People I met at the airport (1)

June 29

Customs

As I left my parents and girlfriend at the airport, the first people I met were the US Customs agents. It was quite interesting, because their job is to ask about what is the purpose of my visit and I couldn’t exactly tell them and expect to not be detained or denied entry. I didn’t want to lie to them but couldn’t tell them the full truth either.

“What are you going to be doing in the US?”
“Well sir, I am really glad you asked me that. You see, I am going to be working with a group called No More Deaths at provides food, water and first aid to people who were driven into poverty by facors beyond their control that include the corruption of their leaders as well as economic decisions made by our leaders and are forced to cross into your country illegally to look for work. We will also be documenting mistreatment of detained migrants by your Border Patrol officers. Can I come in now?”

Wouldn’t have gone over well and if I am not allowed to go I can’t do much good.

So this is what actually happened:

The officer behind the desk looks at me and casually asks where I am going.
“To Tucson, Arizona”
“Doing what?”
“Camping” (we will be camping out in the desert where the migrants come)

The atmosphere changes a bit and he looks at me more intensely.
“Where are you meeting?”
“Sacred Heart Church” (where NMD stays in Tucson, it is a former convent). He googles it and sure enough, it pops up.

“What will you be doing?”
“Camping.”
“So what do you do?”
“I’m a substitute teacher.”
“Where do you teach?”
I list off 2 divisions.
“Do you work with disabled kids?”
“Yeah, I work with all students”.
“So who are you meeting in Arizona?”
I give him the name of our Karen, our coordinator.
“Where in Arizona are you going camping?” I tell him Karen knows, she’s my friend who lives there and I’ll find out when I get there. I don’t know exactly where the desert camps are, except that they are close to the border
“Are you sure you aren’t going there to volunteer?”
I repeated I am going camping.
“Because some people go there to volunteer”.
“Oh yeah”.
“So are you coming back to substitute teaching next year?”
“Yeah”.
“It’s very interesting in Arizona”.
“Why do you say that?”
He pauses and looks a bit confused.
“It’s just really hot”
“Oh yeah”.

He waves me through. I have to say I was quite impressed by his persistence. He was good at changing the topic and it seems like he was trying to catch me off guard by the questions. The last time I went through customs like this was Ben Gurion airport, only I was questioned 5 times by Israeli airport staff on my way out of the country. This was after my time with CPT and ISM.

I wanted to be upfront with him but also wanted to avoid problems with entry. I have full respect for him and he was doing his job quite well. It was an interesting several minutes.