Comment by fhood
10 years ago
As much as I enjoy feeling superior to the British (spelling color with a 'u' is nothing short of pretentious) I would love to know if people from the UK suffer the same sort of troubles entering the US. As a US citizen I have found traveling to Canada and Australia to be a relatively pain free experience, but then Australians and Canadians are, in general, a whole lot nicer than Brits or Americans.
"I would love to know if people from the UK suffer the same sort of troubles entering the US"
I personally have had extended grief entering the US on a number of occasions - not in the last 4 or 5 years though. Worst was probably an extended session with me being asked why I went to Turkey so often from the UK (saying "it's a nice place to go on holiday" seemed to make them angry [maybe a lack of vacation days] - I think I must have provided 20 variations on that statement).
A friend who was a senior corporate lawyer had it much worse when he visited the US from the UK to attend a legal conference - extended stay and a "cavity search".
So do you think this is more of a policy problem or an attitude problem.
I have no idea - but I've traveled to a lot of places and in terms of friendliness of reception at the border the only place that was worse involved communists and large crew-serviced machine guns (NB crossing into Yugoslavia in the late 1980s by train from Italy).
Edit: For the avoidance of doubt, I really like the US as a place to visit both for business and vacation, but the experience at the border can leave a lot to be desired.
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I've not had any serious problems entering the US, but it is always a mildly unpleasant experience with long queues, fingerprinting, and questioning by a humourless guard. The return trip is usually a little less unpleasant, with much the same queues but no fingerprinting and little questioning.
Once, when travelling from the UK to Canada, I was accosted for extra questioning because I had declared on the customs form that I was in possession of weapons. When they determined that this was a bag of swords they weren't worried and let me through, telling me that their main concern was Americans who had forgotten that they weren't allowed to bring their firearms into Canada.
A British friend of mine suffered almost exactly the same situation attempting to visit the USA a few years ago to present a paid workshop. He's now barred from travelling to the USA without first arranging a visa at an embassy (which is apparently extremely hard to do with a previous incident on your record).
If you're not caught flouting their laws or being rude then, in my experience, they're all fine. The US is the most intrusive - fingerprints and photo every time you enter, but it's only a problem if you find it a problem (if you see what I mean).
What probably didn't help this lady is that she was being really quite rude. I don't know any country where low level officials take kindly to that. You REALLY don't want to be rude to US border agents. I mean, they have signs that say not to make jokes as they won't take kindly to that sort of behaviour.
For some reason my spellchecker thinks I've spelt behaviour incorrectly (and spelt). How colonial.
So using one spelling over the other - spellings that are the outcome of hundreds and hundreds of years, multiple languages , war and who knows what else - is some how remotely connected to pretentiousness? That was a really, really strained dig at Brits I must say.
I actively avoid the US these days because the last time I went, we spent ages in a queue being shouted at by irate border control folk and then were required to have our fingerprints taken. This was just for a vacation.
This isn't common knowledge amongst travellers, but if you have travelled to the US at least once since 2008 and have a valid ESTA, you can use automated passport control like the US citizens now - saves a ton of time and from having to queue up in the longer line.
If the airport staff there actually knows about the rule. Too often you are just sent to the back of the regular line before being given the chance of using the machine.
(And it does not allow for entering on visa.)
I'm often crossing all those borders and can say unequivocally that Canada and Australia have some of the absolutely most nasty border guards.
Canada is easily the worst. They're known for it.
I'm Australian so I wouldn't know.
US CBP = depends which airport you fly into. SFO = friendly, LAX = THE WORST. NYC = Also terrible.
that feeling of superiority to anyone is severely misplaced.
I've had friends fly in from Sweden, Canada, and the UK several times, and they have had no notable issues with border control.
That's not to say it never happens. Clearly if it were an endemic issue we'd hear about it far more often, but even if rare, experiences such as Rachel's are still deplorable.
And spelling colour without a 'u' is nothing short of wrong. ;)