Yet another senseless, restrictive, border begins on May 7: Real ID, an unnecessary and excessive burden for any US citizen who travels by air. For twenty years, every state, political party, and numerous organizations, both liberal and conservative, fought against Real ID, on so many grounds: violation of privacy, freedom of movement, unfair treatment of immigrants, environment destruction (due to border fence protection passed within the Real ID bill), and more, since this Federally enforced law amounts to a National Database of personal records and private information collected from anyone who boards an airplane, which is most everyone in this country.
I fly frequently; I love to travel. For years, I've moved all over the US unrestricted by anything other than cost and opportunity. This past week, I came up against a wall I can't get around. I knew Real ID was coming, thought I'd have plenty of time to go to the DMV and get that star on my license that says I'm real. I'm a US citizen, I have a birth certificate, and never needed more than this to prove who I am. Every state has different degrees of rigidity. I happen to be in a state that wants many documents I don't have or don't want to give. Tax returns, W2 forms, bank issued financial statements? I'm not applying for credit or immigrating to this country. I simply want to get on a flight I've paid for.
The Real ID thing reminds me of a lot about the Patriot Act that most Americans still seem unaware of -- like everything within 100 miles of the border being within Customs and Border Patrol jurisdiction. It's hard to see that you're not living with freedom when it creeps up like that and you don't necessarily think it will be a big deal. But now even more so -- with corporate takeover of the federal government and access to those databases of private information. I hate to think what they might be doing with it all.
Thank you for reposting this piece! I am going to have a look at the stories by all the commenters on the original post too. I have been lucky so far with crossing borders. The only time I had difficulty showed me though how scary it can be for people who are not so lucky. You are instantly treated with an incredibly hostile approach as if you were demanding something completely outrageous (I actually had correct documentation for the border I was crossing), from even other travellers around you.
I've been there, too, treated okay while watching others face more difficult crossings. Mostly in Russia and mostly around someone having something that seemed valuable and not realizing it would provoke demands of bribes. Once, a woman's violin while we crossed the border by train. It can be heartbreaking even when it's not life- or freedom-threatening.
Deep, thoughtful, evocative writing as always, Nia. Thank you. So much comes to mind, as you say, when borders are the theme. Like riding from Kathmandu atop a bus to a steep hillside Tibetan border town at the start of the Himalayan spring, where as a traveler to easy places I had the eye-opening experience of arguing with Chinese guards - for a day and a half - over the size of the necessary bribe to continue on to Lhasa.
I'm thinking too of other species' borders, like the nesting south polar skuas who had distinct but invisible red lines which, if crossed, earned me a dive-bombing at my head.
Ah! Like the tree swallows who will go after me if I get too close to the nesting box while working in the garden. Animals are clear about territory and boundaries.
That is a great story -- as a story, though not something to have experienced, I'm sure. I've been thinking about bribery a lot, since it's a reality in Russia, too. People keep talking about wiping social media from their phones when coming into and out of the U.S., but my thought is more about any online banking or financial accounts. Because it's such a short step from intimidation to bribery. Most Americans haven't had much experience with that within the country.
True, we're pretty innocent of the kind of transactional ugliness that haunts places with less institutionalized rule of law. We have plenty of other things to haunt us, of course. I really like your truism about the short walk from intimidation to bribery.
And with all due respect to tree swallows, who are near and dear to me, they got nothing on skuas, who will draw blood if they can. And then they would scavenge your body if they could. My friend Steve had a bagel taken out of his mouth by a skua as he put his parka on. I've seen skuas stand up to 10-ton loaders coming for a claimed dumpster. And a skua once stole the hat off my head. It was delivered back to me two years later by helicopter...
Another fantastic read, always learn so much, and loved the many uses and definitions of borders, I had not thought of them in these particular linked ways. I had not read of your father's path, and it was so sad to read about not seeing his father again. 😢. Take care, Paul
It was a hard time when his father died. One of my more vivid memories. And so many people face that reality. Though it does also make me think of something I read once about the early centuries of agriculture, and how walled cities were not built for protection, to keep people out, but to keep people in.
