General existing world immigration/border notes

Events occurring and how they relate/affect Anabaptist faith and culture.
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Josh
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by Josh »

Boot, I listened to that segment when it came out.

She's not telling us the whole story of why she was specifically targeted.
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Bootstrap
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by Bootstrap »

Josh wrote:Boot, I listened to that segment when it came out.

She's not telling us the whole story of why she was specifically targeted.
Is that true? What reliable information do you have? It is so, so easy to make accusations or raise scary scenarios that cannot be proven false, even if they are false. You know, "do you still beat your wife?"

And it doesn't sound like she was specifically targeted, they stopped a bunch of families traveling to a wedding. None of them were ever arrested or charged with anything. They feel very free to tell their story in public, I'm guessing that might imply they don't feel they have dirty laundry that might come out.
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Hats Off
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by Hats Off »

I was heading for the Canada/US border one day with an Old Order Amish man in my car when I realized I didn't have my passport with me. Oh well, we can always turn around if we have a problem. Just before we got to the border, I said something to my friend and he realised he didn't have any identification. Oh well, we are this far, we will just go ahead. The lady at the border asked for our id and I gave her my photo drivers licence but said he has nothing with him. Ok, leave the car right here with the key in the ignition and go into the glass building! After giving the agent his information, we stood there visiting with the agent. He was from the New York side of the crossing and had Old Order Mennonite, Old Order Amish, and Schwartzentruber Amish neighbours so this Old Order Amish man and the MWMC man took the time to explain the difference.

I learned a lesson - don't try to cross the border without ID and the agent got a lesson about the different Amish and Mennonite groups. In the end he let us go, even informing the Canada Customs agents that these two old men were coming through and that they should let them go. Instead of saving half an hour by taking a shortcut from Ontario to Quebec through New York, we lost an additional hour and a half.
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Josh
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by Josh »

Hats Off,

The US passport card is very useful to carry in your wallet and only costs $30. It means I'm always ready to go to Canada or Mexico even if my passport is left at home.
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Judas Maccabeus
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by Judas Maccabeus »

Bootstrap wrote:
Josh wrote:Boot, I listened to that segment when it came out.

She's not telling us the whole story of why she was specifically targeted.
Is that true? What reliable information do you have? It is so, so easy to make accusations or raise scary scenarios that cannot be proven false, even if they are false. You know, "do you still beat your wife?"

And it doesn't sound like she was specifically targeted, they stopped a bunch of families traveling to a wedding. None of them were ever arrested or charged with anything. They feel very free to tell their story in public, I'm guessing that might imply they don't feel they have dirty laundry that might come out.
Ultimately, if they are US citizens, they HAVE to let them in, questioning aside. You can't deport one of your own citizens. If they arrest them, that is when the lawyers start to get involved.

My guess is that the intelligence people may have been behind this, although we will never know. My daughter and I were given the "little room" treatment once, only question they kept asking was "why do you have so much camera equipment."

My daughter-"I am an art student," well that was not a sufficient answer.

J.M.
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temporal1
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by temporal1 »

ohio jones wrote:Only once have I had a delay entering Canada at a land border, but that time they asked me to park and go inside, where they asked a bunch of questions and called ahead to make sure I really did have a hotel reservation. Meanwhile the car was searched by the K9 unit.

No idea what they were looking for, but they overlooked the one thing that might have tipped them off I was giving truthful-but-incomplete answers. :blah: :?

Now that I have Global Entry, flying back to the US is much easier. No more long lines for passport control; most times (without checked luggage) it takes 10-15 minutes from the door of the plane to the door of the terminal, or the security line for a connecting flight, and most of that is walking.
all border patrol everywhere should be warned about this one. and his brother mike. :P
Hats Off wrote:I was heading for the Canada/US border one day with an Old Order Amish man in my car when I realized I didn't have my passport with me. Oh well, we can always turn around if we have a problem. Just before we got to the border, I said something to my friend and he realised he didn't have any identification. Oh well, we are this far, we will just go ahead. The lady at the border asked for our id and I gave her my photo drivers licence but said he has nothing with him. Ok, leave the car right here with the key in the ignition and go into the glass building!

After giving the agent his information, we stood there visiting with the agent.
He was from the New York side of the crossing and had Old Order Mennonite, Old Order Amish, and Schwartzentruber Amish neighbours so this Old Order Amish man and the MWMC man took the time to explain the difference.
:D

I learned a lesson - don't try to cross the border without ID and the agent got a lesson about the different Amish and Mennonite groups. :D

In the end he let us go, even informing the Canada Customs agents that these two old men were coming through and that they should let them go. :D

Instead of saving half an hour by taking a shortcut from Ontario to Quebec through New York, we lost an additional hour and a half.
occasionally, my grown daughter will have some odd experience to share in which she will end up with quite a tale to share (bemoan.) some are so entertaining that i ask her,
"what price or value could you put on that experience?!" - it seems worth it all,
just to have the account to remember (and share) for as long as you may recall. :mrgreen:

Hats Off, in your case, all the better, the agents received the benefit of a first-person encounter most will never experience. i hope they benefited. i expect they did, then, they chose accordingly.
(the U.S. passport card might be useful / it's an option.)

in this thread, the first-person accounts are most-interesting.
looking forward to more.
8-)
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Most or all of this drama, humiliation, wasted taxpayer money could be spared -
with even modest attempt at presenting balanced facts from the start.


