Notes from the Antipodes
 

I am currently on my honeymoon in the Antipodes and have experienced both international and domestic security screenings in New Zealand and Australia. In all cases I experienced the following:

Quick, professional, and cordial screenings.

I even had a secondary on an Australian domestic and it was done with the utmost professionalism and politeness.

I did not experience:

Bad attitudes, fascism, scare tactics, bullying, or threats.

Seriously, why can't the same be done within the "Land of the Free"?

On a side note, the immigrations and customs officials extended the same courtesies in both countries as their respective security.

I am not looking forward to:

The additional screening at the gate for the US bound flight, the ICE thugs, the TSA thugs, the rescreening into the domestic and all the accompanying barking from the over empowered "Protectors of Freedom" next week.

I'll try to keep it out of my mind as we enjoy the rest of our trip.

I'd have to agree with you. Even when I had a small problem with the folks at SYD they were exceptionally polite and apologetic.

BTW, how exactly does one get to the Antipodes?

Back in July 2006, Mrs Flies and I made our annual pilgrimmage to OZ. On the way home, she was selected for a secondary backpack search at SYD. We were way early for the flight, so there was nobody else to "randomly" pick.

The Aussie screener gave my wife an 8x11 (actually A4) laminated sheet of paper which was two things:

1. An Aussie-equivalent of a Privacy Act disclosure; and,

2. A written consent agreement. (She had to verbally agree to have her backpack searched and could have refused with the penalty of not being allowed into airside.)

It was really refreshing to find a government that cared about the rights of their citizens and visitors. Wow -- for a fleeting moment, I thought the Aussies has adopted the US Constitution.

Well evidently it IS available for adoption....we seem to have abandoned it....... :(

I just came back from the Dominican Republic a few days ago. On a flight to the US, I was shocked at the "lax" security--no shoes off, no laptops out, no secondaries. The initial screening and then random bag checks at the gate. It was a pleasure.

Then we made a connection in Atlanta and TSA failed to detect a suitcase full of liquids (medication). It was the height of irony.

The second amendment may be a problem.

I'm sorry but the rule is if the customs, immigration, or security officers work in the English speaking country, then they will tend to be fascists. Two examples from down under.

2003 - I fill out the customs form stating that I was not bring food in to Australia (SYD). In the USA and Canada and Europe, food means stuff like fruit, vegetables, meat, cheese. In Australia, it means junk food and wood. The kids had left over candy in their back packs, and naturally the Australian custom's people wanted to make federal case of it.

2007 - My 68 year old mother's clothing was was swabbed for explosives in SYD before a flight to Brisbane. Comes up positive. They find a female to strip search her (sexually assault) her. She's hasn't handled a weapon or powder since she was a kid on the farm.

Australia is a great place to visit, but keep in mind this country is building a nationwide firewall to protect the children. When it comes to "security" it is as demented as Canada, NZ, UK, and USA. These are the countries that pay each other to spy on the other's citizens as well as on the governments of their allies.

The second half of the name, "junk food" should clue you in to the fact that you need to declare it in Australia. Their forms and signs are very specific. Any and all food. The FA on my flight told me she has to declare her Tic-Tac candy. If you think Australia is bad with regard to declaration of food & such, don't go to New Zealand.

If you eat it, it is hard to see why you wouldn't call it food...

Customs can be quite severe here.. and AQIS (the Australian Quarantine Inspection Service) can be extremely "intrusive" in some peoples view... but remember please that this Island continent of ours remains free of many nasty diseases endemic in other parts of the world... rabies and foot & mouth being two fine examples...

There is a local television series that has had a run of a few seasons... it is filmed at Sydney airport and shows the sort of things people try to bring (or mail) into the country... Unbelievable!!

One quote from the show(that the OP can probably relate to;)) .. an incoming passenger with a suitcase chock full of edible items (who naturally had NOT declared any "food" items on her entry form) .. when challenged insisted .. "IS not food... Is snack!"

A distinction which I must say completely escapes me!

Those folks take their jobs seriously.. and as a local I can only applaud that... and it would take a hard heart not to be charmed by the sight of the AQIS Beagles in their little maroon coats trotting around sniffing away....

A long as they don't "indicate" my bags to their handlers of course!!!:D

I have had one or two pretty nasty (hidebound/borderline rude) Customs agents on arrival back home - they are mostly quite pleasant or at least polite... and as that mirrors my experience with the TSA - no notably poor experiences with them either.. I'd have to say, IME, it's all pretty much the same...

Show me how TicTacs can cause and epidemic in AUS and I will concede your point.