After reading this, I tried to count the borders I have crossed in my life and I stopped at 25. It has always been easy, even when I needed to get visa and/or work permit, proof of housing prior to crossing, I could step off an airplane and arrive. There was even a time when I would call myself an expatriate, a posh word for "migrant with feelings of superiority". Now I spend time with migrants coming to my country, trying to make them feel welcome in a climate of increasing hostility.
And recently, I found this quote by Stefan Zweig, Austrian writer and Jew, who emigrated to Brazil in 1940, escaping persecution, and where together with his wife, he committed suicide in 1942, and it made me stop short in my tracks:
"Before 1914, the earth had belonged to all. People went where they wished and stayed as long as they pleased. There were no permits, no visas, and it always gives me pleasure to astonish the young by telling them that before 1914, I travelled from Europe to India and America without a passport and without ever having seen one."
(ZWEIG, Stefan, The World of Yesterday, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1964)
Oooh, that sounds like a book for me to read, Sabine!
Shamefully for me, it took many years for me to even consider the weird privilege and classism in "expatriate." Expats, refugees, exiles, immigrants, emigrants, ... these word choices shape a tremendous amount of perception.
The beginning of the voice note reminded me of the "right to roam" episode from 99% invincible podcast, and it shed an important light on how people in the UK were able to 'unlock' the "private land" conundrum that they faced while walking the land. https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/right-to-roam/
I've been writing about how borders now are a show of force and intimidation, and how anti-human they are. Maybe it'll come out this weekend, and I've been delaying it for a bit..
Absolutely. That's how my parents started out, actually. My dad (in the Soviet Union) lived in Leningrad and my mom (American) got a job teaching English in Helsinki. She took a train to Leningrad to visit most weekends, with my older sister, until they were finally given permission to marry.
Love the sign! I would totally have that in my house!
As last year, as soon as I started reading your post, I immediately thought of Leslie Marmon Silko’s essay and looked it up, and as I was looking it up, realized I had already sent it to you! And yep, as I continued to read saw your mention of it!
I’m glad you linked to your previous post because I then thought about the time we accidentally crossed the Canadian border, and I did comment with that story there! It was such a traumatic experience though.
I love this piece so much! It really makes you think about these issues.
If I could cross-stitch, I would make you a copy of that sign!
That essay is so good. I'm really grateful you shared it with me before. I printed it out to have a hard copy around.
Your story has stuck with me and probably will forever. There are no real words, but that visceral feeling of worry, fear, powerlessness -- what I really hate is that there are still plenty of human beings who want to inflict that on people, and are given the power to do so.
Thank you so much! It was definitely one of the scariest situations I’ve been in! I’m just so glad that my daughter, who was 4 at the time, was too scared to say anything because right around that time she had taken to repeating things she’d heard on shows and movies and was hooked on some phrases that very much would not have been good! Hahaha! I had to prewarn the daycare that we’d spent the week before Halloween watching The Simpson’s Treehouse of Horrors DVDs 😂
Oh lord Kristin, I just spent a few minutes laughing SO HARD because my son used to go into a day car at a period when he was constantly saying, "For f-ck's sake" whenever he was frustrated, courtesy of his dad.
Dark humor, but it's true. There are situations where perfectly normal things for kids to do could have consequences. Which is frustrating on its own!
This is so beautifully put. I’ve never thought of borders as particularly scary until recently, but that probably comes with having a passport that opens rather than closes gates. That said, the gates have become much more restrictive.
Nowadays in Austria it is forbidden (literally illegal) to speak anything but German in the government offices when interacting with the state employees. My friend was also berated like you were.
I’ve been going through the border you mentioned between WA and BC my whole life and I can attest when I’m alone, both sides treat me like garbage and have even drummed up things they claim they can fine or arrest me for (luckily it’s all just bluffing). But when I’m with anyone else, I usually get waived through.
That would explain it! This was in 1998 so I'm guessing it's been a long-time law. (I still have my meldetzetl.)
