posted on April 19, 2004 10:37:25 PM new
My run-in with American security on full apple alert
GAVIN ESLER
THE American authorities have decided to toughen the entrance arrangements for British people arriving in the country. Photographs and fingerprints. A new routine, they say.
The fantastic dollar exchange rate means there has not been such a good time to visit the US in years. Probably a lot of Europeans will go there this summer - me included. But here’s a tip: leave your sense of humour at home. It will not be required on the trip, when it comes to dealing with the US Immigration and Naturalisation Service, or indeed anyone involved in security in the United States nowadays.
Perhaps the security business has never been a lot of laughs. A few years ago, I had the pleasure of following Bob Dole’s ill-fated campaign against Bill Clinton in the 1996 presidential elections.
Dole is an extraordinary man - a war hero with a wounded and withered right arm. You have to shake his left hand, which takes a bit of getting used to, and he has the kind of dry and caustic sense of humour which the British love and Americans do not much care for.
In 1996, everybody - probably including Bob Dole - realised he was not going to be president of the United States, but we all trooped off to San Diego in southern California for a very good humoured Republican convention. Good humoured - except that nobody told the convention security guards.
THE good news in America is that you can buy the best, freshest and most healthy food anywhere. The bad news is that at political conventions, airports, train stations and sports arenas, what you can mostly buy are hamburgers, pizzas, popcorn and hotdogs, the junkiest of junk.
Ever since I visited a slaughterhouse and saw what went into hamburgers I have been a conscientious objector to this kind of junk. Nothing will make me eat it. But at the San Diego convention, that was more or less all that was available, and so I paid a visit to the local supermarket and loaded up on oranges, apples and bananas to tide me and my team through the proceedings.
When I got to security gate at the convention centre, I was taken out of the line and ordered to hand over my fruit to the Secret Service.
Hand over my fruit? You must be joking! Er, no. Joking must be some other department.
Now, I have had a long history of dealing with the US Secret Service, and agents are usually models of common sense. When I have made a reasonable case to them in the past, I have usually had a reasonable response.
So there I was arguing gently about apples. The agent looked at me stonily, and then made his judgment. There would be no further courts of appeal. I could take bananas into the hall, but I had to leave the rest of the fruit.
This seemed completely bizarre. I started to argue again, but he silenced me: "Absolutely no spherical fruit."
No spherical fruit? What the heck is spherical fruit?
Oh. It began to dawn on me. The Secret Service had been alerted that some anti-Dole protesters might try to bombard the podium as part of their protest. Fruit - spherical fruit - apples and oranges - made good missiles. Mine was confiscated. And nobody laughed.
It’s worth remembering that those were the good old days before any of us paid any attention to al-Qaeda. So, as I am planning a trip to the western United States this summer, I intend to prepare for the worst. Long lines at US immigration. Lots of questions. Fingerprinting and photographing. No spherical fruit.
And absolutely no funny answers to men in suits or in uniform. They really do like the Brits over that side of the pond, but best not to try out our famous British sense of humour - at least until you leave the airport.
AMERICAN Secret Service agents have in the past shown they are not utterly devoid of humour. A few years ago, a group of Scandinavians sailed across the Atlantic in Viking ships to prove that the Vikings could have discovered America years before Christopher Columbus. With the Scandinavians were friends of mine in a documentary film crew commemorating the journey.
When the president (George Bush, sen) arrived at Georgetown harbour, the area was flooded with Secret Service agents, who declared we were all in a "frozen zone". It meant no-one was allowed to move.
The documentary cameraman tried to leap off his Viking longship to get a few shots of the president. The Secret Service refused to let him.
"But ... but ..." the cameraman stuttered, "I’ve sailed 5,000 miles to get this shot."
The Secret Serviceman was like a rock. "And I’ve driven five blocks to stop you."
By the way, does anyone remember what happened to Bob Dole? He lost to Clinton, and then went on to become a spokesman for the anti-impotence drug Viagra.
One minute you hope to be the most powerful man in the world. The next ...
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If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
