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This is a question Travel

I've had guns pointed at me in many different countries, sometimes even by our own side. I've also sat on my own on a beach on a desert island, which was nice because nobody was trying to shoot me. Tell us your tales of foreign travel.

Thanks to SnowytheRabbit for the suggestion

(, Thu 18 Apr 2013, 17:43)
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My first ever trip on a plane was to New York JFK - On my own.
I was a 20 year old slip of a lad with very little experience of the world outside of messing around with computers. But I found myself at JFK immigration being quizzed by the biggest scariest woman I've ever seen in my life. Think of Rusty Lee but without any sense of humour or any hint of a smile on her face.

After various questions we came to:

"You haven't filled in where will you be staying?"
"I don't know."
"You have to stay somewhere."
"Yes. I don't know where I be staying yet."
"You have to record the address of where you're staying."
"I told you - I don't know where I'll be staying. When I meet my girlfriend we'll find somewhere. We plan to travel."
"I can't let you through unless you record where you're staying."
"Erm... New York?"
"I need an address."
"Erm. Times square, New York?"

After a pause she scribbled an address on my immigration form and said,"This is where you will be staying."

I looked at the address. It was nowhere I'd ever heard of.

"Do I have to go there?" I enquired. I wasn't really happy with this scenario.

With a withered look she said,"No, Kid. It's for the paperwork? Please, just go."

It would have been easier if they'd had a 'Travelling' checkbox on the form.

Edit: On 2nd thoughts maybe it was her home address and she just wanted some hot young Brit action.
(, Fri 19 Apr 2013, 11:09, 4 replies)
I had a similar thing in Chicago
For the place I was staying, I put "O'Hare Airport" as I had a connecting flight within the hour. They didn't like that, for some reason.
(, Fri 19 Apr 2013, 11:33, closed)
Her Twin Brother
Funny that, when I first went to the same place as a 20yo slip of a lad (BUNAcamp, thanks for asking) in 1990, I was also stopped at JFK by a very big, scary African American immigration official. To this day, I have no idea what he asked me, as my ears (despite a teenage diet of Cagney & Lacey) really hadn't tuned into the Noo Yoik accent.
(, Fri 19 Apr 2013, 18:18, closed)
The Next Time...
The next time I went to NYC was over a decade later, in the middle of the Foot & Mouth outbreak here. Travelling for work this time - critical customer meeting.

I'd dutifully filled in the immigration form, with its hastily added question about staying on a farm. *Phew* I thought, not done that, so won't get stopped.

At immigration though, they asked me (my ears better attuned with age) if I'd stayed in a B&B. Which I had. The day before. In Northumberland. Centre of the F&M universe.

Thinking that being known as 'that guy that brought Foot & Mouth into America' would be career limiting, I thought it best to 'fess up, expecting the full strip, power hose and rubber suiting treatment to immediately follow.

Fortunately, they just followed up with asking whether I'd touched any livestock, which I hadn't, and waved me on my way.
(, Fri 19 Apr 2013, 18:23, closed)
I suppose wearing wellies and a condom...
...meant you hadn't "technically" touched any livestock.
(, Fri 19 Apr 2013, 20:39, closed)

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