Getting Around

I've had more than my share of moving across borders over the past 18 years when we have managed to live pretty full lives, simultaneously, in both the U.S. and in Canada by spending two weeks of each month in each place (with the excess going to the U.S.).  We've skipped right across bi-coastal to bi-national.  At this point, however, it's grown a little wearisome, and medical circumstances make it imperative that we get ourselves back to the U.S. on a full-time basis.  (And, as a matter of fact, that may make posting a little irregular on the blog, although I'll try to maintain some stability, in every sense of the word.)

However, there are more possibilities for travel than i had considered, possibilities much more onerous, I'd guess.  Point Roberts has a marina where I rarely go because I don't have much interest in boats, although they do have many beauties of which I am an insufficient observer.  When we went to see the pygmy-angora goats arrive a couple of weeks ago, I looked around at the Marina with a somewhat more interested eye.  There are a lot of boats there.  They surely don't all belong to full-time residents of Point Roberts; my guess is that Canadians keep them there for one reason or another.  Lower fees, lower taxes, who knows.  In any case, the marina pretty much has all its slips filled.  As of last week, anyway, there were only 8 available out of what looks like several hundreds.  (The marina's website has much information, but not including the number of slips available.)

In addition to the boats and the chandlery, and the restaurant, and the service facilities, the marina currently has two other features.  On is a small herd of highland cattle (which were also shipped in, like the goats, but on a somewhat larger boat) and the other is a two-story, 82-foot long barge/house boat that would appear to be something like a small-ish hotel.  The houseboat has been here and there for many years apparently and was, I am told, most recently shipped in to us in Pt. Roberts from Salt Spring Island.  But it is now for sale to anyone who would like to cruise around from country to country with all their closest friends.  All it would take is the friends and some way to move the houseboat (it didn't really seem self-propelling, and i guess if it's a barge you'd actually need a tug-boat to move it, but what do I know about boats?).  And then, you'd also need about $1.8+ million dollars. (The color picture above: that's the barge/houseboat, even though it just looks like a house.)

And then you would have the opportunity to live bi-, tri-, quatralaterally nationally.  Personally, I wouldn't recommend it, but then, everyone has his or her own level of tolerance for complexity.

(Sorry that two of the pictures turned out to be in b/w.  My photo program occasionally has the need to do this and when I discovered it, I wasn't well situated to retake the pics.)

Leaving the Northwest

You stay in Point Roberts/Roberts Creek too long and you forget how the rest of the world (or at least the ROUS) works, or at least how to work with the ROUS. A brief trip to central California left me at the Vancouver Airport yesterday, faced with the Canadian equivalent of the TSA and the American customs people in a different configuration from the Point Roberts’ border experience.

I guess I am too old or too temperamentally ill-equipped to deal with what certainly appears to be irrational authority. The take-off-your-hat, -jacket, -scarf, -shoes mentality completely evades me, given that I have to march through the Magic, All-Seeing Arch of Oz, but I reluctantly and unhappily do as I am ordered. I just refuse to participate in the little plastic bag with liquids, creams, unguents and emollients ritual, so I don’t bring any of those things with me. Nor would I dream of submitting to having my digital camera, computer, I-Pod, and whatever up for being turned on, searched or justified, or examined in the myriad ways they could think up to investigate them, so I travel with nothing electronic. I have things made of fabric plus a plastic toothbrush, comb, and hairbrush. My theory of travel in the Strict Daddy State age is that everything I need can be found at the other end of the trip. This, I believe, will keep my interaction with the TSA at the maximum minimal level.

The theory turned into practice is less successful. I arrived early for the flight with my pre-printed boarding tickets, my passport and customs card in hand. At the airline ticket office, the agent congratulated me for having everything done just right. I get through 45 minutes of customs. I make my way to the magic arch, remove all my outer garments and shoes, place them and my suitcase on the conveyor belt, step through the magic arch, put my clothes and shoes back on, put my purse on my shoulder, and walk away, with great relief. Ten minutes later, I notice that I have no suitcase at the end of my hand.

A walk back and a long rigamarole in which I successfully demonstrate that my suitcase and I are meant for one another. Which all goes to prove, I guess, that anxiety creates reality. Really: just pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

The Cuban Connection

My neighbors went to Cuba this winter. They also went last winter. My other neighbors are going soon. It’s a terrific vacation spot, they say. Wonderful people, great beaches, good food, interesting sights and all at good prices. They’re Canadians, of course. They can go to Cuba any time they want to if they’ve got the price of the tour ticket.

I can’t go to Cuba, of course, because I am an American, one of the 300 million Americans who live in the midst of incredible freedom. Although not, of course, freedom to travel to Cuba. And this is because??? Really??? Is it really because the votes of the Cuban emigres in Florida are so important to both the Republicans and Democrats that ordinary Americans have been forbidden to travel to Cuba for about 50 years? Incredible. The land of the free, all that. Of course, it’s not quite true that it’s illegal for Americans to travel to Cuba. The right to travel is a Constitutionally-protected right. What’s illegal is for you to spend any money should you inexplicably find yourself in Cuba. That, dear ones, turns out not to be a freedom enshrined within the Constitution.

Some Americans do go to Cuba, of course. If you are a politician or a government bureaucrat, you can go there on a “Fact Finding Tour,” although I don’t know that any of them are actually interested in finding any facts. Facts about mojito drinking, is my guess. At some periods in the last 50 years, you have been able to go there if you are an academic or some kind of professional to attend educational conferences. There have also been some arts exchanges over time. And if you are a Cuban-American, you are permitted to go back and forth occasionally to visit relatives (currently, once every three years for two weeks--so generous, don't you know?). During the last 7 years, though, the restrictions have been dramatically tightened. If the American government discovers you have gone to Cuba without its explicit permission—which you are not likely to get--there is something like a $15,000 fine.

But despite that, Americans do go. Half a million+ Canadians visit Cuba each year. Not so many Americans. I don’t suppose anybody knows exactly how many Americans show up, other than the Cubans, who do not choose to reveal the information. If you are a Cuban-American with relatives in Cuba, as I understand it, you have to get permission from Cuba to appear at their doorstep. But if you are just a standard issue U.S. citizen and you start your trip to Cuba from Canada or from Mexico, they’re pleased to see you, but don’t bring a credit card.

My Canadian friends say there are often Americans on the tours they take to Cuba, whether it’s for a week in the sun on Veradado Beach, a history and arts visit in Havana, or a tour of the entire island. Cuba has been deeply involved in working to restore its cultural heritage by restoring the buildings of old Havana and that in itself, the Canadians tell me, is worth the trip. I wouldn’t know, of course. I’m an American.

The Cubans and the Canadians, I’m also told, are very protective of Americans who do make it to Cuban shores to see the sights of the Forbidden Island. The Cubans are careful not to stamp U.S. travelers’ passports, and the Canadians are careful to check those passports upon return to make sure that nothing got accidentally stamped. Considerate of them both. More considerate, I’d say, than those who think freedom means votes for them from Cuban-Americans who are still pissed at Castro. Indeed, I have begun to think of the Florida Cuban-Americans as our Palestinians. The Arab countries are always promising the Palestinians that they will be restored to their homeland with restitution for their intervening hardships, and I presume that the Cuban Americans are similarly looking to the U.S. government to be restored to their homeland, with comparable restitution. As far as I know, though, the Arabs don’t forbid their citizens from visiting Israel. Although somebody else may.

My Canadian friends, on the other hand, have no Palestinians or Cuban emigres of their own, so they go wherever they want. Lucky them.