The use of the prefix ‘Sir’ is different here I’ve noticed. I’m addressed as Sir in my capacity as a schoolteacher, and it has always felt respectful, if not entirely appropriate. When addressed in the same manner in shops or by service staff it has always felt equally respectful, but whenever anyone calls me Sir here, it has been without exception, done negatively.
It reminds me of a Homer quote I’d long since forgotten: he is on the way to a black tie dinner with Marge and makes the comment, ‘Perhaps someone will call me Sir, without then adding, you’re making a scene’, and I didn’t realize how relevant it was to American culture until now. I’ve been addressed as Sir 3 times: once by a lifeguard for running in the swimming pool, once by Security in the airport prior to being searched and once by a Customs officer on the Border of Canada. None of these were positive exchanges, but the latter definitely takes the biscuit.
As has been mentioned before, my wife has an American passport and can come and go as she pleases, however as British citizens, my children and I have come in on Tourist visas, which require stamping every 90 days up to a period of up to 2 years. Such stamps are achieved by leaving the country and re-entering it, however we opted for this over applying for a full years visa as 40% of these are declined, and we did not want to risk the trip being over before it began, so we opted for the low risk/high hassle option. This meant that midway through December our visas were due to expire, and as the many emails I received informing me of this proved, the government was well aware of this.
So a weekend trip to Canada was in order. Simone had an old friend who lived in a town called Duncan which was in British Columbia, and fairly close to the American border. Truth be told I was incredibly uncomfortable about the whole thing from the get go. It seemed like an arbitrary trip across the border might be questioned and I had heard the term ‘meaningful departure’ in abstraction although I wasn’t sure where. The trip involved a long car journey and a ferry to Vancouver Island so I was naturally also concerned about the arbitrary cost.
Since we’d just taken a rental contract out on a house and also bought a car (and above that bought season tickets on the mountain for the whole family), we decided it was a necessary evil/risk, so we planned a trip. My school friend Alistair lives in Hood River, a town around half way to the border so we requested a stop-off there, and Melissa, who was worried about my rear wheel drive SUV (Ha!) making it over the Hood Pass with the recent snow, insisted we borrow her 4x4 Minivan to make the journey. So we did, and I reluctantly packed another car for another long journey that promised little other than gas money and stress.
Al provided a safe-haven in Hood River away from the stresses of border crossing.
Luckily this journey fulfilled that promise with gusto. Heavy snow on the pass made the transition to Al’s skittish and taxing, but his warm hospitality made up for it. The journey to Port Angelis was long and against the clock, which is never nice. I slept for the entire journey on the ferry, upright, in a seat, so I’ve no idea what that was like, and our exit through Canadian customs was confusing.
The Canadian Customs man asked us some questions, before which he explained that he needed to ascertain whether we would be allowed back into America if we only planned to stay for 2 days, North of the border. Unfortunately his knowledge of US Customs laws seemed poor at best, as he displayed genuine surprise at being informed a US tourist Visa only lasted 3 months, as he believed it to be 6. If he was ignorant of such a basic and highly relevant law, then what good was he to ascertain our suitability for acceptance on our return? In fact, I think if any of you out there are thinking of emigrating to Canada in the inevitable wake of whatever Brexit turns out to be, I suggest you just turn up at the border with your stuff in a van and tell them you’re only going to be there for the weekend, and I imagine they’ll wave you through, as they did with us. Like a Venus Flytrap.
This was the view from Massimo’s house in British Columbia in the morning. What a cliche?
Canada was lovely, although pretty much exactly as I imagined it to be. Misty, woody, rural. It definitely felt more European than Oregon or Washington State. The price of petrol was high like in Europe, but everyone had those massive trucks, like in Oregon so God knows how that worked. Did the government pay for everybody’s petrol? Or did they pay for each other’s, in a friendly, rather than socialist way? Strangely that seemed more likely.
The highlight of the trip for me, had to be the Municiple Swimming Pool. Not that that was how it was referred to, but that’s what it was, as proved by it’s $4 entrance fee ($4 Canadian!). I’d been reluctant to go at first, it seemed a waste of an afternoon in Canada to go to the swimming baths, but I was wrong: it was the best swimming pool I have ever been to, and I’ve been to a few.
The Swimming Pool in Duncan BC was a show stopper.
2 Diving boards, 2 water slides, the kind that go out of the building and then in it again, a wave machine, water guns, a hot tub (massive and really hot) sauna, steam room and a lazy river, the latter of which my son would have lived out the rest of his days, given the choice. We didn’t have armbands for Stan: they were provided, and no one stole all my cash from the locker I didn’t have the requisite change to lock (more on that in the future). All in all, a class act.
