Skip Finland, maybe

“It’s standard procedure. She’s from a third world country.”

This is what my partner was told when he called to file a complaint about what happened to me today. And briefly, because I need to say it to anyone who will listen, this is what happened.

After three years on the JET Programme in Japan, and a lifetime of pining to see the world, I had enough money saved up to live my dream. I started in Europe because my partner lives here. I had submitted the detailed financial records, travel insurance certificate, letter of invitation, letter of intent, and other documents required for a Schengen visa. I was successful, and ecstatic. Helsinki became my base to explore this new continent. Southeast Asia is my next stop.

So, today. I was returning to Finland from a one-day ferry excursion to St. Petersburg. The trip had been great. The immigration checkpoints, not so much. But I’m used to that. Immigration officials have an astounding lack of geographical knowledge, in my experience. Some have questioned whether a country called Trinidad and Tobago actually exists. An officer once pulled out his smart phone and googled it to make sure. They all finger my passport endlessly, looking for some sign of my assumed up-to-no-goodness.

And then there are the myriad personal questions that usually ensure I’m the last person in line to clear immigration. Still, the ache of muscles required for fake-smiling, while I feel my dignity being slowly eroded, is a small price to pay to sate my inconvenient need to walk the earth. These are all people following guidelines, having good and bad days, and doing their jobs. I understand.

Europe, however, and Finland in particular, has been a whole other level of unconcealed contempt. Every time I enter, I have to walk with a portfolio of documents and convince someone that I’m just a regular traveler and I have enough money to support myself and I don’t engage in sex work and I won’t try to live here illegally. My friends who possess more fortunate nationalities breeze through and wait for me at customs. I have become used to this too. I chose this.

What happened today I cannot get used to.

The immigration officer was taking longer than usual with my passport and then he called another officer to come and take a look at it. I was questioned in turn by both of them. Then I heard the awful words, “Please come this way.” I broke down and asked why. People stared. They took me into a back room and sent a woman out to deal with me. I asked if I could make a phone call to let someone know I was being detained. She refused. I couldn’t stop sobbing. “Cut the bullshit,” she said. I wasn’t told why I was being detained. She just kept asking me vague questions about my life. Made me write down information about my partner. My hands were shaking. The more I asked about why they were doing this, the louder she became. When I asked again if I could make a phone call, she responded, “Look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. Which do you want?”

That’s when I knew that I was helpless. I stopped asking questions and did everything she asked. I stopped crying and stared at the floor. I went into survival mode. I heard her in another room mocking my voice. I heard the others laughing. She took my credit card away for inspection, along with my passport. Her face had the look of someone who desperately wanted to spit.

When she finally let me out of the room, I didn’t look at her. I wanted to ask for her name but I was scared about what that would cause her to do me. I chose freedom instead. Twenty minutes had passed but it seemed like much longer. I wished that I could make her feel what it is like to be so powerless. Perhaps, though, she already knew this feeling in some way, and was exorcising it by inflicting the same on others. But this is speculation, I know. When I tried to walk out of the ferry terminal (like everyone else was doing) and got detained yet again by customs, and had my passport seized, I was already too numb to feel anything and answered their questions mechanically. They let me go eventually.

My partner was livid when I told him and immediately went to work making phone calls. He felt the ire of someone who has no expectation of being treated this way, not in a country as progressive as his. As it turns out, this is standard procedure because I’m from a third world country. This is what they said. He and I must walk around on this planet with different expectations. He asked if it was standard for them to take someone who had all their papers in order into a back room, to break them down to tears. They said it happens. And that was that. There is nothing that can be done and it will probably happen again.

Yes, I come from a country where some people are cut off from basic resources in a way unheard of in Finland. I also come from a country where some people enjoy a quality of life and deep happiness that many Finns will never be able to attain. Some of us resign ourselves to the rat race because nothing outside of that seems safe. And some of us go after our dreams, perhaps even if those dreams lie beyond the tiny patch of earth where we happened to be born.

Finns visit countries like mine all the time, soak up the sun that is so scarce back home, enjoy the intoxication of a spending power they’ve never known before. That is the natural order of things. When people like me journey to more developed shores, purely for pleasure, there is something inherently suspicious about that. This is how the world is.

My friend said to me, in the aftermath of this, “We are never victims, no matter what the circumstances.” She is right. That is not my role. I am fortunate enough to be living my purpose and, perhaps all the more because of where I’ve come from, I am grateful for my mobility every single day. I must keep moving. Those who heed the nomadic calling understand this.

I write this, not for sympathy, but to increase understanding. I also write it for those who are like me — those from places that are looked down on by the developed world. I’ve met so many of you. You take it for granted that it is as much your right to wander this world as anyone else, in spite of the extra paperwork. And it is. Just know that some places will treat you like less of a human being and give you extra hoops to jump through. That is their standard procedure. I am asking you to weigh the benefits against the risks when deciding where you will gift with your presence. Because the world is big.