Maybe it's the people who staff that particular border, too. I don't think I've been through that one, mostly through the Canada/US border in Montana, though some through New York and once in Minnesota, where our car was turned inside-out and my then-boyfriend and I were interviewed separately for over 2 hours. I think they thought we were trying to run away to Thunder Bay, though *why* is still a question that bugs me!
I’ve had a hard time reading long form pieces so I listened to this one, and I’m so glad I did! It was so nice to hear your voice (and your neighborhood!), and needed your little exhortation at the end, “I hope you all cross a border today.” There’s something about the small acts of rebellion within reach right now that eases the terror. Thank you so much for breaking open our bordered world once again. The poetry of your last paragraph took my break away (again—I immediately remembered the experience of reading it the first time around!) And thank you so much for your kind attention to my poems. Sending you much love.
Thank you so much, Shaina, and I'm glad that hearing the background was pleasant! You're right about the acts of rebellion easing the terror; I feel that way about connecting to real bits of life -- mine and others' -- too. Hugging a tree is cliche but sometimes it's so, so soothing. 🌲
I thought of a dozen things I wanted to say here, but went back to the original comments and found I'd said them all!
Well, except two.
In 2000 we hiked the Tour de Mont Blanc. You could tell you'd crossed from France to Italy because all the hikers switched from bonjour to bon giorno.
And arriving at Liberia airport Costa Rica with the first chip passport the immigration guy had seen. He asked if he could run around and show his friends. ¡CIaro que si! He came back, shook my hand, thanked me. On the way out two weeks later he recognized me, "El señor con el chip", and shook my hand again.
Yet another senseless, restrictive, border begins on May 7: Real ID, an unnecessary and excessive burden for any US citizen who travels by air. For twenty years, every state, political party, and numerous organizations, both liberal and conservative, fought against Real ID, on so many grounds: violation of privacy, freedom of movement, unfair treatment of immigrants, environment destruction (due to border fence protection passed within the Real ID bill), and more, since this Federally enforced law amounts to a National Database of personal records and private information collected from anyone who boards an airplane, which is most everyone in this country.
I fly frequently; I love to travel. For years, I've moved all over the US unrestricted by anything other than cost and opportunity. This past week, I came up against a wall I can't get around. I knew Real ID was coming, thought I'd have plenty of time to go to the DMV and get that star on my license that says I'm real. I'm a US citizen, I have a birth certificate, and never needed more than this to prove who I am. Every state has different degrees of rigidity. I happen to be in a state that wants many documents I don't have or don't want to give. Tax returns, W2 forms, bank issued financial statements? I'm not applying for credit or immigrating to this country. I simply want to get on a flight I've paid for.
The Real ID thing reminds me of a lot about the Patriot Act that most Americans still seem unaware of -- like everything within 100 miles of the border being within Customs and Border Patrol jurisdiction. It's hard to see that you're not living with freedom when it creeps up like that and you don't necessarily think it will be a big deal. But now even more so -- with corporate takeover of the federal government and access to those databases of private information. I hate to think what they might be doing with it all.
Thank you for reposting this piece! I am going to have a look at the stories by all the commenters on the original post too. I have been lucky so far with crossing borders. The only time I had difficulty showed me though how scary it can be for people who are not so lucky. You are instantly treated with an incredibly hostile approach as if you were demanding something completely outrageous (I actually had correct documentation for the border I was crossing), from even other travellers around you.
I've been there, too, treated okay while watching others face more difficult crossings. Mostly in Russia and mostly around someone having something that seemed valuable and not realizing it would provoke demands of bribes. Once, a woman's violin while we crossed the border by train. It can be heartbreaking even when it's not life- or freedom-threatening.
Deep, thoughtful, evocative writing as always, Nia. Thank you. So much comes to mind, as you say, when borders are the theme. Like riding from Kathmandu atop a bus to a steep hillside Tibetan border town at the start of the Himalayan spring, where as a traveler to easy places I had the eye-opening experience of arguing with Chinese guards - for a day and a half - over the size of the necessary bribe to continue on to Lhasa.
