ITP - 028: Border Crossings, Visa Chaos, and Survival Travel Stories

Greg: Welcome to the International Teacher Podcast with your hosts, Greg the single guy and Matt the family guy. We're recording episodes from around the globe to tell you about the best-kept secret in education. That's right—it's teaching overseas. We're glad to have you.

Matt: Ladies and gentlemen, friends and family, international teachers and non-international teachers, or anybody who's just out on a road trip and needs something to listen to—welcome to the International Teacher Podcast. As always, my name is Matt. I'm the family guy.

Greg: And I'm Greg, the single guy. And you know what, Matt? We lost Kent this time, so we don't have him with us. Kent, you're missed, but we know you'll be joining us real soon. I think Kent had his weekly pedicure, manicure, flute lesson, and then the manager—

Matt: Okay, that's what it was.

Greg: Yeah, and not that we're knocking that because we would be right there with you, buddy.

Greg: We need to apologize to our audience. We're a week late on this one. I don't know if the audience really knows this, but every two weeks is our goal. We want to put a podcast out every two weeks, and we've been doing this for over a year now. But we need to apologize—life just took over. I went to the States.

Matt: That's right. What did you do in los Estados Unidos, Greg? I love when you speak Spanish.

Greg: For those of you who don't know, I went to the great old state of Wisconsin. I went to Milwaukee for a wedding. It was a little annoying wedding, but it was great—really good to see family. I don't go back very often, but I usually go back once a year now because my parents are getting a little older. But yeah, I was busy from point A to point B. I didn't stop. I didn't see many friends. I saw a couple for a little bit of time, but it was all family. It's one of those trips where it's just family.

Matt: I had one of those trips in October for my brother's wedding. I know what those are like. So when you routed through, did you go through Amsterdam? Did you go through Doha? Dubai? Where did you route through?

Greg: I usually fly to Dubai and then take a Dubai trip straight into Chicago. It's a 14-hour flight, but I don't want to deal with the airports. I don't want to deal with different flights and missing connections and all the rigmarole that's still left over from COVID. I had to get a COVID test just to get into the States. I know we don't talk about COVID that much anymore, but I had to get a test just to get in.

Matt: That's wild. Around the world, I don't think you need one in China anymore, but you need one to get into the States?

Greg: Apparently. I can't believe it because in the States it feels like there isn't even COVID anymore. But I had to have a test to get there, and it had nothing to do with where I was leaving from—it had to do with where I was landing. That's the U.S. Everybody else traveling around for a little break didn't have to deal with that.

Matt: Yeah, we haven't. Wherever we've gone in the Middle East—we've been through Bahrain, Dubai, even the Maldives—we didn't need any PCR tests. Regardless of whether we were sick or not, it's just strange. Does the U.S. lock their borders to U.S. citizens? That just makes absolutely no sense. Joe Biden, if you're listening, can you chime in and help us out on that one? Because I'm a bit clueless about it.

Greg: As I am with most things. I know more about the world than I know about our own country. I don't watch the news either, but I guess we aren't missing much.

Matt: I guess not.

Greg: So here we go. We missed an episode and we're about a week late.

Matt: Yep, we did. Some people understand.

Greg: Next week I'm going to put an episode out. I'm looking forward to it because I've done two interviews. I have a library of interviews sitting aside in case Matt and I can't meet. If I'm not too busy, I can post those interviews that I usually do with teachers from other countries. I've got two that I really look forward to sharing, especially because recruiting season is still happening. People are still looking for schools and wondering how to do this.

Greg: I had a great conversation with an old friend named Roberto. He's a director at a school in Thailand—the Eastern Seaboard School. We had a full-on discussion about recruiting questions, interviews, and what to look for. The second one I'm really excited about is with a first-year teacher in Turkey named Rose. That was a lot of fun. So our listeners can look forward to a couple of new ones coming up besides just listening to you and me banter.

Matt: Which is always fun and entertaining, right Greg?

Greg: It sure is. I also want to give a little background here. Matt, how many countries do you think we have listeners in around the world?

Matt: Oh man. Let’s round it off to 200 countries total. I’m going to go with somewhere near 100.

Greg: You’re really close—we’re at 90 countries.

Matt: Well, 90—that’s pretty good for one year.

Greg: Yeah, I want to thank those listeners. I went through that list and saw places like Senegal and Iran. Someone’s listening in Iran—whoever it is, thank you. We’re big in Iran. It’s not my mom.

Matt: It could be my mom.

Greg: Gabon in Africa—I had to look it up on the map. I thought I knew a lot about the world, but here are three that threw me for a loop. Have you heard of Eswatini?