Not the point... if you eat it it can quite reasonably be defined as food. The declaration you fill in (and sign) when entering the country asks if you have any food..

Pretty simple question really... and if you are unsure whether what you DO have is OK or not- why not ASK???

How hard is that?

My comments on the stringency of AQIS and Customs inspections were a response to the imputation that these people are 'fascists".... not a suggestion that any/all debatable foodstuff imports were a problem...

Is it "fascist" to want to:

A: protect the country from the importation of disease (and pests.. which CAN and HAVE been brought in in wooden items), and

B: Expect people to take entry documentation (that they are SIGNING!) seriously.. It's a legal document for goodness sake!

(How about having a LOOK in the cabin bags on your way to immigration? There are "dispose of unwanted food HERE" bins in the entry hall!)

In fact.. if you ASK you might well be told that certain things ARE fine Roasted sunflower seeds fr'instance) .. Just declare them first!

Again.. How hard is that?

I guess I was not clear...I did not fault the officers for enforcing the rules...I am saying the rules are stupid and unnecessary.

The dirt on the bottom of my shoes has a MUCH higher risk or tracking in some pathogen than my Tic Tacs yet the Tic Tacs are verboten. See the problem?

And no I am not advocating shoe confiscation ;)

You'll love our AQIS people then.... My riding boots were taken away to be scrubbed when I got back from the USA in October...:D

They certainly agree with you that dirt on shoes/boots IS a concern... which is why one of the questions on the declaration is whether or not you have spent time on farms or near livestock...;)

Yes, I agree tic tacs are probably harmless (yes, alright.. ARE harmless).. but let's face it.. it is MUCH easier to write an internally consistent set of rules - and ENFORCE them - if you say:

"No food AT ALL unless declared and OK'ed"

Rather than producing a list of allowable (no declaration required) AND banned foodstuffs.. which would have items missing... arguable interpretations etc... be anightmare to administer.....

The food thing in Australia/NZ is stupidly easy to deal with. Check the "yes" box and then tell them what you actually have. The US form has specific types of foods listed so that is what they are looking for. The forms down under do not (and they are pretty clear about it in the signage and a video they showed just prior to arrival in AKL as well). Sorry you had to deal with it, but you did err on that one.

I was also given a secondary at SYD on my international-international connection a couple weeks ago and actually found it pleasantly entertaining how professional and polite they were. Two people are involved from their security crew, but they make it pretty clear that they are doing it that way to ensure that you receive good service and your rights aren't violated, not to intimidate. The A4 page with the description of your rights and options is also nice. I was ready to go for the wand/pat-down and they actually made me stop and rad the paper before they'd start.

Top notch all the way ^

It's pretty simple in Australia and New Zealand - declare it if it is food of any type and they decide if it is a problem. Most food items they will simply allow to pass and away you go. They are trained to decide what is a problem and it saves thousands of untrained airline passengers all making up their own minds about what is a problem.

I have never had any food items taken off me on entry to Oz or NZ - I did get one screener apologetically take a jar of Vegemite from my carryon on exiting SYD once though - I had forgotten that I had it and he was embarrassed to be seizing it when you could see them on sale in the duty free shop from the screening station. This was right after the adoption of the no liquids and gels rule.

Hmmm. If swab tested positive they should have repeated with a new swab. Only if both were positive (and no simple explanation) would a manual search of bags be done. They don't just do strip searches - there must have been some reason for it to be escalated that far.

I use this to my advantage. I often get a free shoe clean when entering Australia or NZ :D

No repeated swab. My theory was that the clerk who did the test was incompetent, and to save face, decided to make granny's life hell.

I am clued into it now. Again, no other country is that anal. And if the countries down under want to be anal, they should be clearer on the form. And don't get me started about Australia's stupid rules about declaring prescription medications. I have to go through secondary screening each time. The first time some idiot looked at the pill bottle and said: "what's this?". Like I have to read for the moron too?

No they aren't. Junk food is not food, it is junk. That's how it is viewed in North America, and North America has more native speakers of English that the rest of the world combined. That's how it is viewed in the EU, and the EU probably has an even better grasp of English.

The forms say to declare anything derived from animal or vegetable. So I should declare my cotton tee shirt, leather shoes, wool socks, paper books? All that stuff is edible? What about my lap top and DVDs ... they are made from plastic? Or is Australia's official view on the original of hydrocarbons is that they are abiogenic? Aren't dinosaurs animals, or does Australia belief in the Genesis version of origin?

The forms say "animal" and "vegetable" origin. Do you declare your
rubber condoms when you enter Australia?

