1978. It was a hot summer day in LaGuardia. I was in a small windowless room with a boy in uniform and there was no A/C. In fact there was no A. If it was any consolation, it was worse for him than for me. All I did was sweat. His face turned to road kill as the heat brought out his acne. I didn’t want to get too close cause I knew some of those little rasberries were going to blow. We’d been there for an hour. He’d taken everything out of my pack, even the dirty, yucky underwear and socks. Deep down at the bottom he’d found my diary, and there he’d sat reading my most intimate secrets. It gave me time to ponder. Why hadn’t I taken a flight into JFK? They probably had A/C in their interrogation rooms at JFK. They’d probably just assume this long-haired, bearded hippy type was a musician or a poet on his way to a concert and wave me through. They probably wouldn’t have singled me out and gone through my documents and found my resumé and my references.

“If you’re supposed to be coming here on holiday, son (He called me son even though I knew he was far too young and unpleasant looking to have got anywhere near my mother) How come you’re bringing your job references?”

It was a good question. I was hoping they might help me find work but, of course I couldn’t tell him that. I was on a tourist visa.

“I picked them up in England when I was back there,” I said. “I thought I might need them when I get back to Australia. I didn’t dare post them.”

He gave me the eyeball. I think they must teach immigration officials the eyeball. They’ve all got it. Every country. That same, superior, ‘I know your deepest thoughts’ eyeball. I knew he wasn’t a very smart immigration official cause if he was he would have started on the last page of my diary where he could have found my hopes and dreams of a new life in America. Instead he started at page one and went through it one sleazy secret at a time looking up at me now and then and drooling.

I was just about to tell him to put me on the first flight out of the country, to anywhere, but he slammed the book shut having only reached April, and he smiled.

“I tell you what I’m gonna do,” he said. I assumed gonna was some kind of a word. “I’m gonna let you in. You know why?” I was on tenterhooks. “Cause I like ya.” Oh, how lucky I was. I had a friend. I’d lost my appetite for a life in north America but I had a new buddy at the airport. He even gave me his phone number. I often wonder what it was he read in my diary that endeared me to him so.

I think that was the traumatic moment that first made me hate immigration officials. I grew sick of those friendless upstarts in uniform flourishing their power like a Lightsaber – Jedi Overlord of their own little four feet of nether-world.

So imagine how delightful it must be for someone with my hang-up to be living in a country where every three months I have to report to the Thai immigration department. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, they’re all police. Don’t get me started on police. (I don’t have a problem with postmen so I know it’s not a uniform thing. I still have traumatic moments with immigration officials on casual Fridays when they wear their ridiculous Hawaiian shirts.) The web boards are jammed with horror stories of foreigners having run-ins with the Immies over here; corruption, racism, inefficiency, corruption, insults, humiliation, and, I’m told…corruption. I believe all these stories because I’ve witnessed them myself. It’s amazing how many loops you can be sent through unless you grease a palm here or there. Even a box of chocolates or a bottle of wine can make the process that much easier.

“You’re police,” I say. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourselves? You’re supposed to be the moral and legal bastions of the country, examples for the next generation, yet you allow yourselves to be so openly rotten? Well, I tell you what,” I say. “Paying graft is just as bad as expecting it in my book. So you keep your visa and I’ll get on the next flight to Malaysia. See if I care.”

Of course, when I say “I say these things” I don’t mean the words actually come out of my mouth. What I mean is that I think them very loudly, because I don’t want to go to Malaysia. I like it here. And that’s the power the immigration weasels wield. And, as if things weren’t bad enough, they’ve just found a new ruse.

During the week I arrived at my big visa day – the extension. They’ve shuffled round their administration districts and moved me from one provincial immigration office to another. Four hours round trip drive across country. A new, unknown foe. But I was ready for them. I’d copied everything three times including the outside covers of my passport. I had my health certificate, my bank statement, my passport photographs and my form, neatly filled out. I had the visa fee in exactly the correct amount in a transparent envelope. I had a hand held tape recorder with a blank tape and the police ministry complaints hotline on speed dial on my wife’s cell phone. I knew I could combat whatever degradation they threw at me. But the bastards were one up on me again. They hit me with something I’d never expected. They were polite, efficient and respectful. In a little over half an hour I walked out of there with my new visa. Damn them. They always find a way to get to me.