Matt: Sounds like Africa somewhere.

Greg: You’re right. It’s in South Africa—kind of inside it. The other one is Timor-Leste.

Matt: Southeast Asia?

Greg: Yep, just east of Indonesia. Good job. Here’s the last one—Guernsey.

Matt: That sounds like UK territory.

Greg: You’re right. It’s an island off France. Apparently it has one of the highest population densities in the world. If you’re that person listening from there, we’ll come record a live show.

Matt: Let’s do it.

Greg: These people are out there listening to us, and we owe it to them to put out a good show.

Matt: Yeah, absolutely. If you’re from those areas or anywhere else and you’ve been listening—thanks. Two guys who don’t have a lot to say, and you’re still listening. That’s a huge thank you from us.

Greg: We have 6,000 downloads now. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s something.

Matt: That’s crazy. 6,000 people have heard us.

Greg: I think 5,999 are my mom. Do you think my mom is using a VPN and just hitting different countries?

Matt: Dave, get upstairs. Record more episodes—we’re at 5,994.

Greg: Hi Dave, if you’re listening.

Matt: So what do you feel like chatting about today, Greg?

Greg: We kicked around a lot of topics. We could talk airports since we both traveled recently, but I thought border crossings would be fun. I went back and thought about a couple of my border crossings. I can give you Central America or Venezuela.

Matt: Anything you want. Venezuela sounds like an escape story.

Greg: Due to political situations between the Chavez government and the U.S. government, it was incredibly difficult to obtain a legal working visa. So we were brought into the school on tourist visas. Those visas would expire every 90 days because the school spent huge amounts trying to obtain legal ones. Basically, every 90 days they would give us money and say, “You have to leave the country for at least 48 hours.”

Greg: So for four years, my scuba diving trips were basically paid for because we had to leave the country regularly. The only trouble was the heat turned up a bit when going through the airport—especially Maiquetía. They’d ask, “What are you doing here?” and you’d say, “Working with students,” and they’d stamp your passport. It felt wrong, like we were sneaking around, even though it was the school handling everything.

Matt: Yeah, that feeling of being questioned—like, “Am I allowed to be here?”

Greg: Exactly. One of the things that helped was that every 90 days, you were ready to leave anyway. It was an intense place to live. We had a good life, but it could be intense. That break helped reset things.

Matt: Early on, I loved staying local and exploring, but now I prefer jumping on a plane and getting out.

Greg: It went back and forth. Sometimes you just needed to get out, reset, and come back. Back then, there was no easy way out. It could take a full day just to leave Venezuela. One thing I’ve found with travel is that people often overlook visa requirements. Even now, people forget you still need to check entry requirements carefully.

Matt: Absolutely. You have to be a professional at this—making sure visas, entry forms, apps, everything is ready. When we went to the Maldives, we had to upload all traveler information into an app. Some friends didn’t know and almost missed their flight trying to fill it out at the airport. You have to research everything—passport validity, number of pages, visa type, duration.

Greg: I went to Thailand once and had to do a visa run halfway through. That meant traveling all day just to get a stamp and come back.

Matt: And people who don’t travel don’t think about that.

Greg: Exactly. And having a U.S. passport helps a lot.

Matt: Biggest advice—do your research.

Greg: And over-prepare. Bureaucratic systems love telling you that you’re missing something. I carry paper copies of everything—multiple copies—and digital backups too. You never know when you won’t have service.

Matt: Especially with kids. You don’t want to be stuck at a counter while everything falls apart.

Greg: One of the things that’s funny too is when you don’t have the right form or you don’t have the right paper, or even when you over-anticipate everything, there’s nothing people that are working ticket booths or government offices—any sort of bureaucratic situation—there is nothing they love more than to tell you, you don’t have the right things or the right forms or the right information.

Greg: And they’re never open. It’s worse than the DMV. It’s like every day is a celebration and they only work between 3:05 and 3:06 that afternoon if you’re lucky.

Greg: And so when you’ve done it enough, and when you’ve traveled enough, they’ll say, “Oh well, you need this,” and you’re like, “Ha ha, got it,” and you lay it down. And they’re like, “Oh no, you need this.” “Ha ha, got it.” “Oh no, you need this.” “Here’s this.”

Greg: I travel with digital so I can use my phone for some tickets and stuff, but I tell you what—everything, even going to the States, I still had a paper copy of every one reservation, a copy of every—whether it was a medical form or a visa form—everything that I need when I travel to a country, I put it on paper, carry it with me in multiple copies, like three copies. I put one in my suitcase, one in my book bag, one in my other thing—the carry-on—and then in my book bag and in the suitcase, I split them up with different copies.

