Customs & Border Protection USA

We landed at Honolulu Airport at 6:30am Hawaiian time, after an eight hour journey from Auckland. Despite the fact that I’d had somewhat of a restless sleep, I felt wide awake and prepared to start the day, despite the film of grime that had developed across my teeth.

As we disembarked the plane, we were shuffled into the terminal by local Air New Zealand staff. Now, the Honolulu Airport is currently undergoing a refurbishment however as the airport is rather large, it’s obviously going to take a while.

Stepping into the airport is like taking a time capsule back into the late sixties. There is a tonne of wood panelling and brown and tan as far as the eye can see, with loads of gold fixtures and fronded plants in huge, concrete garden pots dotted throughout the terminals. I turned to Christian who I knew would be enamoured by the decor of the airport and he whispered to me, ‘you know, Elvis once walked these halls‘. I rolled my eyes and obediently walked forward, ushered single file toward the exterior of the terminal where I could see a pair of buses that looked like they belonged on the island of Rarotonga.

hnl — *Passenger Shuttle, Honolulu Airport.*

We boarded one of the buses and waited a few minutes to ensure everyone had alighted, and then were transported to security clearance and baggage claim in another terminal. I was astounded at the size of the airport, and commented to Christian about how huge the place was. We idly chatted as I attempted to quell the churning in my stomach as we prepared to meet the oft-feared TSA.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is an agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that has authority over the security of the traveling public in the United States. It was created as a response to the September 11, 2001 attacks and their reputation as no-nonsense, serious men and women of law is infamous.

On average, the TSA screens approximately 2 million people per day throughout the United States and its’ two territories Puerto Rico & Guam.

Prohibs 3-16-12 — *Image courtesy of US Army.*

In Fort Worth in 2012, a TSA officer confiscated a live 40mm high explosive grenade from a passengers luggage; the fact that firearms, live animals and drugs are still attempting to be smuggled in and out of the US, coupled with the world as it exists today post 9/11 has proven the need for the country to take its’ border security very seriously.

The country’s currently political climate regarding immigration was also a cause for concern, especially during a time where President Trump has expressed definitive and divisive opinions on immigration.

At the end of January this year, President Trump decreed executive order temporarily banning travel from seven Muslim-majority countries. The move sparked protests around the country as people who had previously been approved to come to the United States were being detained at airports and there were also indications that the ESTA visa waiver program would be scrapped in favour of stricter visa-issuances for all foreign visitors.

Although the order was blocked in appeals courts, The Donald has reportedly signed a new executive order, removing Iraq from the list of countries that would be impacted by the travel ban and stating that the order would apply to new visa applicants only. This will mean that travellers who’d previously been blocked by the initial order despite having legitimate visa documentation may now be allowed entry to the United States.

As a New Zealand born citizen, I rarely worry about travelling abroad, for the simple fact that our passports are ranked as one of the best to have in the world. This is based on the number of countries (170) that permit entry to citizens of New Zealand without requiring visas.

Upon reaching passport control, we were asked to enter our passport details into a self service machine that scanned our biometric passports and took our photos. This printed out a slip that we were required to present to the customs officer at security, along with out passports.

As we approached the officer, I hoped that we would get someone nice, or at least someone who would be interested in the fact that we hailed from the land of Hobbits, Orcs, Gandalf and Middle Earth and less interested in my husband’s birthplace.

Christian was born in Lima, and spent several years living in his country of origin Peru before emigrating with his family to New Zealand. At this stage in the game, he is a naturalised citizen travelling on a New Zealand passport and has been a resident in Auckland for the last 27 years. On this basis, you would assume that the length of time he’d been away from South America that the cultural stereotypes that come along with hailing from this part of the world would have lapsed, right? Wrong.

Even our own friends have made jokes about Christian being an undesirable, being ‘randomly selected’ at airports internationally because of his ‘Mexican sounding name’, laughing at his name being that of someone who is quite obviously a Columbian drug mule…guess what, team? It’s not funny. People of colour are routinely treated poorly, or differently because of their given names or familial lineage. The very fact that we cannot make these exact jokes to an anglo-saxon makes these racist. So stop it. It’s not funny. It’s lame and I’m sure you’re smarter than that.

Because we seem to be the most blessed people in the world, our customs and border protection officer (also a department of Homeland Security) was a Mexican gentleman named Luis.

He greeted us warmly welcoming us to the country and nonchalantly asked Christian about his country of birth, how long he’d lived in the country and how he’d ended up in New Zealand. ‘Peruano!’, he exclaimed repeatedly stating that he’d not met many in his line of work and that it was nice to meet Christian.

His language was interspersed with Spanish, and I smiled and breathed a sigh of relief. We came to the US with the explicit intention of enjoying a family vacation and I had been convinced by so many people that we would be treated as hostile, threatening individuals who were intent on causing havoc in the USA – thankfully, my experience couldn’t have been more opposite.