I'm thinking too of other species' borders, like the nesting south polar skuas who had distinct but invisible red lines which, if crossed, earned me a dive-bombing at my head.
Ah! Like the tree swallows who will go after me if I get too close to the nesting box while working in the garden. Animals are clear about territory and boundaries.
That is a great story -- as a story, though not something to have experienced, I'm sure. I've been thinking about bribery a lot, since it's a reality in Russia, too. People keep talking about wiping social media from their phones when coming into and out of the U.S., but my thought is more about any online banking or financial accounts. Because it's such a short step from intimidation to bribery. Most Americans haven't had much experience with that within the country.
True, we're pretty innocent of the kind of transactional ugliness that haunts places with less institutionalized rule of law. We have plenty of other things to haunt us, of course. I really like your truism about the short walk from intimidation to bribery.
And with all due respect to tree swallows, who are near and dear to me, they got nothing on skuas, who will draw blood if they can. And then they would scavenge your body if they could. My friend Steve had a bagel taken out of his mouth by a skua as he put his parka on. I've seen skuas stand up to 10-ton loaders coming for a claimed dumpster. And a skua once stole the hat off my head. It was delivered back to me two years later by helicopter...
I feel like skuas must have been somebody’s horror movie inspiration … !
Any movie made by a baby penguin...
Makes me wonder if you ever watched Pingu! One of those cartoons I was glad my kids liked because it gave me an excuse to watch it 😂
I watched some once in the Antarctic museum in Christchurch, NZ... We were either coming or going from the ice, and the museum is at the airport...
Another fantastic read, always learn so much, and loved the many uses and definitions of borders, I had not thought of them in these particular linked ways. I had not read of your father's path, and it was so sad to read about not seeing his father again. 😢. Take care, Paul
It was a hard time when his father died. One of my more vivid memories. And so many people face that reality. Though it does also make me think of something I read once about the early centuries of agriculture, and how walled cities were not built for protection, to keep people out, but to keep people in.
After reading this, I tried to count the borders I have crossed in my life and I stopped at 25. It has always been easy, even when I needed to get visa and/or work permit, proof of housing prior to crossing, I could step off an airplane and arrive. There was even a time when I would call myself an expatriate, a posh word for "migrant with feelings of superiority". Now I spend time with migrants coming to my country, trying to make them feel welcome in a climate of increasing hostility.
And recently, I found this quote by Stefan Zweig, Austrian writer and Jew, who emigrated to Brazil in 1940, escaping persecution, and where together with his wife, he committed suicide in 1942, and it made me stop short in my tracks:
"Before 1914, the earth had belonged to all. People went where they wished and stayed as long as they pleased. There were no permits, no visas, and it always gives me pleasure to astonish the young by telling them that before 1914, I travelled from Europe to India and America without a passport and without ever having seen one."
(ZWEIG, Stefan, The World of Yesterday, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1964)
Oooh, that sounds like a book for me to read, Sabine!
Shamefully for me, it took many years for me to even consider the weird privilege and classism in "expatriate." Expats, refugees, exiles, immigrants, emigrants, ... these word choices shape a tremendous amount of perception.
I neither agree nor disagree nor make any statement in support or against anything that is said here, lest I incriminate myself.
🤐🤐🤐
The beginning of the voice note reminded me of the "right to roam" episode from 99% invincible podcast, and it shed an important light on how people in the UK were able to 'unlock' the "private land" conundrum that they faced while walking the land. https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/right-to-roam/
I've been writing about how borders now are a show of force and intimidation, and how anti-human they are. Maybe it'll come out this weekend, and I've been delaying it for a bit..
I remember that episode! it really brings home how much land is locked away through that story of private property.
Always love your writing, and appreciate your comments.
always thinking about how borders keep apart people in love.
Absolutely. That's how my parents started out, actually. My dad (in the Soviet Union) lived in Leningrad and my mom (American) got a job teaching English in Helsinki. She took a train to Leningrad to visit most weekends, with my older sister, until they were finally given permission to marry.
Love the sign! I would totally have that in my house!