Greg: And I’m like, here you want a copy of my visa? Here’s a copy of my visa. I’m not wasting my time on my phone because you never know if you’re going to have wireless or coverage because it goes in and out at some airports. It’s not existent in somewhere else.

Greg: I always try to snapshot everything on my phone too, so I’ve got it on paper, and I’ve got it digital, and I’ve also got the phone evidence of it as well.

Matt: As professional travelers, Matt—you know, that’s just what has to happen because you’re going to walk up there, you’ve got four boys and your wife standing in line with you, and they’re probably going to be all over the place. You spend too much time at that ticket office—you are hyper-organized before you leave on a trip.

Matt: And part of it too is if the people working the counter are holding up the line, my parental leeway also lessens at that point. And so you can gain—those of you with kids—there’s a certain amount of leverage you can gain, especially when you have four boys who love to wrestle, especially on suitcase conveyor belts and stuff like that.

Matt: You’d be amazed at how quickly they’ll get you through the line. So there’s—I will admit—there’s been a couple of occasions I’ve been like, “Okay guys, you’re up, you’re up, your turn,” because Daddy, what Daddy did didn’t work. So let’s have you start climbing on stuff and banging on plexiglass, and they’re like, “Okay, let’s get these kids out of here.”

Matt: We were—you know what’s funny? Once I was traveling back to the States with the three oldest, and this is when the twins were four and our oldest was six, and we were passing through Paris, France, and we got stopped by a couple of heavily armed French dudes—like big M16s, big serious-looking soldiers.

Matt: They were just clearly—I was smuggling something along with my three sons or smuggling three sons or whatever—and they were going through all my stuff. They had it all over the place.

Matt: And finally the twins start climbing on their desk, kicking their chair over, and the guys just bust out laughing. They just can’t contain themselves. These two ding-dong twins are playing all over their stuff.

Matt: And finally they’re like, “Forget it. Here, just have a good day. Get out of here. We’re sorry we bugged you.” I’m like, “Thanks guys,” and I’m trying to throw everything hurriedly back in there.

Greg: So some countries, they really give it to you with customs, right, where you’re entering the country or leaving the country. I remember to this day, I remember landing in Cambodia, and I had a sprinkler. It was a five-dollar, put-it-in-the-ground, like a little dagger—you put it in the ground sprinkler that a buddy of mine needed for his garden.

Greg: And the woman—the Cambodian woman at customs—she takes it out, they stop everything, they put me in a small room, they go through everything that I have, and the sprinkler just got smacked down. She’s like, “What is this?” in very broken English.

Greg: And here I am pantomiming—I’m doing the sprinkler dance, like you do on the dance floor—I’m like, “Yeah…” and that doesn’t exist there. They just have a guy with a hose with nothing on the end of the hose.

Greg: It’s like cut with a pair of scissors and he puts his thumb in it, you know, that’s somebody’s job. So who in their right mind would bring a sprinkler?

Greg: I literally—which by the way would cost you 50 bucks there—it cost me a lot of time. She had to call her manager in, they had a discussion about this plastic thing. I have no idea what was going through their mind because I don’t speak Khmer.

Greg: I mean I’d been living there for a year, so I was sort of ready for this. When you bring things in, you have to have a good sense of humor, and you have to be very serious with everything. But boy, oh boy, that was just one.

Greg: The time I brought the Diaper Genie—do you know what a Diaper Genie is, Matt? With four kids?

Matt: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

Greg: So I brought one of those for a friend of mine. Ron had a brand-new baby, so I brought them a Diaper Genie down to Honduras. What do you think happened at customs with that one?

Greg: Try and explain and pantomime Diaper Genie to somebody. That was another hour, hour and a half sitting there. I could have been having a beer or out instead, but no, I’m sitting at customs because I chose to bring this gift in.

Greg: There are some things you just don’t have in developing countries.

Greg: So yeah, customs is always fun. What would you say is a huge piece of advice for people who are going to be traveling around, regardless of border crossings or leaving countries?

Matt: Well, you know how I’m a technology guy, right? I think my biggest piece of advice is if you’re going to a country, or if you’re bringing stuff back into a country, take everything out of the box. Take all of the price tags off. Take all packaging off.

Greg: Yes. Yes. Yes.

Matt: Make it look used. Because if it looks used, they won’t try and tax you on it. If it looks new, they will make something up and charge you.

