Canadian Customs

I arrived in Winnipeg, Manitoba last Friday to visit my girlfriend. The first leg of my summer tour will start next Tuesday, June 6th when I head to Montreal for their Fringe Festival. With all of the recent hub-bub over border security, I find it interesting to compare the way Canada handles people heading through customs vs how the US handles things. When I went througth Canadian customs in Toronto, I guess that my story about travelling around Canada to attend theatre festivals with my solo show sounded a little fishy, so my customs declaration was marked with some red writing and I had to go and speak with another customs agent. This is the sort of thing that is likely to happen in the US as well. The agent looked at my form, looked something up on the computer, asked me a couple of questions. Stared at my customs form some more. He seemed to be pondering something. Was he going to send me to some secret detention facility outside of Ottawa. Was I going to be dragged off tortured and sexually humiliated somewhere in the hopes that I had information regarding terrorists? in I was getting a litte worried. Finally he said, "I'm just trying to figure out if you need to apply for a work permit." And that is the difference between the US and Canada when it comes to dealing with Customs. The US agents make you feel as though they think you are a terrorist. The Canadian agents make you feel as though they think you might need to fill out another form.