Personal experience: all the circles of hell through which tourists pass at the border control at the New York airport

On the channel "Barefoot Yogini" on Zen Yandex a story was published about how a tourist from Russia was almost denied entry to the United States when she was already at the New York airport. This was her second visit to America: during the first she did not violate anything, but she drew attention to the control at the airport - and away we go ...

In 2018, the author visited New York on a 3-year US visa. But, according to the rules of the host country, you cannot stay in it for more than 6 months. She stayed in America for 5 months, that is, the tourist did not break the rule, but she understood that such a long stay during the first visit could raise questions and suspicions.

After the first trip to the USA, she managed to visit Spain, Poland and the UK. Since the visa expired in 2020, the author decided to fly to America again. She monitored groups in social networks for a long time, prepared answers for the inspector at customs, memorized the route she was going to take, as well as the names of attractions, etc. The preparatory moments took about a month.

What you need to consider when going to the USA

But not only the answers were important - the author thought out her costume.

She says she saw people who entered America 6-8 times on a tourist visa, who stayed as long as possible without any problems at all. And I heard stories when people were actually turned back at the second entry because of the too long first visit.

Having a visa cannot give a 100% guarantee of entering the United States, because the decision is made by the inspector at the border. And here are the points that are important:

• citizenship
• marital status
• whether you are traveling alone or with your spouse
• how clearly can you tell about your goals
• how you are dressed and how you make an overall impression.

Second visit

The author flew to America from Poland in early October 2019, her visa was valid until February 2020. A huge line awaited her at the airport. The next line was moving faster - there were those who have a green card. It was so cold in the room that my jaw cracked. But, despite this, when meeting with the inspector, she tried to keep herself free and smile.

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The inspector looked relaxed, even drowsy. The author showed him a return ticket after 3 weeks. But when he saw her marital status (not married), he started flipping through her passport and saw a previous trip to the United States. When she replied that she had last stayed in the country for 5 months, the inspector stopped talking and called an escort. The Russian tourist was taken to a separate room.

Proceedings in the room

As soon as you enter this room, your passport is taken from you and placed in a colored folder. The tourist does not remember, but it seems that the phone is also taken away.

In that room, she saw several passengers who were on the same flight with her. Three inspectors deciding whether to let you into the country or not were also in that room. The author of the story called them “three heroes” because they were sitting on a hill. When people approached them, they still found themselves below them, although they stood.

"Maybe this is done specifically for psychological pressure?" - the author suspected.

Inspectors leaf through the pages of the passport, check the information on their computer, and ask questions. Documents between them are distributed randomly, that is, before your turn comes, you do not know who you will get to.

She began to examine the inspectors. One of them was a white man in his 50s. He sent people with a stamp in their passports pretty quickly. The second is a man of 25-35 years old. People did not stay with him for a long time either, he turned out to be not as meticulous as the third one.

And this third inspector, a large man of 25-35 years old, asked a lot of questions, rummaged through the documents for a long time. Our author just didn't want to get to him, but that's exactly what happened.

Provoked and accused of lying

“The problem was that he could not find in the system the flight on which I was returning to Russia after the first trip. That is, he suspected that maybe I didn’t come back at all, ”the author explained.

The inspector asked her a lot of questions and for some reason told about his sister, whom he hated.

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However, he nevertheless put the coveted seal, since he did not find any evidence that she was telling a lie.

“When I came out of there, I was shaking as I had never shaken in my life. For another forty minutes I was stuck at the airport, because I could not collect my thoughts in any way, ”the tourist admitted.