Greg: Bar none. Every country I’ve lived in—everything comes out of packaging. Everything is put separately in suitcases. That’s one of my number one border-crossing pieces of advice.

Matt: Yeah, and don’t get caught in a country with an expired visa because you can’t leave without paying a heavy fine. You’ll be detained until you pay.

Greg: All right, let’s take a moment break for a little contact information.

Matt: If you want to reach out, you can find us at [internationalteacherpodcast@gmail.com](mailto:internationalteacherpodcast@gmail.com). Remember, complaints can be addressed to Greg, the single guy. And we are also on Instagram at ITPexpats.

Greg: I’ve got a story from Venezuela and I’ve got a story from Honduras for you. Which one do you want to start with?

Matt: Let’s start with the Venezuela one.

Greg: So I was with Scott and Tara, good friends from Venezuela. We decided to go on a trip, and they wanted to bring their four-month-old, Elsie, with us. Scott needed three more countries in South America to complete his list—Suriname, Guyana, and French Guiana—but French Guiana didn’t count because it’s still a French protectorate.

Greg: So we decided to go to Suriname and Guyana. If you go east from Venezuela, you hit Guyana, but you can’t cross directly because of the dispute over oil rights in the Orinoco Delta. So we had to go another way.

Greg: We drove to the very tip of Venezuela. I mean, you couldn’t step one more step or you’d be in the ocean. There was no dock, nothing. We got there on time, had our tickets, and there was nobody there. We waited five hours for the ferry to show up.

Greg: Then it started raining. The National Guard let Tara and the baby sit under an awning while we stood outside. There wasn’t even a beer around.

Greg: Eventually we get on this ferry, and it’s wonderful—people dancing salsa, music, we’re like, “We made it.” We get up to Trinidad and then eventually to Guyana.

Greg: Guyana is very underdeveloped, lots of mining companies. We spent Christmas there—very strange place.

Greg: Then we get to the border of Guyana and Suriname. There’s a river between them, so we take a small ferry across. We had all our paperwork ready.

Greg: I’ll never forget—Tara and Scott are changing the baby, and Scott puts his beer down, and some random guy comes up and starts drinking it. I’m like, what is happening?

Greg: We wait another couple of hours. Finally we get on the ferry, go across the river, and when we land, there’s a chain-link fence and one guy stamping passports.

Greg: As soon as the ferry touches land, about 200 people sprint to get in line.

Greg: We think we’ve got an advantage because of the baby. Someone pulls Tara to the front, but Scott and I get sent to the back. So she goes through, and we’re stuck behind 200 people in the rain.

Greg: We watch everyone go through, fill up the buses, and leave. By the time we get through, there’s nothing left. No buses. We’re in the middle of the jungle.

Greg: Eventually someone with a phone helps call a bus. We wait another two hours in the rain. The bus finally comes, and as we get on, the driver says we have to pay extra because there aren’t enough people.

Greg: We’re like, “You’ve got to be kidding me.” We already paid for everything. He stops the bus and tells us to get off.

Greg: And I lost it. I was like, “No way. I am not getting off this bus.” I was furious. Scott and I were both thinking the same thing—this is not safe.

Greg: When we finally get to the city, we make him drive to the owner’s house. The guy’s sweeping outside, and we argue for an hour. Finally he just says, “Fine, take them to the hotel.”

Greg: That was the worst border crossing I’ve ever had.

Greg: But we did get a hot shower that night. And Scott didn’t even want to pay for the hotel at first—he’s pretty frugal—but Tara and I were like, “No chance.”

Matt: I don’t have anything like that. I hope I never do.

Greg: I don’t wish that on anyone. That was a big challenge. Looking back, we’re like, why did we bring an infant on that trip?

Greg: Now when I travel, I want warm water and cold drinks. Otherwise I’m not going.

Greg: On that same trip, we stopped and saw a guy holding an anteater, and it was screaming. The driver told us he was waiting for the mother to come so he could catch both for food. That was just… yeah. That was that trip.

Greg: If you’re listening and you’ve got stories, hit us up on Instagram at ITPexpats or email us at [internationalteacherpodcast@gmail.com](mailto:internationalteacherpodcast@gmail.com).

Matt: We’d love to share them. And thanks to everyone listening in 90-plus countries. That’s incredible.

Greg: We’re in the thousands of downloads now, and we’re just getting started.

Matt: And now that I’m done with my master’s program and we’re heading into summer, we should be able to ramp up episodes.

Greg: All right, I’m signing off. Thanks for joining us.

Matt: This is Matt, the family guy, signing off.

Greg: And Greg, the single guy, signing off. Until next time, thanks for listening. