UK to US travel, circa early Oct 2006
Oct. 8th, 2006 01:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
indigo_rose99From scanning websites in advance, we packed all our liquids in our checked luggage. As is usual in the UK, there was a security person checking our passports and asking security questions before we checked in and got our boarding passes. He explained that we could just buy liquids inside security and take them aboard the plane -- just keep the receipt and be prepared to show it when boarding. Yay! I was expecting a very dry 8 hours.
The security line was long, but we came early. We took off our shoes, and I took off my warm travel shirt (new since I lost the last one on a China flight). Oddly, the Scottish put their luggage on the roller bars (before the conveyor belt through the security scan) and then would just leave them and walk through! Weird. I, trained as I am by paranoia, waited until I saw all of our carry-on luggage onto the actual conveyor before walking through... And proceeded to find myself patted down in ways... Let's just say that places on my body were touched that only my husband touches. She was very professional, but quite thorough.
I didn't think anything of it, until I asked T how his went.... And he had not gotten patted down. At all. Am I special?
But wait! So, when we are at the boarding gate, we walk through the doorway to go down to the plane and are faced with an array of tables and security personnel who ask me to put my bag on the table and take off my shoes. Again. *sigh* I do. Another woman got very close to me. She even had me show her the bottom of my (shoe-less) feet. A second woman went through my carry-on. She seemed at first dismayed and then fascinated by my portable keyboard for my PDA. Neither of them asked for the receipt for my water.
T had gone ahead and when I met him on the plane at our seats, I asked him how his pat-down had gone. ...He didn't get one. Seriously. My inner thighs are clearly free from bombs and they just wave him through!?!?!
Perhaps this is profiling of suspiciously dressed women? I am wearing cargo pants and a plaid men's button-down shirt (the previously mentioned traveling shirt). To check and see if makeup and high heels would get me passed over would take repeated sampling I am personally unwilling to undergo. But perhaps you can....?
The security line was long, but we came early. We took off our shoes, and I took off my warm travel shirt (new since I lost the last one on a China flight). Oddly, the Scottish put their luggage on the roller bars (before the conveyor belt through the security scan) and then would just leave them and walk through! Weird. I, trained as I am by paranoia, waited until I saw all of our carry-on luggage onto the actual conveyor before walking through... And proceeded to find myself patted down in ways... Let's just say that places on my body were touched that only my husband touches. She was very professional, but quite thorough.
I didn't think anything of it, until I asked T how his went.... And he had not gotten patted down. At all. Am I special?
But wait! So, when we are at the boarding gate, we walk through the doorway to go down to the plane and are faced with an array of tables and security personnel who ask me to put my bag on the table and take off my shoes. Again. *sigh* I do. Another woman got very close to me. She even had me show her the bottom of my (shoe-less) feet. A second woman went through my carry-on. She seemed at first dismayed and then fascinated by my portable keyboard for my PDA. Neither of them asked for the receipt for my water.
T had gone ahead and when I met him on the plane at our seats, I asked him how his pat-down had gone. ...He didn't get one. Seriously. My inner thighs are clearly free from bombs and they just wave him through!?!?!
Perhaps this is profiling of suspiciously dressed women? I am wearing cargo pants and a plaid men's button-down shirt (the previously mentioned traveling shirt). To check and see if makeup and high heels would get me passed over would take repeated sampling I am personally unwilling to undergo. But perhaps you can....?
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no subject
Date: 2006-10-09 08:59 pm (UTC)Was T wearing tight clothing under which it was much more clear that he was not carrying bombs or whatever?
no subject
Date: 2006-10-09 09:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-10-10 04:06 am (UTC)Oh, right, they weren't giving you a head massage.