”We’re all just walking each other home.”
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Bootstrap
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by Bootstrap »

Judas Maccabeus wrote: My guess is that the intelligence people may have been behind this, although we will never know. My daughter and I were given the "little room" treatment once, only question they kept asking was "why do you have so much camera equipment."
I have been detained twice at the border. Once, I lost my driver's license the day before a bicycle trip across Ontario in the early 1980s. At the time, the border was relatively open, so I decided to see if I could get in on a student ID. The Canadian government let me in when I crossed from Michigan, but in Niagara Falls the American official sent me to the back room with my bicycle. I waited for about 40 minutes, then someone came by and asked what I was waiting for. I explained, he looked surprised and said, "and they made you come back here?" He went and talked to someone briefly, came back to me, apologized, and wished me a nice trip.

The other time was in 1988, when I returned from working for 3 months in Berlin. The customs officer was confused that a computer scientist had a transit visa for East Germany, and asked what I had been doing in East Germany. I explained that a transit visa only lets you drive through East Germany, it does not let you stop, so I hadn't actually been in East Germany. He asked why I would be driving through East Germany. I explained that I was a freelance computer scientist with customers in Berlin and West Germany. He repeated his question. Eventually, it became clear that he did not know that Berlin was an island in the middle of East Germany, but they allowed you to use their highways to reach West Germany with a transit visa. When I explained this, he did not believe me, and insisted that West Berlin was in West Germany. I drew him a map. He said that couldn't be right, because nobody would put a West German town in the middle of East Germany. I explained that Berlin is 750 years old and East Germany was less than 50 years old, and the Allies didn't want the Russians to take Berlin, so we defended it. I told him about the raisin bombers bringing in food and medicine when the Russians blockaded West Berlin. He still didn't believe it. I explained that I had been living there for 3 months and was pretty familiar with where things are. No dice. He kept trying to get me to tell him why I was lying to him. After about an hour of this, I realized I was probably going to miss my next flight, and asked him if he could get a map. He said no. I said, "this is a question a map could clear up very quickly, we've been discussing it for an hour now, and the map will tell us who is right". He said he didn't need a map to know where Berlin is. I asked for a supervisor. He got red and started shaking - he clearly did not want me to talk to a supervisor - and angrily told me to get out. I'm not sure what that was all about, but that experience makes me more willing to believe some of the other experiences people tell. At least they kept me for only an hour.
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appleman2006
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by appleman2006 »

Bootstrap wrote:
Judas Maccabeus wrote: My guess is that the intelligence people may have been behind this, although we will never know. My daughter and I were given the "little room" treatment once, only question they kept asking was "why do you have so much camera equipment."
I have been detained twice at the border. Once, I lost my driver's license the day before a bicycle trip across Ontario in the early 1980s. At the time, the border was relatively open, so I decided to see if I could get in on a student ID. The Canadian government let me in when I crossed from Michigan, but in Niagara Falls the American official sent me to the back room with my bicycle. I waited for about 40 minutes, then someone came by and asked what I was waiting for. I explained, he looked surprised and said, "and they made you come back here?" He went and talked to someone briefly, came back to me, apologized, and wished me a nice trip.

The other time was in 1988, when I returned from working for 3 months in Berlin. The customs officer was confused that a computer scientist had a transit visa for East Germany, and asked what I had been doing in East Germany. I explained that a transit visa only lets you drive through East Germany, it does not let you stop, so I hadn't actually been in East Germany. He asked why I would be driving through East Germany. I explained that I was a freelance computer scientist with customers in Berlin and West Germany. He repeated his question. Eventually, it became clear that he did not know that Berlin was an island in the middle of East Germany, but they allowed you to use their highways to reach West Germany with a transit visa. When I explained this, he did not believe me, and insisted that West Berlin was in West Germany. I drew him a map. He said that couldn't be right, because nobody would put a West German town in the middle of East Germany. I explained that Berlin is 750 years old and East Germany was less than 50 years old, and the Allies didn't want the Russians to take Berlin, so we defended it. I told him about the raisin bombers bringing in food and medicine when the Russians blockaded West Berlin. He still didn't believe it. I explained that I had been living there for 3 months and was pretty familiar with where things are. No dice. He kept trying to get me to tell him why I was lying to him. After about an hour of this, I realized I was probably going to miss my next flight, and asked him if he could get a map. He said no. I said, "this is a question a map could clear up very quickly, we've been discussing it for an hour now, and the map will tell us who is right". He said he didn't need a map to know where Berlin is. I asked for a supervisor. He got red and started shaking - he clearly did not want me to talk to a supervisor - and angrily told me to get out. I'm not sure what that was all about, but that experience makes me more willing to believe some of the other experiences people tell. At least they kept me for only an hour.
:D Sorry not laughing at you but rather at the exchange you had. I think most of us that cross borders frequently have run into border officials that make us wonder why they have the job they do. As in any profession there are good and bad officials. However I do believe that very seldom do they ask questions that do not have a direct purpose even if we cannot often see their reasoning. And I for one always choose to be respectful as you did even if I do not understand their reasoning. In the end they are simply working for their respective gove3rnments and using tools that they have to try an maintain the laws and do their jobs. Would more open borders be nice at times? Of course. Particularly when we would like to cross each other's borders to do volunteer or church related work which BTW has become harder through President Obama's time than at any other time in my lifetime. It is hard for me to understand the reasoning of letting a illegal person crossing the Mexican border being let go on his own to a city of his choice, sometimes even given a free plane ticket, while a person that is trying to legally cross the border from Canada that simply wants to help for two weeks of disaster relief in your country as a volunteer is denied entry, but it happens all the time. But as I stated perhaps all those protests for open borders will change a thing or two? Who knows? ;)
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mike
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

