Rules Before Boarding

There are some problems that I encountered before boarding an international flight which are quite minor but it is good to be aware of. I appreciate all the hard works done by customs officers because after all they try to ensure we have a safe journey. 

For domestic flight, when your hand carry luggage goes through the customs, they will just roughly scan your stuff, asking what is inside the bag, sometimes weight your luggage and that’s it. They are quite lenient.

When come to international flight, the procedures are stricter than domestic flight. Firstly, before entering to the departure hall, my passport and thumb print are required to check-in using a machine and that is how my problems begin. I was stuck at the machine due to that silly thumb print sensor. After I inserted my passport into it, I need to press my thumb quite hard on the sensor to get my thumb sensed. But the thing is the small piece of glass seems to be easy to break and that’s why I dare not press it with full force, so error keep on showing on the screen. 3 minutes struggling with the machine, I decided to walk out from that stupid machine and manually check-in at the counter.

 While waiting for the long queue to reach the customs, I took a glance at how the officers frisk the passengers and check their hand carry luggage. It took a few seconds to get things done, so I thought it would be easy to pass the customs. When it’s my turn, first thing that the officer told me was ‘Please take out your laptop and belt,’ Well laptop is still acceptable but why belt?  Maybe they wanted to prevent me from highjacking the plane by strangling the pilot with my belt.

Trouble still haunting me until the very last moment before boarding. When the officer opened my bag, he asked me to empty my bottle which is full of water and I forced to drink half bottle and pour the rest. The worst thing is the officer had confiscated my lotion as only 100 ml of liquid is allowed to board while my lotion exceeds that limit which is 200 ml. Now I’m suffering dry skin in UK thanks to my dear officer for carrying out his job so seriously. I guess the reason why the amount of liquid is restricted is because explosive chemical stuff like liquid nitrogen can be made by water.

Airbus 330-200 from Etihad Airways  awaits, Liverpool here i come~