And cane toads being an exception. Introduced with government complicity.

Anyway, Alberta is land locked, and is rat free, with no need to inspect airline pax' luggage for rats, or stop motorists at the B.C., Saskatchewan, or NWT territory borders looking for a rodent stowaways. AQIS needs to get over it, and focus on the toads. Maybe they should visit Alberta for lessons in pest control.

Let me know when you catch a disease from my kids' Reese's Pieces. Hey I got an idea, maybe cane toads like deadly Hershey's chocolate.

I hadn't realized Australian T.V. had gotten that bad. You guys really need to do something fun like playing GTA-San Andreas. Oh yeah, that's right, AQIS protects you from that too.

Well I'm sure you feel safer now that Australia's crack customs agents have seized another load of deadly trans fat and substandard chocolate.

I naturally loaded up on Tim Tams the last time I returned from Australia, and U.S. customs didn't arrest me for failing to declare them. How could they not fear deadly Arnott's chocolate and processed wafers?

I also noticed that air side in the SYD international departure terminal, they were selling candy (so I bought my third box of Tim Tams). Apparently Australia is less concerned about the spreading of deadly "food" to other countries.

You don't see the distinction between processed and cooked goods and raw vegetables, fruits, meat, etc? Are you serious?

Yes like most government bureaucrats they take their little jobs seriously.

I agree. Having some filthy diseased mutt drool, urinate, and excrete over my stuff irritates me too. At least I'm not allergic to mutts, but too heck with those people who are right?

There we agree again. The Anglosphere has staffed its border and transportation security departments with equally rude and incompetent people.

Australia's customs people aren't confiscating tic tacs because of safety, it is because they want tourists to buy Australian junk food rather than bring in their own. It's the same reason liquids are banned (the airport stores want a monopoly on liquid beverages), and IDs are checked (the airlines want to prevent pax from transferring tickets). It has nothing to do with security and it is all about protectionism.

Because my clothing is of animal and vegetable origin. If I declare it (like I declared my prescription medicine) I have to go through secondary screening and wait even longer to get out of the bloody airport.

How hard is it to construct a blank customs form that that explains what is meant by animal and vegetable origin? I mean assuming the people at AQIS have higher IQs than 100?

They are putting all the bags through X-rays. How hard is it to pull the stuff that is actually dangerous and stop hassling and barking at people who have come to spend thousands to tens of thousands of dollars in your country? How hard is it to stop treating people who visit countries that have a different interpretation of "food" as criminals?

That's only because people in OZ don't want to kill Koalas, they're too cute. Black and Grizzly bear arms are also much more impressive when mounted on the wall.

http://tubearoo.com/articles/24307/F...Bear_Arms.html

Actually, I find the New Zealand form to be very clear. Section 3, on page 2 of the PDF, is explicit about what they are talking about.

AQIS guidelines might help you in the future.

I think any food is pretty explicit. If you put it in your mouth and digest it, it's probably food.

Assumes the pax have the requisite IQ to read and properly understand the form. Surely simpler is better? If you can eat it, declare it.


There's a different interpretation of food? Not been through customs for many years but it was my experience that the process was very simple and a cursory glance at the food in question was all that was needed for everything I ever carried.

Not sure how you can call it secondary screening when it is the only screening point at SYD, but ok.

I think you are misunderstanding the purpose of the screening machines. Food is the dangerous item that they are screening for - both Australia and New Zealand have important agricultural industries and work hard to keep pests out of the country.
If you declare your food items, you can often bypass the screening. The biosecurity guy will ask you what you have, and if it is not dangerous, you can exit straight out. If you don't declare you do need to go through the screening just incase you have something.
I have never had a problem with them barking at me - though I wish they could make the queue shorter.

You have gone off on a tangent on just about every point there.. I have no intention of trying to refute them one by one as you clearly have already made up your mind.

How many times in this thread have you been told that it is NOT necessarily the food that is a problem... many things will be allowed in- If you declare them first!.. it is the fact that YOU did not declare them that led to your problems. Is your (strange?) assertion that chocolate is not a food item a result of sheer embarrassment (as a frequent traveller) at being caught out like that - with a "novices" error? The level of emotional content seems to indicate something like that....

To describe AQIS beagles as "flithy diseased" mutts is as good an example of your hyperbole as anything.... Care to provide evidence that they ARE diseased as you assert? Or "filthy"? Show us evidence of them drooling or urinating on passengers bags?

Thought not....

