn't clear to me what can happen if I answer "wrong" (e.g. the answers do not meet his expectations).
For comparison, in many (if not most) countries (I don't want to name my specific case because this could derail the discussino) a border guard presented with a passport issued by his own country has exactly two options: 1) arrest the person on the spot (arrest meaning what it should, e.g. call the police and follow the law) or 2) let the person in. There are no questions, because the border guard has zero discretion in letting the person in. In general, a citizen of any country should always be able to enter that country, no questions asked (with the possibility of being arrested right afterwards, of course).
I find it both strange and disturbing that this gray area seems to be universally accepted and that outrage (like in the article above) is rare.
This is a type of "behavioral profiling". They take you on a random walk down a conversation tree, and unless you're a very good liar, it will be difficult for you to answer the questions without delays, inconsistencies or other signs of prevarication.
It's a common claim around here that airport security is mostly theater and that El Al does it right. But El Al uses behavioral profiling, and as you point out, that can seem as intrusive as any scan.
Are you arguing that behavioral profiling is useless or that it's not perfect?
The classification technique goes beyond just watching how fast you answer: It's a skill that takes training and practice, but can be extremely effective, which is why the Israelis and U.S. ICE use it.
I have no words. They won't even stop at looking through your files on a groundless suspicion - they'll clone your harddrive? With your naked pictures of your girlfriend, diary, company secrets and everything?
And I'm a "rights-free person" (a foreigner). If they do this stuff to citizens, I can't even imagine what sort of authority they have over foreigners. You guys really need to rein in your government, this is getting insane.
> They even went through his laptop and copied his hard disks.
I may be completely out of line here but why can't he request a lawyer before doing this kind of stuff? Why are they allowed to dig so deep into someone without any evidence of doing something illegal?
And always have good backups, especially when traveling. Loss and theft are serious risks. There have even been anecdotes of people having their laptops confiscated for long periods of time by government employees at borders for the silliest of reasons. Hardware is replaceable, but all the projects, notes, and things you've been working on for possibly years are not.
I certainly avoid the US for any connecting flights to Central and South America (I live in Europe). I've also been avoiding vacationing in the US since I experienced some rather rude TSA agents at Miami International a few years ago, although to be fair I have seen some of the US and wanted to expand my horizons.
I'm sorry, but if you try to enter the US with any physical objects that have even the remotest chance of being interpreted as being illegal, or digital storage that isn't encrypted, you're just asking for trouble these days.
Cross borders with blank drives. Re-image when you're at your destination.
Although it can be interpreted as such, it's not a sign of guilt, it's a response to the possible threat of immigration officers on a power trip. The vast majority are absolutely fine, but there are some that overstep their bounds or work within an egregious legal framework, e.g. the Brits. If they force you to decrypt your data (as they legally can in the UK), who knows what they'll do with it, especially if you've got proprietary work and confidential business stuff on there.
The drive doesn't have to be blank. Just put on a fresh install of an OS and don't put on any personal files. Then reimage after reaching your destination.
What I would love to do is to get stamps from the 'axis of evil' all on one page of my passport by visiting Iran, Iraq and North Korea, then travel the the US. Maybe I can get them to also stamp that page :)
To be honest, this isn't so hard to do. I went to Kazakhstan to visit a college friend once and got placed on the watch list for the two years after that. Apparently visiting a country with stan in the name, regardless of purpose, is cause for suspicion.
I'm a little surprised they bothered to copy the hard drives. Usually they just do a full search down and then they want you to be gone as soon as possible.
It makes me sad, but I'm unsure as to what to do about it. I'd generally suggest removing the hard drive from the computer, but that's becoming more difficult to do. You can use full drive encryption, but then if they want they might just confiscate the whole computer. Beyond that, at this point that unless your paranoid your communications can be monitored with ease.
The State Department will sometimes grant a second passport if you can prove you need it - like if one of your visa stamps is known to get people killed in your new destination country.
Political risk, business risk, etc. The same reason you don't invest everything in one stock, one skill-set, etc. Same reason you back up your database and use version control.
Distributed systems is all the rage now. It makes sense on all levels of life.
people being able to see your travel history. Go to places on one side of the argument with one passport, then the other with the other, they never need to know you went to both.
