border visit, 19 January 2020

Sunday, January 19th 2020. Afternoon at Roxham Road, USA.

A cold day at the border.  We waited for about 20 minutes before the first taxi arrived. 
It contained a young man  in his early twenties from Angola who spoke fluent English.  He was 
not dressed for the cold and happily accepted mits, hat and scarf from us.

About 15 minutes later a young family from Columbia arrived: mother and father in their late 20's with a small child aged about 3 years old. They only spoke Spanish and there was an RCMP officer was able to communicate with them in Spanish.

Shortly after they crossed a taxi brought a very nervous man in his early 40's. He did not want to speak with us or look at us and crossed over.

Finally at about 4.20 pm a taxi brought two women who were not together but had shared the taxi. One women was a French speaker from the Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) who had a small child aged about three. The other woman spoke English but we didn't find out where she was from.  They were both glad to accept some warm things. Both  women had quite a bit of luggage and the RCMP officer helped them with it.

Today the RCMP officer was very courteous and kept to the protocol.