WHILE travel holds much promise of adventure, novelty and joy, it now is laced with fear of vampires among the security and customs personnel at airports.
And while the best part of traveling is the going home, it now, too, augurs some anguish over what trickeries those airport personnel’s sticky fingers will spin.
Time was when some customs people at the arrival area, upon seeing packs of chocolates, would brazenly ask if one of those was theirs.
“Garapal!,” you’d say under your breath. But you tone it down and say, “Sorry, I just brought enough for the family.”
But “tanim bala?” Never in our wildest dream did we see this coming. Honestly, we did not even think the Pinoy mind could conjure up such devilish scheme.
True, we’ve heard before of travelers’ various travails in other airports. Even in popular Thailand, thieves are among the baggage handlers commissioned by international airlines.
The pilfering is done while the baggage is being loaded into the aircraft. Since they alone are inside the plane’s hold, supposedly stacking luggage, they actually break the luggage locks and steal the valuables.
Not wanting the incident to hurt their reputation, the international airlines prefer to pay damages to complaining passengers.
In San Francisco, elderly Asian women lost bags with over $100,000 in cash and jewelry to thieves coaxing them to conduct a ceremony to dispel bad spirits from their families.
In Honolulu, private security guards have allegedly been demanding payoffs from cab drivers ranging from $20 to thousands. Such payoffs allow them to wait for customers on airport traffic islands. Non-payments mean being shooed off and customers being diverted to paying drivers.
The guards reportedly work for Securitas, one of the world’s largest private security firms. Ironically, it has a three-year, $98 million contract to provide security for all of Hawaii’s airports.
In China, the scare tactic is thrown in as well. Travelers from Uganda applying for visas have to present their yellow fever vaccination certificate. The Chinese Embassy in Kampala has denied the need for such requirement.
The main orchestrators of this extortion scheme are reportedly the employees of the Entebbe Handling Services (ENHAS), and Das Air Cargo, the firm handling cargo at the airport.
These employees are supposedly under the protection of rogue security elements in the aviation police, a specialist group in charge of securing the airport.
In her book “Bribery and Extortion: Undermining Business, Governments, and Security,” Alexandra Addison Wrage writes about various extortion schemes in international airports.
They are as creative or ridiculous as they get. In Kazakhstan, travelers pay through their teeth for “irregularities in the paperwork.”
In Qatar, customs officials demand additional fees for clearing the passengers’ goods. Refusal would elicit threats of tax audits or inflated tax bills. Naturally, payments have to be made “just between us,” and in the office of the corrupt officials.
The book, published in 2014, makes no mention of the Philippines. The “tanim bala” scandal hitting the international media circuit is fodder for a revised edition.
That’s when the downside of the Filipino’s much-vaunted ingenuity will see print.
(lelani.echaves@gmail.com)