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" I thought I recognized those acrylic letters!"

" I thought I recognized those acrylic letters!"

Old Nov 14, 2007, 7:50 am
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" I thought I recognized those acrylic letters!"

Flying from ORD through DTW on Monday afternoon. Terminal 2, NW First Class and Elite pax ID check point. Short line, two people ahead of me. ID checker, wearing TSA uniform, takes my passport (I was traveling to a country that has rather odd position in regard to US Passports, so I was using my Russian passport on this trip), looks for my name in the passport. Now, the data page in any passport is either on the very first, or the very last page, given that most passports are machine readable nowadays. It should not be hard to open the passport right at its cover and see what name appears on the page. It takes her, no joke, 2 minutes to thumb through the passport, not realizing where to look. At this point, I am not saying anything, as I am very amused. She then randomly stops at a page with an old Brazilian visa, and says "what is that suppose to mean?" To which I reply: "Its a visa." She has this bewildered look on her face, can't find my name on the visa, gives up and says, while looking at my passport: "Where is this THING from anyway?", to which I reply: "Russia." Her response: "I thought I recognized those ACRYLIC letters!"

My name: never found and never checked (not that it matters anyway).
My tax money: wasted
My amusement level: through the roof
Benefit for linguistic science: TSA has discovered new ACRYLIC alphabet!
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Old Nov 14, 2007, 7:54 am
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... all Greek to me

Celeriac script is handy for when you're feeling peckish.

You're just fortunate that she didn't realize you could take out the entire terminal with your azbuka.

Last edited by jib71; Nov 14, 2007 at 7:59 am
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Old Nov 14, 2007, 8:04 am
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Originally Posted by asnovici
Flying from ORD through DTW on Monday afternoon. Terminal 2, NW First Class and Elite pax ID check point. Short line, two people ahead of me. ID checker, wearing TSA uniform, takes my passport (I was traveling to a country that has rather odd position in regard to US Passports, so I was using my Russian passport on this trip), looks for my name in the passport. Now, the data page in any passport is either on the very first, or the very last page, given that most passports are machine readable nowadays. It should not be hard to open the passport right at its cover and see what name appears on the page. It takes her, no joke, 2 minutes to thumb through the passport, not realizing where to look. At this point, I am not saying anything, as I am very amused. She then randomly stops at a page with an old Brazilian visa, and says "what is that suppose to mean?" To which I reply: "Its a visa." She has this bewildered look on her face, can't find my name on the visa, gives up and says, while looking at my passport: "Where is this THING from anyway?", to which I reply: "Russia." Her response: "I thought I recognized those ACRYLIC letters!"

My name: never found and never checked (not that it matters anyway).
My tax money: wasted
My amusement level: through the roof
Benefit for linguistic science: TSA has discovered new ACRYLIC alphabet!
It's been a few years since I've seen a Russian passport, but, doesn't the cover say "Russia" or "Russian Federation" in English right under the ACRYLIC "Россия"? I know my old Russian visa was bi-lingual.

I'll bet she's one of ORD's top performers.
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Old Nov 14, 2007, 8:28 am
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LOL! Loved the azbuka comment!

Actually Russian passports just have cyrillic alphabet on the cover (but bilingual throughout the passport, English and Russian both), it says, all in acrylic, of course, "Russian Federation" and under the two-headed eagle "Passport." So, basically, she had no chance

Note to potential terrorists: procure Russian passports immediately, apparently that level of secret coding really throws the TSA off.
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Old Nov 14, 2007, 9:02 am
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You need to give the screener at least one point for trying It could have been worse - they might have said "this is a Klingon passport! I saw this writing on TV!"
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Old Nov 14, 2007, 10:15 am
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She's not the sharpest tool in the kit, but probably above average when compared to most TSA agents, and way smarter than TSA management.

Thanks for the laugh.
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Old Nov 14, 2007, 3:11 pm
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Invented by Saint Acryl, no?
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 6:18 am
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Past Saturday, same TSA ID checkpoint in ORD, different idiot (TSA agent).
While looking at the same passport I mentioned in the OP (I now make it a habit to use it at that very check point), he decided that his shiny new blacklight he uses to look at driver's licenses with would be very useful at determining if my passport was fake. He shined at it for some time, from different angles, and let me through. I am curious, what exactly was he expecting to find, and how much of a training those morons get to recognize what kind of holograms or watermarks foreign passports contain? Answer is obvious: none. Circus at its best.

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Old Jan 30, 2008, 9:29 am
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I am curious, what exactly was he expecting to find
...acrylic letters spelling out...KIP HAWLEY IS AN IDIOT
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 9:34 am
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Glad to Help!

Originally Posted by donsig
...acrylic letters spelling out...KIP HAWLEY IS AN IDIOT
For your future use...

Кип Хоули такой идиот
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 9:37 am
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Originally Posted by FliesWay2Much
For your future use...

Кип Хоули такой идиот
Having Russian as my native language, I affirm the correctness!
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 9:49 am
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Acrylic is a plastic-like material used to make acrylic paint.
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 11:06 am
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Originally Posted by asnovici
Benefit for linguistic science: TSA has discovered new ACRYLIC alphabet!
(Somewhat OT reply, but this thread made me think of it....) We should not be surprised by this; the TSA, after all, is a creation of an administration whose Commander in Chief pronounced a certain word as "Nuke-You-Ler" no less than half a dozen times during the State of the Union the other night.

So, can I throw my shoe at the next TSA'er who annoys me, much as I almost did at my TV the other night? ( but also )

Last edited by drat19; Jan 30, 2008 at 1:00 pm
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 12:01 pm
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giggling aloud like a madwoman in the ord rcc...thanks for a great laugh, i missed this the first time around. ^

acrylic...heh heh heh.
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Old Jan 30, 2008, 6:16 pm
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Originally Posted by karenkay
giggling aloud like a madwoman in the ord rcc...thanks for a great laugh, i missed this the first time around. ^

acrylic...heh heh heh.




Me too (minus the ORD RCC and woman part)-- and I needed that laugh today.
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