Border visit 10 April 2022

It was a relatively quiet day, all things considered. Around 4:00 pm the first taxi arrived with a young Haitian couple, soon to be new parents.  The sun was shining when they arrived so they declined our offer of hats and gloves. They seemed to be quite relaxed and crossed without any trouble.

Soon a second taxi pulled up with a young Honduran father, and his six year old son. It was only when the taxi driver opened the trunk to give him his luggage that he realized that he had taken the wrong suitcase from the bus when they got off in Plattsburgh. He was remarkably calm about it and his son was in a very cheery mood.  While we tried to figure out what we could do about the suitcase mix-up, the last group of the afternoon arrived. An Angolan couple and their three children also seemed very calm and crossed easily.  

After doing our best to reassure our new Honduran friend that we would do our best to try to locate his suitcase, he finally crossed empty-handed except for a hat for the boy and mittens for himself that they had accepted from us.

The RCMP were telling people that 'anything they said could be used against them'.  Prior to the Covid 19 border closure this had not been part of the RCMP protocol.  Officers did not say this last week so  it seems probable it is not.  Otherwise nothing in the RCMP behavior was problematic.  A total of 9 people crossed while we were there - 5 adults and 4 children.

Our trip across the border was very smooth both ways.

Update: On April 11th the Honduran man's bag was located and should be brought to him  by our contact in Montreal.