As I mentioned, getting through immigration was long and tiresome. But after doing so in Kiev, it was easy to spot my bags since they were the only ones remaining at our flight's baggage carrousel. If you'd traveled internationally you know that when you arrive at your country of origin, you have to collect your checked luggage and take it through customs before returning it back to the airline carrier for the remainder of your domestic (for whatever country you're in) trip.
So I was glad to see that my luggage was still there, I collected it, and happily headed towards customs. There was a green line and a red line and since it had been a long time since I traveled internationally, I instinctively headed toward the green line (green = go, red = stop, right?). I thought it was strange that I had not had to fill-out a customs card but whatever...
So then the very nice woman in the green line asked to x-ray all of my bags, no problem. I even joked that maybe I should go through the machine superman-style (with body language, her English wasn't so good) and she laughed. then after my bags went through she asked how much money I brought and whether or not I had drugs. I told her and happily handed-over my one-quart bag of medicines, liquids, etc. She proceeded to go through it item-by-item, carefully reading each package until she came across my 24-pack of Pseudophedrin.
She said, "ah, Pseudophedrine... it is illegal in Ukraine. Please wait here." She walked away with the pseudophed and my passport.
Mother shitter... shit shit shit...
As many of you know, I'm prone to anxiousness. I even take medication (Lexipro) to help with it. But this wasn't helping. My life flashed before my eyes. Specifically, my family and friends gathered around a TV watching the latest episode of "Arrested Overseas" starring me.
I quickly started digging through my bags, pulling out anything liquid or that might be perceived as a drug. I think I found my allergy inhaler and maybe a small bottle of sunscreen.
I waited. This older man came out. I don't really remember what he said... I was a bit panicked, but it was clear that I was going to have to go elsewhere and that I was in trouble.
As a side note, I had been to Ukraine once before.
Why do we say "The Ukraine?"... we don't say "the China" or "the Australia" or the-any-other-country... so I'm trying to teach myself to say simply "Ukraine". Am I the only one who does this? I didn't even know it until my friend Anastasia (whom I'm visiting) asked, "why do you say The Ukraine?"
The last time I was in Ukraine, I was also detained along with my friend David Hoehner for being "foreigners in a closed city." We had traveled to the resort city of Yalta (BEAUTIFUL!!!) and decided to pick another less-touresty random destination on the Black Sea. We arbitrarily chose Feodosia because it appeared to be fairly large.
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cohenscorner/Lechno/maps/feodosia.gif
To get there, we flagged a "taxi" from Simpheropol (north of Yalta) and asked to go to Fedosia. A taxi at that time was anyone whom wanted to earn an extra dollar. And the driver neglected to tell us that Feodosia was a "closed" city because it is a military port and thus foreigners are not allowed. So when we tried to check-in to our hotel, we were escorted to the police station and interrogated for a couple of hours. When they realized that we weren't spys, we were told to stay in our hotel until the next morning and to leave town as soon as possible.
Back to my interrogation in Kiev on my next post...
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