Passports, pears and gatekeepers
From The Toronto Star
Sep. 1, 2005. 01:00 AM
Passports, pears and gatekeepers
You don't have to fit a racial profile to run afoul of U.S. customs officials, Jon Mendelsohn discovered
To some this may be passé. But to white Canadian boys, it's still new. So bear with me.
I was at Pearson International recently en route to New York City. I had my passport, aware that soon enough we would no longer be permitted to enter the country without one. I waited in the snaking line of U.S. customs control the requisite 40 minutes.
The director of traffic, the man in a blue blazer at the front of the line, sent me to booth number five when it became free. It was manned by a woman no older than 30. I thought this would be to my advantage. I figured it would be better than dealing with a man. Angry men are generally less susceptible to male charm, you see.
Unfortunately, my customs officer was a woman who'd been angry many years before she met me. There was no charming her. I was doomed before I started.
She didn't yell but almost yelled. Where was I going? New York City. My purpose? Vacation. Where was I staying? The Bronx. I was staying with a friend. What's the address? I'm sorry? The ADDRESS? She was yelling now. I don't know it, I stammered. The friend I'm staying with is going to pick me up.
I'd been to America countless times before and had never once been asked for an address. You need an address, she said. I'm really sorry, I don't know it. What am I supposed to do? Her arms were crossed.
You're gonna have to find it out. How, I asked? You'll have to call your friend. But he works in a hospital. He won't answer his phone. She hadn't uncrossed her arms. Listen, you want to come in to the United States, you need an address.
How is the government supposed to keep track of you without an address? I dared not ask why they needed to keep track of me. But I did say, pleadingly: If he doesn't answer his phone what can I do? (I'm now truly hating myself for not having made one up.) YOU CANNOT ENTER WITHOUT AN ADDRESS, DO YOU UNDERSTAND? I said I did and she directed me to a pay phone.
It was only because it was a childhood friend I was visiting that I recalled his parents' phone number by heart and so could call and get the address.
On my return I was permitted to bypass the line. The director of traffic, the man in the blue blazer, held me back when the next available customs officer came free. It seemed I was to be sent back to the woman at booth five. Only she wasn't free. She was harassing some other traveller.
Eventually I was sent to booth number four, adjacent to the woman's. She had her back to me and there was bulletproof glass to muffle the sound.
The young male officer at booth four politely asked me where I was going. The Bronx, I said, address in hand, ready. He didn't ask for it and was already stamping my boarding pass. And that was that.
Until, that is, the lady officer behind him turned around and saw me. Through the bulletproof glass she asked the officer, DID HE GIVE YOU AN ADDRESS?
The officer said no and I frantically raised up the paper the address had been written on to show her I had it. I told her that he hadn't asked for it.
You have to understand. It doesn't matter that I hadn't done anything wrong. The important thing was that to this point I had been deferential, obliging and relatively subservient. Then I got stupid.
I mean how many times have you been told to never ever get angry or snippy or anything but obscenely obsequious to customs officers? The woman started yelling about something or other and, truth is, I'd had enough so I just turned away from her and looked back at the more personable young man. He gave me my stamped boarding pass and passport and I was sent on my way.
I had what I needed and had only to pass one more person, a young woman who had been standing near booth five the whole time. She took my passport from me and said I had to accompany her. I asked, in my most Disney-innocent manner, if I had done something wrong? Sorry sir. That was all she said and kept marching. I was to follow.
I was taken into a room, left behind a large yellow curtain. She returned a few minutes later and by gesture and grunt indicated that I was to follow round to the other side of the curtain. Standing there, at a computer, was a broad, fat man in his manager's uniform. He waited for the girl to leave.
He started softly. Asked me what had happened. I was given about 20 seconds of talk-time — my feeble attempt to express my innocence — before he started to yell at me. I was not to EVER disrespect one of his officers. DID I UNDERSTAND?
And suddenly I was in every bad American army movie I had ever seen, head down, hands clasped together before me getting all yes sir, no sir, three bags that I packed myself, sir. He spent much effort yelling about how easily he could stop me from ever entering the U.S. again. I was now the crown king of deferential.
Was I American, he asked? I said no, I said I was Canadian. He corrected me. I was a foreigner. Did I understand? Yes, sir. The supervisor left. The woman returned.
She went through my bags. In my knapsack she found a pear. Underneath a Mack truck of rage from the fact that I had no recourse in any of this, I was still petty nervous, the way so many people must feel who cross the border with the "wrong" colour skin. I quickly apologized, said I was planning to eat it before boarding the plane.
Instead of just confiscating it, the woman said she'd have to check it with agriculture. Off she went. More minutes ticked by. She returned. The pear was set aside. Another national American crisis diverted.
She clicked away at her computer after telling me to zip up my bags. Am I free to go? I asked tepidly. Still looking at her screen she said a flat "ba-bye" in response.
Furious and pearless I boarded the plane en route to Manhattan. Welcome to George Bush's America.
Jonathan Mendelsohn is a writer who splits his time between living in Canada and Japan.
