Leaving America...

This last week we went back to Michigan to see my family and give my parents time to spend with their granddaughter. We decided to head back through Canada since it cuts off more than three hours from the trip. We have done this many times, but this time things changed a little on our departure.

As we drove up to the border, we were stopped by two border patrol officers. One was talking to the person in the van in front of us and the other came to our window. This was different since most border patrol officers are in their little cubical at the gates. This time they were both standing outside waiting for cars coming to them. The officer asked to see our passports. He asked us the usual questions - why are you traveling to Canada, are you planning on stopping anywhere in Canada, any guns or alcohol in the your possession? This was all normal.

While this was happening the officer that was dealing with the car in front of us had the person get out of his vehicle. She asked him to open the back of the van so she could look in. The thing I noticed was that the gentlemen was of middle eastern decent. The officer that was dealing with us didn't go any further than asking us the normal questions and smiling the whole time. Then another van drove by us on the right hand side. This car was not stopped. The officer told the women, who started to run after the van that it was so and so. She smiled and nodded at our officer and continued with her driver.

We were handed our information back to us and were waved on. We put all our information away thinking that we were on our way to Canada. Now this all seems normal until we got to another gate where we had to give our passports over again. Come to find out the first stop that we had to make was actually the U.S. border patrol. The Vermont boarder patrol had officers asking people why they are leaving the U.S. Do we now have to get permission to travel outside America? Why were they so much more interested in the man in front of us than they were us? I think that they were doing some racial profiling. Why didn't they look in our van? And why are they concerned with who is leaving the country?

I told Mark the next time we leave and they stop us, we should tell them we are defecting. I just want to see what reaction it would get and how long we would have to be in jail.