BIG RED LINE

I don’t know whether you’ve ever been “lucky” enough to have to pass through U.S. Customs and Immigration, but it has been rather on my mind lately.

Now, before we start, I want to make it quite clear that I absolutely love visiting the United States as “A Tourist” but sometimes, actually getting into the country, especially if you are deemed to be someone not clever enough to have managed to get yourself born there (i.e. everyone else in the world), can feel like an utter chore.

Much of it starts at your departure airport where the security questions and checks are many and varied and almost bound to make even the most law-abiding traveller feel slightly guilty about something that they hadn’t even thought about before.

Now I’m perfectly in favour of having as many security checks in place as is humanly possible, given that I’ve always been something of a “nervous passenger” anyway, and, in this day and age, the more the better, but it does sometimes seem bizarre as you throw off your shoes for the fourth time, and virtually have to undress yourself, whilst proving that all of your camera and other digital equipment is fully charged, getting X-rayed, patted down, and having all of your bottles of fluid checked, whilst at the same time answering several dozen questions, the replies to all of which seem to start with a resounding “Erm…”

And then you have to do it all over again to get into the Departure Lounge, and then once more as you get onto the plane itself.

Maybe I just look a little bit “dodgy”, I don’t know, but they always seem to pick me, presumably so as not to appear racist and be equal-opportunity body searchers.

Still, once you get onto the plane, things do quieten down a little, apart from the occasional reminders about various aspects of “Federal Law” which seem to be designed to to keep you just a little bit on edge for the entire journey.

Once upon a time you used to have to fill in the faintly absurd green Declaration Form whilst you were still on the plane, then wave it hopefully in the direction of the Customs Officer once you had been waved solemnly across the fabled BIG RED LINE at your airport of arrival.

Okay, my memory is a little fuzzy. It might actually be a BIG YELLOW LINE, but I’m usually jet-lagged to pieces, so we’ll just say it’s RED and move along, eh…

Move along…

I call the form “faintly absurd” because you can’t imagine ANYONE wanting to tick one of the “wrong” boxes asking questions about any criminal activity that you might have planned, and yet, despite this strange feeling that EVERYONE who is not American must be up to no good, they still appear to believe in some sort of “honour system” for these forms.

In recent years this process has now had the $14.00 ESTA check added to it, so that you have to apply for permission to fly – and pay for the privilege – a minimum of three days before you board your aircraft, but it does rather negate the need for the form, even though they still get handed out.

If you have to make a connecting flight, this whole process can step in to quite ruin your day, especially if the timing turns out to be something you might consider “tight” like, say, about an hour and a half.

During our 2004 trip to California, our plane landed at Chicago at about the same time as five other wide-bodies jets, and, after dutifully retrieving and identifying our luggage and placing it in the designated “Transfer Baggage” area, we ran like hell to join the Customs and Immigration “Non-US Citizens” line and managed to get ourselves into the first 100 yards or so of it.

Other, more sluggish passengers hoping to make the same connection were several hundred people behind us in the queue and, by the time we had been allowed to cross the BIG RED LINE (with me having been shamefully sent back behind it by a scary security officer when it turned out that the Beloved and I, whilst travelling together, were not actually married), and removed and replaced our shoes several times en route, we ran to the gate and caught our flight by the skin of our teeth, which is more than several of our fellow passengers managed, swearing never again to trouble Chicago O’Hare with our presence ever again, with its many terminals and monorails which needed negotiating.

You see, for the airlines, it’s really no skin off if you miss your internal flight. There’s always several people just waiting and hoping for an available seat on a connection, so they can always fill it and, presumably, charge you again for the one you still need to get on to get where you want to be going.

Another interesting thing seems to be the “flexibility” over the rules of “carry-on” luggage for internal flights. Quite often we have made our way on board with nothing but our tiny little bags as per the International Flight Regulations only to find all of the overheads crammed full of stuff from the half dozen or so passengers already aboard who seem to be travelling with several large-sized suitcases, along with a lot of other paraphernalia that would all be taken off the likes of me in a queue in lil ol’ Eng-er-land.

Since our Chicago “experience”, more recent trips have been through Boston and Philadelphia and, perhaps luckily, have been far less overwhelmed and far, far more relaxing.

But not TOO relaxing, you understand, because there’s always that BIG RED LINE to get across…

Once you reach the BIG RED LINE, because its actually there, stuck to the floor, representing a huge barrier to entry, and not metaphorical at all, your toes dare not cross over one part of it until you are beckoned and tacitly given permission to do so by a stern looking officer who will then ask you all sorts of flummoxing questions, take a photograph, scan your fingerprints, make you feel like the lowest form of life imaginable, because, by implication, everyone in the world who is not a U.S. Citizen is obviously out to pull a fast one, stay there illegally, or generally not to be trusted.

Still, with all of that out of the way, hopefully, the officer will then stamp all of your papers and wish you a pleasant stay as if, by not tripping over one of the several potential hurdles put in your way, you have miraculously instantly been transformed into a reasonable facsimile of a human being after all.

I imagine that, with the addition of the current virus checks into the mix, that it’s likely to get even worse, because there are practical things that could be done with regard to that to save time whilst you are still in the air, but the system seems unnecessarily suspicious of anything like that done outside its own jurisdiction or control, even if it might just be slightly more practical.

Still, the last time I returned to the UK via my home airport, it had begun to feel a little like that here, too… although “our lot” seemed to have decided additionally and unilaterally to be equally suspicious of anyone holding a UK Passport, too.

“You are welcome to our country” they seem to be saying, “just not very welcome…”