Good-bye to all of that
I was born travelling and some of my earliest memories are in riding a car literally all over the eastern seaboard of North America. Travelling was second nature to me. I remember my first day of holidays in July 1990 when I woke up and decided I needed to be anywhere but where I was. I packed a light travel carry-on bag and caught a cab out to Pearson International Airport. The first flight leaving after my arrival was to Vancouver so I paid cash for a ticket 20 minutes before departure and took my seat on the plane. I spent two weeks living in a small bed and breakfast in downtown Vancouver. It wasn’t the first time I did that but it was the last. One cannot do that anymore – or at least you cannot do it without a great deal of hassle with presumed flags raised against your name…well, unless you are wealthy Nigerian and get on a plane in Laos with changeover in Amsterdam
In the past year, I spent more time commuting between the eastern and western Canada and was forced to acknowledge some aspects of my personality had changed and not necessarily for a more pleasant me. My preferred method of transportation is anything over flying and I am no longer a good traveller. The constant hurry up and endless waiting of air travel; the rules, the restrictions drive my tolerance level for bullshit to ‘E’ for empty. I am no one’s favoured customer. If I had my way, the 9/11 Hijackers would not have died in their attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Centre but instead would be left in my care so I could torture them at will for all the horrendous changes for the worse their hijacking of those planes created.
The main lesson I took from the 9/11 Commission Report was the conclusion that it was primarily a failure of imagination on the part of those entrusted with security. The lesson I take from the North Western Air plane by a disenfranchised radicalized Nigerian is simply this; it was a human failure to implant and follow up established procedures.
So today, due to a new whole host of restrictive security regulations being implemented to flying into the United States to compensate for human failure; I simply choose never to fly into the US or have a changeover occur on US soil. I’ll gladly pay more not to be needless harassed in an experience that is already overtly invasive and restrictive. I chose not to sit for an hour held hostage with my hands clearly visible in my lap without benefit of book, blanket, pillow or iPod. I have broken no laws and do not wish anyone harm but those already long dead. If the freedom of our society is worth preserving the way to do so is not with endless restriction and regulation against the law-abiding nature of many against the risk of a few. Life is fraught with risk; some known but mostly not. I’d rather live a life unknown freely than a live a life regulated and govern by endless governmental restrictions and regulations.
