Thoughts on my return to Bangalore.
A woman nearly died on my flight from Philly to Paris. At least, I thought she nearly died. She was incapacitated for over an hour, lying in the middle of the aisle, with a flight attendant holding her legs above her head, a doctor-passenger (paged, just like on the television!) inserting an IV into her arm, and an entire airplane of turned heads keeping a steady vigil. She eventually pulled through. I don’t know how I would have felt if she died on the plane, but it certainly felt awkward enough flying around with a potentially dead body.
I was disappointed that Charles de Gaulle didn’t have smoking incubators. I thought if any airport in the world would have smoking incubators, it would be one in Paris, or France. I’ll try to go through Frankfurt next time.
Speaking of smoking, they always tell you that it’s a federal offense to smoke on an aircraft, yet they are all equipped with ashtrays. Are these just remnants of a previous civilization, or do flights actually exist during which one can smoke? Not that I particularly want to be on a smoking flight. In fact, it sounds kind of gross. Besides, I’ve slept through the majority of all of my recent flights, and I haven’t yet mastered the art of smoking while sleeping.
Don’t worry, Mom. I’ll quit one day soon.
My flight landed an hour late in Bangalore. Immigration took an hour, and customs took another hour, and was just as exciting as I imagined it would be. When I took the suitcase off the carousel, it was covered in large circled X’s drawn in white chalk. I sighed, knowing that I would be soon raped by customs, just as I was last time.
A mustached man asked if I had a laptop in my suitcase. Of course I did. Can’t you see all of the X’s on my bag? I was half tempted to say no, there’s nothing in my suitcase, but I had one in my carry on, in addition to some camera equipment. But I couldn’t lie. I didn’t like the prospect of being thrown in jail, or having to pay a ludicrous amount of duty/bribes for my personal belongings. Unfortunately, this was inevitable.
I was slightly wiser this time, but not nearly as brazen as I wanted to be. I took out my Dell laptop, as it was a big chunk of black plastic and looked less expensive in comparison to my shiny silver Macbook. I was told that the duty would be 36.6% of the cost of the laptop to import, which is pretty ridiculous, but having no proof of the laptop’s worth, I was able to negotiate this pretty handsomely.
The laptop, I convinced him, was a company hand-me-down well over three years old, and could be worth no more than, hm, $800? He pulled out his calculator and told me that my duty would be $288. I quickly told him I wouldn’t be paying that much to import a company laptop, and he explained my other option would be to detain the laptop at the airport until I bring proof in letter form that it is property of an Indian company (which it wasn’t). Clearly, even if I was able to get the proof, the laptop would have been long gone by the time I returned. I chuckled at the thought.
I’m not leaving it here, and I’m not paying $288, so what are our other options? He gave me a shady look, and said, “Okay, a hundred then.” No, I told him, fifty. He said seventy. I knew I had a healthy amount of USD on me, left overs from Christmas gifts, and maybe Rs. 2000 which I never removed from my wallet after leaving India in October, but just to double check, I took out my wallet. The man nearly jumped over the counter to prevent me from doing this. “No, sir, no no no. Not here.”
Across the way were two adjacent offices, one containing a shady Indian boy-man, who could either have been 18 or 46, I have no idea; the other containing a legit-looking Indian teller sitting behind a desk, accompanied in his office by a cot stripped of sheets but covered in plastic shrink wrap. He pointed to the left office, and followed me in.
I opened my wallet and said, “I can only pay fifty. I need to have cash for my cab ride home.” I handed him fifty, and he asked for twenty more. I sighed, and pleaded with my conscience to hand it to him and get it over with. It would be so much easier this way. And so I did. He counted it, handed it to the boy-man, and asked me to return with him to the customs counter. I flipped the lid on the whole operation when I asked, “Do I get a receipt for that?”
“No, no receipt.” He turned around and walked away.
“Oh hell, no. I need a receipt.”
“I’m sorry, sir, no receipt.” He kept walking, leaving me with the boy-man.
I told him to give me a receipt, or give me my money back. I definitely raised my voice. He turned around, spooked, looking over his shoulders to see if any of the other guards were paying attention.
“Please sir, calm down, calm down. Come with me.”
As we walked back to my belongings at the counter, I ranted aloud about thieves and crime and whatever else came to my head. It was close to 3AM, and I was delirious. I realized that I was now in control of the situation and that I could have a little fun being loud and angry. The more attention I garnered from other people, the more likely he was to crack, and let me walk away duty free. I kept ranting.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get away duty free. In fact, I still ended up paying around $70. After he wrote up the receipt for the transaction, I walked it over the legit teller with the plastic-covered cot, paid the price, and got my copy. I wouldn’t call this a victory at all. In fact, it was an absolute failure on my part, but at least I got my receipt.
During this entire charade, I overheard another woman being hassled at customs — probably legitimately. She worked for Microsoft, and had around six red plastic containers filled to the top with computer peripherals and gadgetry. The customs officers’ heads were spinning. As I dragged my luggage passed her, I wished her good luck. She was going to be there for a long time.
The ride to my hotel was peaceful. I arrived, unpacked, and started my Lost marathon.
