Someone pointed out that of course they won't ask the same questions, because then you can plan for them. And a TSA person said something that hints that that is true. Still, it seems that at least some of the questions should be consistent. "Are you bringing in any plants?" What is the advantage of not asking that some of the time? If you don't ask me, cool. If you do ask me, I either lie or get caught. But, if I'm a liar, I'm going to bring those in if you don't ask. Aren't I?
Anyway, this last trip was full of variations. In some places, half of us would get grilled, the other half nothing. Here are my favorites:
- In one country, we passed through security (I believe it was customs), and the people watching the monitors were young and flirting with each other. I watched the whole time. They didn't look at the screen with the scan of my bags. Not even once.
- In Perú, there were no employees, no officials. Just a big doorway that said, "If you have something to declare, go this way. If not, go that way." No x-rays, no people. Just our call.
- Which got us into some trouble later, because the camera set up we traveled with got confiscated in Uruguay. We really should have thought about that and had forms filled out, and one of us did reach out to my organizations international office to see if we'd need to and was told no. But it was definitely a far cry from Perú. And we got our equipment back, and know what to do now. No fault to Uruguay. But we definitely weren't prepared.
- Driving over the border into Brazil, we got out of the vehicle and walked into the Customs/Immigration office. There were signs saying, "Silence" and others with pictures of someone with their finger to their lips. We literally said nothing. And they said nothing to us. NO questions, not even about our camera setup. Just a stamp in the passport and away we went.
- I had one immigration official who was kind of younger, and had his AirPods in. I think it was the flight where we were going from Uruguay to Argentina and then on to a different place in Argentina where we'd cross into Brazil. He asked like, 3 questions, and then was satisfied. Everyone else got grilled, because there was nothing on our itinerary showing we were leaving Brazil (no flight). But not my guy. He just wanted to get back to whatever he was listening to, I guess.
- I think my all time favorite was immigration in Atlanta. I don't think the guy even looked at my passport, but his computer showed that I'm an archivist, which led to a 5 minute conversation about what exactly it is that I do for a living. Not where I usually have that conversation. (Everyone else in my group usually puts down historian, but I stubbornly refuse. Thus, explaining to an immigration official what I do for a living).
I will say, I spent waaaay too much time in customs, immigration, and security lines on this trip. But, at least it was entertaining.
