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8:55 am
January 11, 2011
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sheila
| | mindsided by Blindsight | |
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1:53 pm
January 11, 2011
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Andrea_A
| | Germany | |
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What a mess!
I adviced one of my relatives (psychology student) to think twice about going to USA.
A co-worker had trouble with the border patrol a couple of years ago, too. We're not friends, so I know no further details.
Maybe I should go to a tourist fair and ask uncomfortable questions there … as it appears to be risky visiting the USA.
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3:18 pm
January 11, 2011
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Hljothlegur
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Andrea_A said:
What a mess!
I adviced one of my relatives (psychology student) to think twice about going to USA.
A co-worker had trouble with the border patrol a couple of years ago, too. We're not friends, so I know no further details.
Maybe I should go to a tourist fair and ask uncomfortable questions there … as it appears to be risky visiting the USA.
This sounds really crass, but ….Is your relative a good looking white girl with no facial piercings, who can act perky and bubbleheaded? If so, no prob. I, for instance, am terribly white and all I do is put on my perky Mom persona, and they don't give me any trouble at all.
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12:25 am
January 12, 2011
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The Echo Inside
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My first encounter with US customs was to have my mother and so, the rest of the family as well, put under armed guard for the night. All because the agent wasn't paying attention and didn't return my mother's immigration papers for Canada. Which meant we couldn't enter Canada/board the flight, had to stay on US soil and so were considered a security risk (and this was pre-9/11). They wouldn't allow us to go back to the entrance area to check for her papers, because it was "federally controlled", even though it was an open area. The next morning, my mother went immediately there, before they "opened" and before they could stop us again and retrieved her papers. From the garbage. Where the agent had put them.
The cleaning staff had started emptying the bins on the other side of the room. A few minutes delay, and my mother would have been deported.
I've visited the US a number of times since then, been hassled on the US side every single time to varying degrees. I'm as pale as they come, but I'm tall and my passport mentions South Africa, only reasons I can think of that they prod at me, because I try and be as nice and smiling as possible.
Perhaps part of why Peter's story got to me when I read it on Boing Boing.
Last time I visited was years ago, not inclined to do so any time soon =P
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"I have learnt silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet strange, I am ungrateful to these teachers." – Kahlil Gibran
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10:35 am
January 12, 2011
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Hljothlegur
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The Echo Inside said:
My first encounter with US customs was to have my mother and so, the rest of the family as well, put under armed guard for the night. All because the agent wasn't paying attention and didn't return my mother's immigration papers for Canada. Which meant we couldn't enter Canada/board the flight, had to stay on US soil and so were considered a security risk (and this was pre-9/11). They wouldn't allow us to go back to the entrance area to check for her papers, because it was "federally controlled", even though it was an open area. The next morning, my mother went immediately there, before they "opened" and before they could stop us again and retrieved her papers. From the garbage. Where the agent had put them.
The cleaning staff had started emptying the bins on the other side of the room. A few minutes delay, and my mother would have been deported.
I've visited the US a number of times since then, been hassled on the US side every single time to varying degrees. I'm as pale as they come, but I'm tall and my passport mentions South Africa, only reasons I can think of that they prod at me, because I try and be as nice and smiling as possible.
Perhaps part of why Peter's story got to me when I read it on Boing Boing.
Last time I visited was years ago, not inclined to do so any time soon =P
That's horrible! Apologies, my dear, on behalf of the US.
Wonder why I am totally under the radar? Could it be that I am so generic, like a Toyota Camry or a Honda Civic, that I am invisible to them?
See, I like to think it's something I'm doing, because that puts me more in control of the situation, right? But I still suspect it's my genericness.
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4:22 pm
January 12, 2011
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Andrea_A
| | Germany | |
| Member | posts 147 | |
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Hljothlegur said:
This sounds really crass, but ….Is your relative a good looking white girl –> check
with no facial piercings, –> check
who can act perky and bubbleheaded? –> not sure. She's a little bit too snobbish … Maybe she would use a "professional mask", getting the answer "Hey bitch! YOU are NOT my therapeut!" — and further trouble.
If so, no prob. I, for instance, am terribly white and all I do is put on my perky Mom persona, and they don't give me any trouble at all.
Anyway — she told me that she has other plans. I could not afford travelling so far (don't like it so much, too). And my mother almost went mad as she heard about me going to France. (Btw: "traveil" (French) means "work" — absolutely true.)
Maybe in Germany we are questioning authorities somewhat more. "We are the people!" on Monday Demonstrations in Eastern Germany, and recently the protests about "Stuttgart 21" (very expensive new railway station).
A German woman made this prison sex scandal public: http://www.lex18.com/news/kent…..al-assault
Another interesting statement about prison system, too (maybe not the most serious source): http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…..other.html
And it is very interesting, that they got released due to expenses of medical treatment (about 100.000 $):
The
Scott sisters are eligible for parole in 2014, but Barbour said prison
officials no longer think they are a threat to society and Jamie's
medical condition is costing the state a lot of money.
Twould
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