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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!lll-crg!well!l5!laura
From: laura@l5.uucp (Laura Creighton)
Newsgroups: net.cycle
Subject: Re: x-country travel
Message-ID: <267@l5.uucp>
Date: Thu, 14-Nov-85 13:18:12 EST
Article-I.D.: l5.267
Posted: Thu Nov 14 13:18:12 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 15-Nov-85 21:00:55 EST
References: <1209@decwrl.UUCP> <1085@mtuxo.UUCP> <857@ihlpa.UUCP> <1248@ihuxn.UUCP> <253@l5.uucp> <1525@Shasta.ARPA>
Reply-To: laura@l5.UUCP (Laura Creighton)
Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco
Lines: 30

I dunno, Steve -- maybe you were lucjy or maybe you just look more repuable
than I do.  When travelling with my parents, I never had any trouble at this
border.  On the other hand, nearly every time I crossed it by bus I have
been stripped and had the contents of my travelling case dumped on the floor.

I have gone through hours of ``do you have a GREEN CARD?'' ``No, I'm
going to CONFUSION - a SCIENCE FICTION CONVENTION in ANN ARBOR.  I don't
NEED a GREEN CARD!!''  I have had my car searched for 4 hours on 2
ocassions.  I had the panels removed from the truck I was riding in
once.  And I have been refused entry into the US twice because they 
wouldn't believe that I was only going to spend few hours in Buffalo.

(Once was during another great Canadian Mail Strike.  I had the 40 letters
I was going to mail right there in the dash board. No sir, they weren't
buying it.)

I have come very clsoe to being refused entry because I didn't have a
birth certificate or a passport (nobody told me I would need one -- I
never had before).  Quite often going through they have wanted to know
the name of my employer (which often I didn't have) and something on
official stationary from there.  

I don't know -- maybe I do something which sets them off.  But I have been
hassled twice at the Buffalo border, never at any other border station, and
nearly every single damn time at the Detroit border.

-- 
Laura Creighton		
sun!l5!laura		(that is ell-five, not fifteen)
l5!laura@lll-crg.arpa