We were fingerprinted and our passports scanned and stamped, before being bid farewell by Luis, where he imparted some words to Christian – ‘you’re a good man, a mano. Take care of your family, you’re doing it right’.

Thank you, Luis!

Charli x

Flight Time.

After months and months of planning and an arduous overnight 8 hour flight from Auckland, my family and I landed at Honolulu airport in the early hours of Hawaii’s Saturday morning.

Unfortunately I didn’t take my own advice and refer to the SeatGuru app when choosing our seats on this plane.

Because Ethan wanted to sit at the window, I was relegated to the aisle seat, which offered additional leg room but a screen on a retractable arm as there was no seat in front of mine. The first row in our cabin boasted only two seats, and I remarked to Christian about how envious I was about the woman in the row who was travelling solo and didn’t have an accompanying passenger in her neighbouring but vacant seat. Bah, humbug.

Upon finding our seats, we were confused as to why there was no screen available in the aisle seat, as we had paid for The Works Deluxe package electing to fly in the most comfortable cattle class option. I then observed an attendant assisting my aisle neighbour, whose seat also did not have a passenger in front, but a wall separating our cabin from the Business Class cabin ahead.

He explained that the screen could be retracted and released from its partition by pushing down on a lever. As he explained this, I looked down to my left and observed a latch, pushing down hard to see if I could release the screen. I felt I had pushed with some force and without any luck, I gave up and assumed that the attendant, who had spoken to all others who were seated in the rows with retractable screens would surely come over before takeoff and go through the same procedure with me, as he had all of the others.

Alas – I was wrong. He started to walk down the aisle toward me and as he did so, I looked towards him and smiled. He looked down his nose at me and without missing a beat, sashayed further down the aisle to assist a colleague to ensure the rear doors were securely fastened. To say I was surprised would be a lie. Being a heavily tattooed person, quite often I am treated differently to your average Joe. People assume I do drugs, drink heavily, am generally a bad or unsavoury person…because I choose to adorn my body with art that I think is beautiful and have a penchant for body modification. First of all, if you think this? You’ve got screws loose. This is not 1950 and what I choose to do with my body is my business. I am sick to death of people remarking on my hair, clothes, body mods and appearance, like by simply existing I am asking for validation.

So, if you’re reading this? Just know, I’m not. I don’t need your validation. I’ve grown into a place where I really like myself and understand I have faults and flaws and am working on those, however I do not need you to comment on or remind me of aforementioned faults and flaws. Mind your own goddamn business.

And as for you (let’s call him Steve) Steve, air steward of Air New Zealand – you suck. Thanks for making me feel less than human by electing to ignore the basic requirements of your job, to make your guests comfortable and assist them where necessary. Cheers! Luckily for me however, one of his colleagues did ask if I had been shown how to use the retractable screen and when I said hadn’t took great care to show me in detail how to use the screen and let me know that the screens would need to be placed away during takeoff.

With that out of the way, I’d like to explain why I didn’t enjoy flying with Air New Zealand in the slightest.

Firstly, as a heavier person with a big bum, I detest planes with narrow seats. Ironically, New Zealand’s budget airline JetStar offers more comfortable seating than the perceived ‘better value’ national airline. I prefer to fly JetStar intercity while in New Zealand, for the simple fact that the seats are wider and the belts stretch easily across my wide torso.

I sat down in my chair and groaned. Not only was the seat narrow, but the armrests did not lift, meaning my thighs spewed out underneath the hardened plastic arms. Before you roll your eyes and say to yourself, ‘she should just lose some weight so she can fit in the seat our buy two seats if necessary’ – I get it. But in this case, even if I had purchased the neighbouring seat, I wouldn’t have been able to lift the armrest, so that argument is moot.

I reclined my seat a wee bit, so as not to disturb the person sitting behind me who was busily typing away on a laptop placed on their tray table – I try to be considerate when flying because I get super irritated when the person in front of me comes flying backwards halfway into my seat and I have to struggle to use my personal screen. I was able to stretch my legs out and sit very low in the seat, which somewhat replicated lying down…but not really.

So, in short? The flight sucked. I have a return flight on Air New Zealand to look forward to on the way home from Honolulu to Auckland so I’m grateful for the fact that it’s only eight hours. Should I ever return to Oahu, I will do so on a Hawaiian Airlines flight!

Charli x

Emperor Lounge

I like to think of myself as a well seasoned traveller, as in my role as an event manager I fly between cities frequently. The majority of my family also live in Australia, while I live in Auckland, New Zealand meaning I am back and forth across the ditch often.

And I hate the airport. Don’t get me wrong, travelling on a biometric passport has made all the difference in streamlining the customs process, but the whole palava of getting your bags checked in, filling out declaration forms, validating your identity with customs officers…it’s a whole mess that stresses me out to no end.

