All because of a shoelace.

Back in Australia, a box of winter clothes sat waiting to be posted to us here in Argentina.  After the problems Talluah had with three text books for university, we wondered what sort of issues our new looking winter coats and boots would cause at customs.  We looked at having the package sent to Paraguay and then driven across the border by a friend of a friend.  Eventually the answer came in the form of our niece who was coming to South America for a holiday and claimed to travel light.  Once asked, she said she wouldn't mind carting our 10 kilograms worth of luggage to Chile where I would meet her and retrieve our clothes.  The days continue to cool and we eagerly waited for our niece to arrive in Chile with our boots and jackets.  We decided that it would be easier, quicker and possibly the same price for me to fly to Chile, pick up our winter clothes and return to Argentina than have our new looking items pass through customs and possibly held up and taxed heavily.

The adventure started at 4:00 in the morning when I was picked up by a remis driver to take me to the airport for my flight.  A remis is like a taxi service but you hire a driver in his private car.  Buenos Aires is four hours away by car (longer by bus).  I think my driver went to bed at his usual Argentine time because several times he decided to use all of the road and even the shoulder.  He did offer for me to have a sleep in the back but I didn’t think it right if we both fell asleep.

After 24 hours in Chile, I returned to the airport with our bootlegged boots, jackets and merken spice – our favourite Chilean spice.  While on the aeroplane I received a customs declaration form that was in English and Spanish.  I was a little perplexed about the rules of what I could bring into the country.  There was a lot of emphasis on items that had been recently purchased and all our jackets and boots look brand new, some even possibly had tags still on them.   The form said that clothes are exempt but new items can be taxed up to 50% the value of the item.  These clothes obviously weren’t my size and I was worried it would look like I’d bought them all in Chile.  I rehearsed my story about having to leave them in Australia and my niece brought them over blah, blah, blah.

At the Buenos Aires airport, there is a machine with a button on it.  Passengers have to press the button.  If the light turns red you go to the line to have your bags searched.  If the light turns green you are free to go on your merry way.  The man in front of me stopped to tie his shoelace and let me go first.  Would this change history forever?  Is fate written in stone?  Did the shoelace really exist or was it a manifestation of my insecurities as a child?  I pressed the button and the light went green.  I walked out of the airport feeling rather relieved.

We later found out that customs is more interested in items that are being brought into the country with an obvious commercial purpose such as new electronic equipment.