As last year, as soon as I started reading your post, I immediately thought of Leslie Marmon Silko’s essay and looked it up, and as I was looking it up, realized I had already sent it to you! And yep, as I continued to read saw your mention of it!
I’m glad you linked to your previous post because I then thought about the time we accidentally crossed the Canadian border, and I did comment with that story there! It was such a traumatic experience though.
I love this piece so much! It really makes you think about these issues.
If I could cross-stitch, I would make you a copy of that sign!
That essay is so good. I'm really grateful you shared it with me before. I printed it out to have a hard copy around.
Your story has stuck with me and probably will forever. There are no real words, but that visceral feeling of worry, fear, powerlessness -- what I really hate is that there are still plenty of human beings who want to inflict that on people, and are given the power to do so.
Thank you so much! It was definitely one of the scariest situations I’ve been in! I’m just so glad that my daughter, who was 4 at the time, was too scared to say anything because right around that time she had taken to repeating things she’d heard on shows and movies and was hooked on some phrases that very much would not have been good! Hahaha! I had to prewarn the daycare that we’d spent the week before Halloween watching The Simpson’s Treehouse of Horrors DVDs 😂
Oh lord Kristin, I just spent a few minutes laughing SO HARD because my son used to go into a day car at a period when he was constantly saying, "For f-ck's sake" whenever he was frustrated, courtesy of his dad.
Dark humor, but it's true. There are situations where perfectly normal things for kids to do could have consequences. Which is frustrating on its own!
Omg that’s hilarious!! And so glad I could make you laugh ❤️
This is so beautifully put. I’ve never thought of borders as particularly scary until recently, but that probably comes with having a passport that opens rather than closes gates. That said, the gates have become much more restrictive.
Well put -- the passport that opens rather than closes gates. I've had situations where an American passport was a detriment, but very rarely.
Nowadays in Austria it is forbidden (literally illegal) to speak anything but German in the government offices when interacting with the state employees. My friend was also berated like you were.
I’ve been going through the border you mentioned between WA and BC my whole life and I can attest when I’m alone, both sides treat me like garbage and have even drummed up things they claim they can fine or arrest me for (luckily it’s all just bluffing). But when I’m with anyone else, I usually get waived through.
That would explain it! This was in 1998 so I'm guessing it's been a long-time law. (I still have my meldetzetl.)
Maybe it's the people who staff that particular border, too. I don't think I've been through that one, mostly through the Canada/US border in Montana, though some through New York and once in Minnesota, where our car was turned inside-out and my then-boyfriend and I were interviewed separately for over 2 hours. I think they thought we were trying to run away to Thunder Bay, though *why* is still a question that bugs me!
I’ve had a hard time reading long form pieces so I listened to this one, and I’m so glad I did! It was so nice to hear your voice (and your neighborhood!), and needed your little exhortation at the end, “I hope you all cross a border today.” There’s something about the small acts of rebellion within reach right now that eases the terror. Thank you so much for breaking open our bordered world once again. The poetry of your last paragraph took my break away (again—I immediately remembered the experience of reading it the first time around!) And thank you so much for your kind attention to my poems. Sending you much love.
Thank you so much, Shaina, and I'm glad that hearing the background was pleasant! You're right about the acts of rebellion easing the terror; I feel that way about connecting to real bits of life -- mine and others' -- too. Hugging a tree is cliche but sometimes it's so, so soothing. 🌲
I thought of a dozen things I wanted to say here, but went back to the original comments and found I'd said them all!
Well, except two.
In 2000 we hiked the Tour de Mont Blanc. You could tell you'd crossed from France to Italy because all the hikers switched from bonjour to bon giorno.
And arriving at Liberia airport Costa Rica with the first chip passport the immigration guy had seen. He asked if he could run around and show his friends. ¡CIaro que si! He came back, shook my hand, thanked me. On the way out two weeks later he recognized me, "El señor con el chip", and shook my hand again.
There are still good stories.
"all the hikers switched from bonjour to bon giorno" -- that is the perfect example of what a border should entail!
Yes, no less, and definitely no more!