We watched the film Blades of Glory that night and laughed, it was a happy day – but ironically again, it preceded a bit of a stinker. Our return to the ferry was another against-the-clock nail biter, and after an initially pleasant exchange with the front line customs lady, a concerned frown and mutterings mentioning the word ‘Superior’ led to us being asked to step out of the car, and report for interview. So we gave the kids a suitably serious warning and left them to fend for themselves as we stepped into the rejection queue.
In that queue there was my wife and I, and two others. One Canadian lady whom they believed was seeking illegal work across the border, which, having talked to her for only 5 minutes I believed not to be the case. Her story checked out. There was also an Australian lady, who like us was extending her US tourist visa, but unlike us this was the second time she was doing it (we were later to find out that she was denied entry, and instructed to fly back to Australia there and then). We waited some time. The interviews before us seemed long, and our ferry was about to leave and that was the last one that day, so if we missed it? My wife and I discussed worst-case scenarios; and they were bleak. All of our belongings bar a weekend bag were still in Oregon, in a house we had taken an 11 month contract out on. Even the car we were driving belonged to someone else and ours was across the border. If we were refused entry to the US, we would either have to camp out in Canada for 3 months (with a weekend bag), or fly directly home; without passing go. What happens to our stuff? What do we do with this car? When the customs officer asked me whom the car belonged to I blurted inexplicably ‘our relocation agent’, which was met with all sorts of suspicious lines of questioning. I was clearly going to have to engage my brain filters for this one.
The interview therefore was intense. The customs officer was pleasant, but thorough. I was actually very impressed with how well he listened; I felt he would make someone a very good friend. He explained to us that now (exactly when things changed remained unclear), it was not sufficient that one left the country, but that it was a ‘meaningful departure’, which he went on to define as a departure in which the departee was absent from the US for a longer period than which they were there. That would mean 3 months in Canada, to satisfy the new requirements of gaining re-entry to the US. That wasn’t practical.
I explained to the Customs officer our situation, which was honourable in it’s intent: essentially my intention has always been to come to the US for a year, and empty my entire savings account into the American economy, and then return to England next September, to resume my duties as a schoolteacher. I’m a dream client. My wife has an American passport and my children have rights to one, if I’m prepared to pay; and I have to go back, as I’ve got a job so staying beyond August would be impossible. What is the fucking problem? Naturally my translation of that was a lot more tactful.
A lifetime later we exited the meeting with a stamp for another 90 days, but it wasn’t a walk in the park. It was given reluctantly; and the customs officer felt I should be grateful. But I wasn’t. Relieved yes, grateful no. Throughout the entire interview the customs officer had been suggesting our ejection was inevitable. Waiting outside the small, concrete office at the docks for someone to make an entirely discretionary decision which had an immediate and potentially disastrous effect on a legitimately present tourist and his young family had made me feel a little bit like an Asylum seeker. I’m quick to make light of it now, but it was a pretty horrific experience, in which the worst-case scenario fucked other people over as well as ourselves; and that makes it so much worse. We stopped for fast food on our re-entrance to Washington-State, and I said to Simone, that in 3 months’, or in fact ever again, I would not do that a second time. And I hold that intent fast, still.
The customs officer appeared hurt at my suggestion that this had been a horrific experience, citing the fact that he thought that he himself, had been particularly pleasant in our exchange. I felt it strange that I was then meant to feel sorry for him somehow, since our interview had been difficult for him as well. I felt like punching him, but decided that would not help our plight, and so decided to take our stamps and get out of Dodge. And that’s what we did.
The fundamental problem with the system here - which is of course designed to keep people out, is the term ‘discretionary.’ Our stay in the States is completely legitimate, however the system is not designed to accommodate such a trip. We have tried at every juncture to abide by the laws and rules of the country, yet still our welcome is decided at an individuals discretion. The customs officer still holds the right to deny us entry for whatever reason he choses, even if we fulfil all the required criteria. This to me is not a robust system, and relies too heavily on individual opinion, and I found the attitude of the customs officer, who felt I should be grateful he believed my story, to be highly offensive. It was not a story, it was the truth which furthermore is documented and can be proven. He went on to say that should we pass through again and he interviewed us, he would further extend our visas as he could see we were legitimate - again the implication here was that if we were interviewed by someone other than himself, then our entrance would of course be refused. Again, I found this infuriating as it was further evidence of fundamentally flawed system: entrance or denial based purely on what seemed to be the luck of the draw.
Arriving home therefore was not the relief that perhaps it should have been. Yes we were back with our stuff, and the girls could go back to school, but we now knew that further extending our visas beyond March would be impossible by similar means, and that were we to stay beyond that, another route would have to be found - and we could already see that such a route might not even exist.