While doing a tonne of research for both our trip and subsequently this blog, I found the LoungeBuddy app, which allows users to view, book and access some of the most luxurious lounges airports around the world have to offer. While Auckland International Airport aren’t registered on LoungeBuddy, they do offer travellers the option to purchase access to their Emperor Lounge.

After completing our bag drop, hugging and kissing mum goodbye several times and completing security clearance through customs, we made our way through the Mecca of duty free stores directly to the Lounge, where we intended to unwind and relax before our 8 hour flight to Honolulu.

The Emperor Lounge is located on the first floor after security, to the right of the Benefit & MAC counters. It boasts a sleek entrance and is relatively easy to find as the lounges are all signposted.

Upon arrival, we confirmed our reservation with the concierge and were asked to present our boarding passes as forms of identification. I looked up my booking reference using the wonderful TripIt app and once registered within the booking system, we were directed through to the lounge.

The lounge was relatively busy at the time of evening we arrived (5:30pm) so we seated ourselves in the dining area where there was a free table.

You are provided with the wifi login details upon arrival and encouraged to help yourself to meals and beverages.

The selection of hot items is small, and a little lacklustre. The soup option was a creamy kumara concoction that looked pale and underwhelming, so I elected to move directly to Malaysian chicken curry on offer, accompanied with either mashed potatoes or jasmine rice. There was also a tomato based vegetarian curry, laden with carrot and tofu. Christian tried this fare and declared it to taste similar to “watered down ketchup”. I told him I’d pass.

Despite the options being far from numerous, I can tell you that the chicken curry was to die for. I had two helpings!

There is also a relatively well stocked bar, offering sparkling and still wines (both red and white), hard liquor and a selection of New Zealand beers, mixers and fruit juices. I poured a double Chivas Regal 12 year old over ice for Christian, and helped myself to a very strong gin and tonic, in the hope it would put me to sleep on the plane.

The buffet also includes a salad bar, complete with dressings, cheeses, club sandwiches, seasonal fruit and sushi.

These petit fours were delicious, and we found ourselves returning for more several times.

I did note that while the buffet was small, the staff were vigilantly replacing items quickly and efficiently, to ensure that the fridges were never without bottled water, non-alcoholic beverages, mixers and beer & wine as well as replenishing the hot buffet items and pastries often.

After chowing down on the chicken curry and pouring myself a second G&T, I setup my laptop to respond to some emails, and check up on Facebook. The last time I was at the airport for an extended period of time, I ended up paying $20 NZD in internet access fees, as Auckland Airport has some of the worst wifi pricing in the land. At Christchurch and Wellington airports, service is free and unrestricted in the terminal whilst in Auckland your first ~500MB is free if you register your email (read: sign up to be spammed for eternity).

The several drinks we consumed over the 2.5hrs we were in the lounge would have easily been priced at one of the flight side bars at well over $60 NZD.

Once we’d eaten more than our fill, I noticed that the lounge had freed up a bit and some armchairs had become free. We settled ourselves in and dug into some petit fours, plugging our phones in to charge in the conveniently located outlets in the wall beside the armchairs. There are quite a number of outlets in the lounge for recharging devices, as well as several desktop PCs setup to provide internet access to travellers without laptops or those who choose the convenience of using a desktop that has been setup and connected to high speed internet.

Christian had a cup of green tea (yes, self tea and coffee service is available for your convenience) to accompany his dessert. We chatted and watched the departure screen above our heads, denoting when travellers should think about being on the move toward their gate. At just before 8:30pm, we strolled leisurely toward Gate 10 for boarding. I stopped in for a cigarette in the terminals’ smoking lounge before making my way down the ramp to the gate as we had plenty of time to board. I usually wait towards the end of queues to board anyway after the attendant makes his or her announcements, as I see no sense in rushing to be on the plane first. Ultimately, the pilot isn’t going to take off until the plane doors are securely fastened and all registered passengers are on the flight, so running to get to my seat never made much sense to me.

Before we departed the lounge, I packed a few of the water bottles on offer in the lounge into my carry on luggage for each of us, so that we wouldn’t have to purchase it after we left to board. Plane cabins always leave me super dehydrated no matter the length of flight, so I did appreciate having easy access to water without having to turn on my call light for the attendant while the plane was in flight and all the passengers around me were dozing in the dark.

So, in all – would I recommend the Emperor Lounge in terms of cost versus benefit? Absolutely. If you run out of time to shower, no problem! Take one there.

Want to get blotto without having to fork out $13 for a tap beer? Done!

Want to avoid eating airport fast food? Done!

Need internet access to pay that utility bill you forgot about? Too easy!

Pricing starts at $49 NZD per adult for 3 hours access. Children under the age of 12 are priced at $24.50 for the same duration, however you can elect to purchase a longer stay (8 hours access) at a slightly higher cost.

Charli x