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Bootstrap wrote:The other time was in 1988, when I returned from working for 3 months in Berlin. The customs officer was confused that a computer scientist had a transit visa for East Germany, and asked what I had been doing in East Germany. I explained that a transit visa only lets you drive through East Germany, it does not let you stop, so I hadn't actually been in East Germany. He asked why I would be driving through East Germany. I explained that I was a freelance computer scientist with customers in Berlin and West Germany. He repeated his question. Eventually, it became clear that he did not know that Berlin was an island in the middle of East Germany, but they allowed you to use their highways to reach West Germany with a transit visa. When I explained this, he did not believe me, and insisted that West Berlin was in West Germany. I drew him a map. He said that couldn't be right, because nobody would put a West German town in the middle of East Germany. I explained that Berlin is 750 years old and East Germany was less than 50 years old, and the Allies didn't want the Russians to take Berlin, so we defended it. I told him about the raisin bombers bringing in food and medicine when the Russians blockaded West Berlin. He still didn't believe it. I explained that I had been living there for 3 months and was pretty familiar with where things are. No dice. He kept trying to get me to tell him why I was lying to him. After about an hour of this, I realized I was probably going to miss my next flight, and asked him if he could get a map. He said no. I said, "this is a question a map could clear up very quickly, we've been discussing it for an hour now, and the map will tell us who is right". He said he didn't need a map to know where Berlin is. I asked for a supervisor. He got red and started shaking - he clearly did not want me to talk to a supervisor - and angrily told me to get out. I'm not sure what that was all about, but that experience makes me more willing to believe some of the other experiences people tell. At least they kept me for only an hour.
That's completely awesome. :lol:
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Re: General existing world immigration/border notes

Post by appleman2006 »

mike wrote:
Bootstrap wrote:The other time was in 1988, when I returned from working for 3 months in Berlin. The customs officer was confused that a computer scientist had a transit visa for East Germany, and asked what I had been doing in East Germany. I explained that a transit visa only lets you drive through East Germany, it does not let you stop, so I hadn't actually been in East Germany. He asked why I would be driving through East Germany. I explained that I was a freelance computer scientist with customers in Berlin and West Germany. He repeated his question. Eventually, it became clear that he did not know that Berlin was an island in the middle of East Germany, but they allowed you to use their highways to reach West Germany with a transit visa. When I explained this, he did not believe me, and insisted that West Berlin was in West Germany. I drew him a map. He said that couldn't be right, because nobody would put a West German town in the middle of East Germany. I explained that Berlin is 750 years old and East Germany was less than 50 years old, and the Allies didn't want the Russians to take Berlin, so we defended it. I told him about the raisin bombers bringing in food and medicine when the Russians blockaded West Berlin. He still didn't believe it. I explained that I had been living there for 3 months and was pretty familiar with where things are. No dice. He kept trying to get me to tell him why I was lying to him. After about an hour of this, I realized I was probably going to miss my next flight, and asked him if he could get a map. He said no. I said, "this is a question a map could clear up very quickly, we've been discussing it for an hour now, and the map will tell us who is right". He said he didn't need a map to know where Berlin is. I asked for a supervisor. He got red and started shaking - he clearly did not want me to talk to a supervisor - and angrily told me to get out. I'm not sure what that was all about, but that experience makes me more willing to believe some of the other experiences people tell. At least they kept me for only an hour.
That's completely awesome. :lol:
:D Kind of feeds in the generally accepted thinking up here in Canada that geography outside of the borders of your 48 states is not taught very well. I bet there are people in your country that believe Alaska and Hawaii exist as islands just below Texas. :P On a more serious note there is at least a slight chance that the border guard was intentionally playing dumb just to really test out the possibility that in fact Bootstrap may have been an agent for some foreign eastern power. 1988 was just after the end of the cold war after all and border guards do use some weird ways to get at facts at times.
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