But here is a thought. If you can't cope with the entry requirements/documentation (which millions of people from all round the world - yes the forms are available in a multitude of languages - manage just fine every year), and if you disagree so vehemently with this Sovereign nations immigration clearance procedures...

Then don't come here! It's your choice after all....

I saw this show tonight in AKL. I think it's called Border Security. Caught two German girls bringing in 5k of xtc each. The other girl was dumb enough to wait for her friend that was getting the full search, so got re-screened, another 5 kilos of xts found, and 8 years in the clink.

The funniest part was the Chinese lady who threw her apples at the custom lady when she was trying to confiscate them.

I was behind another FT'er coming into AKL, and the customs official could not understand why they were only coming in for 18 hours and going right back to SYD. It's often a waste to even try and explain it! :D

Yes, it's Border Security. There's both an Australian and NZ version - I see the AU version filming at MEL pretty regularly.

The NZ version used to be advertised on buses around AKL with "Border Security: They'll get you in the end", complete with rubber glove clad hand as the background...

No other countries has such good reason to be - New Zealand and Australia are blessed in not having many of the diseases which cause problems in other parts of the world for food production. As a result, they are determined to keep them out - remember the UK Foot and Mouth outbreak was traced back to illegally imported foodstuffs which made it's way into the animal feed chain. Many people (including you I would suggest) have no idea about the potential range of disease vectors which can be found in food, especially since the discovery of what nasty little hard to kill things prions are...

Really? Well I'm in the EU and I consider junk food still to be food. Perhaps you should have remebered you were not in Kansas anymore - that you had travelled outside your own country and American rules would not apply?

Australia is a sovereign country. It is free to instigate whatever rules it needs to protect itself and its economic interests. It takes the trouble to fully explain those rules to those who care to listen and not just assume that because they (kind of ;)) speak English there, it will be the same as in the US.

You weren't behind me were you?

FWIW, I think the Australian government encourages people to not declare food as they tell you that you will be ineligible for express customs processing if you declare anything.

Which is rubbish. When travelling to SYD, I normally carry all the food and my wife carries none. I declare it, and most times after questioning from the Bio-security guy in the queue, I get to avoid the screening. Several times I have beaten my wife through!

If you demonstrate that you are aware of the rules and declare, you can often zip straight through.

I agree - this is not a big deal. I always have chocolate coming back from Switzerland, and have never had a problem with declaring it. Once they asked me to open my checked bag after x-ray because (I guess) they thought the tray of dense hand-made chocolate cubes looked suspicious. When I pulled out the gift-wrapped box, they just looked at it and said "okay". On one or two other occasions, when I've said that the food was chocolate, they've asked to see it, but one glance at the bag and I've been sent on. Many many times I've said "chocolate" and they've just waved me through. In September, there was an officer talking to passengers waiting for baggage claim; he looked at my form, asked where I'd been and what food I had, and when I said "USA" and "chocolate", he wrote something at the bottom of my card and said I could leave by the green gate. :)

Even more interesting, AQIS seem to have latitude to apply common sense. Years ago a well-meaning friend gave me a jar of flavoured, whipped honey which was a local specialty. I weighed up whether I could (and should) eat a whole jar of honey on the flight back home or whether a sealed, shrink-wrapped jar might have a better chance, but figured it was a loss since honey is one of the prohibited items due to some issue with bee diseases that I don't have time to look up. I approached the AQIS desk with the jar in my hand and made it clear that I was ready to surrender it. The AQIS lady looked at the jar, and then at me, and then at the jar, and then at me, and finally said "okay." Maybe the flavouring and whipping implied a heat-treatment, or maybe the professional shrinkwrapping meant it wasn't from someone's backyard, or maybe I looked like the sort of person who was going to eat it rather than toss it in the trash. (It was quite good, too. Thanks, AQIS.)

I also had an inexperienced colleague who didn't declare the tea bag assortment he brought back from our time in the UK; AQIS found the tin in the x-ray, gave him a lecture for not declaring it, but let him keep it.

I have to admit that I've never listed TicTacs, Lifesavers, coughdrops, etc but otherwise, if you can eat or drink it, it's safest to declare it and usually there's no hassle.

Rule number 1: don't trust everything you read on wikipedia. A lot of the information is incorrect and taken out of context in that article. I'm not going to elaborate.

Allied governments all spy on each other to some extent or another. If you think the French, Germans, South Koreans, and other allies aren't spying on us, you're sorely mistaken.

At any rate, Aussies do some things right, but at the same time, you're right about them trying to be a nanny state with the great firewall. It's a play taken out of China's book.

Nope, different FTer. :)