He flew home to the USA but he was processed in Canada? In other words, did he fly into Canada from SE Asia and then immediately drive to the USA? Honestly, that would look a little suspicious to me if I was a customs officer.
I've flown into L.A. and Dallas/Fort-Worth a bunch of times from the Asia Pacific region of the world and never received a glance at any of my visa pages.
Plenty of international flights connect through Canada, like Vancouver on the west coast. Also, most big Canadian airports have American immigration facilities since they have so much traffic to process, quite efficient actually.
Yes you're on to something. It's kind of a two part story to me:
i) Was it reasonable to suspect this person of being worthy of a closer look? It seems like the answer is a yes based on his locations and pattern
ii) Is the form that that 'closer look' takes reasonable? Causing someone to miss their connecting flight seems unfortunate.
I had a business colleague who was based elsewhere in Asia for several years. He visited Thailand every few weeks the entire stay. When he returned to the US, immigration gave him the same rundown. When he finally convinced them that he was just a young guy who wanted to have fun, they waved him through with a smile.
It's odd that we still "stamp" passports, allowing border guards to see what countries you have visited in the past. This information should not be available to any authorities by any means, but especially not appended to your identity documents. Afaik, only Israel has a correct policy on this.
A passport was not originally intended to be an identity document, only a travel document. But the US doesn't have any official identity document, so the passport gets de facto used as one. This is unfortunate for a number of reasons.
Few articles on here lately regarding government "security" operations and the TSA. I can sympathize with these people, however most of the issues I have personally encountered have been outside the US, not while leaving the States or upon arrival.
I've recently signed up for Global Entry, which is worth it I think, if you're concerned about any of these things. You are pre-screened in advance, and pretty much not bothered with immigration beyond that when you leave or arrive (note: TSA screenings still apply, unless you are a candidate for TSA pre check which, I believe, only applies to domestic flights as of now).
Honestly, if there were a minimum IQ rating of 25 at DHS to be considered for employment, most of our problems with that agency would evaporate overnight.
The issue isn't "stupid employees" as you seem to think but an overreaching policy that is trying to cover all situations at once but doesn't really cover any. Add to that the reactionary measures that seem to be a staple of DHS since its inception and you just have a recipe for disaster.
Unfortunate story, but also very different than my experience with US border control. As someone who travels outside the US many times a year, including to somewhat odd places (last year has included Sudan, United Arab Emirates, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Malaysia, Ukraine), I've never had a single problem or spent more than a minute talking to anyone from customs or immigration.
Honestly, this is refreshing. The US does not have a serious terrorism problem, so the massive amount of border searches are very trouble. We're giving up a lot of freedom to solve a problem that we don't really have.
On the other hand, we do have a pretty serious human trafficking problem, so I'm glad to see someone taking it seriously.
I have been searched by borders and customs so many times in Seattle that I think they single put Americans for special treatment. I never come with much in my luggage (I shop in the states since china is expensive), so the searches go,quickly at least.
You are a mean person. Even if the ends justify these particular means, as you suggest (and I don't even think you've got the cause and effect right here), insulting and demeaning someone far less privileged than you was immoral.
"How long have you been gone?"
"I don't know. A year, give or take? Who keeps track?"
"Which countries did you visit while you were away? Your landing card just says 'most of them'"
"Well probably not most of them really, but definitely enough not to fit in that space. Let's see... [followed by a complete list]
"What's your occupation?"
"I own a software company. It pretty much runs itself these days, and I just check in every once in a while to see how things are going."
"Is this bag your only luggage?"
"Yeah. I was only gone a year, remember. I find you don't really need much stuff in the tropics. I've worn this shirt 40 days running now. I think I'll buy a new one now that I'm home"
Basically, it's your opportunity to remind them that their job is to sit in a little cube talking to people who are actually out there leading exciting lives. And that their attempts to make other people's lives worse is not really doing a very good job of making their own life any better.
One day they'll quit and go find a better job. Or give up trying to make other people's lives worse, thus making the world a slightly better place.
Seems to be working. These days at LAX, it seems that one in four of the people manning those desks is genuinely friendly. And the ones that need this sort of treatment are few and far between.