Customs officials at the border of the country you’re trying to enter have every right to thoroughly search your luggage. I have a friend who flew into America from Switzerland and was horrified to see one official searching her bags with a hand-held wand. And if you’re going to attempt to enter the US by crossing over from Mexico, your luggage can be searched by a canine sniffer dog. Any luck trying to enter America without having your stuff searched?
Unfortunately, “searching” is the wrong word. “Going through” is more accurate, as Customs doesn’t search every bag, just the ones they have the right to go through. And that’s true of most of the world. The right to look through your luggage and call it a “search” is not a universal right, even in the West. We went through customs at the UK’s Heathrow airport with our two-year-old son and wondered why a customs officer felt that a small laptop was a suspicious package that warranted a pat-down. But since Heathrow is outside London and thus outside the jurisdiction of UK law, the officer couldn’t even enforce the law of England. He was no more or less aggressive than the officer checking luggage at the U.S. border. In reality, what happens is that it’s a business transaction. Customs officers know they can look through your luggage for contraband, but are generally polite about it, and the damage is limited to your pride. As one travel agent told me, “It’s all about playing the game to maximise the returns from your trip.” The good news is that there’s a whole subset of customs that’s more sensitive than merely “going through.”
Just as is the case with international and state borders governing the legitimacy and access of any new online casino that goes live, things are different with customs officials working in different countries.
With the exception of the first months of the Obama administration, foreign travellers who are entering the US for a short time have been subject to some of the most stringent surveillance. Foreign travellers have the right to ask to see a copy of your passport and answer any questions about your trip. Most countries will allow you to send an email (which I did at the start of our trip) or a fax, but the US is the exception. If you try to send an email or fax, you will be automatically treated as a suspect—even if it is perfectly normal for you to contact a consular official while you’re abroad. Under the George W. Bush administration, it was worse. In the event that you can’t comply with a customs officer’s demands to see your passport, you may be subjected to full-on search and seizure. These “random” searches are now a virtual custom in most airports, so you may well get asked to open your luggage and pull out your baggies and your underwear. The result is to make you feel that your bag is a loaded weapon.
For years, airport security officials have assumed that since everyone is guilty until proven innocent, the best thing to do is ask everyone to empty their pockets. The result is that most travellers are coerced into carrying a pre-packed garbage bag full of plastic shopping bags as a substitute for their belongings.
