h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Nearly as scary as crossing the GFR/GDR border all those years ago!

Yes - I remember that too. If you unbuckled your seat belt to, say, get your passport, you had to be sure to not move the car an inch until it was done up again. Otherwise you could get fined for driving without a seat belt. At least, that's what I was told by my passenger at the time.

Awu

True, true!

And if your passport photo didn't *precisely* match your appearance (ie: having grown or shaved a beard in the meantime) then you'd be kept out of the 'paradise of the working class'

back in my hitchiking days, when faced with a 'difficult' border crossing guard or uncooperative bureaucrat, i would open my passport and point to the inside page, giving them a verbal translation of what was written there.

"Her Britannic Majesty's Secretary of State
Requests and requires in the name of Her Majesty
all those whom it may concern to allow the bearer to pass freely
without let or hindrance, and to afford the bearer such assistance
and protection as may be necessary"

I would then produce a small notebook and ask politely for their name.

It seemed to work every time, although i never tried to get into 'paradise'.
Now thirty years later, i wonder if it would have the same effect.

alec.

I remember that. That's an unusual usage of the word 'let'. I had to look it up in a dictionary (although it's pretty obvious what it means).

I recently drove from New Brunswick (CDN) to Maine (USA). I waited a little while at the stop sign, nodded to the US imigration official in his little office, then drove on. I thought it was like driving between Holland and Belgium. It set off all kinds of sirens and flashing lights! A voice over a Tannoy called me back and tore me off a strip.

Awu.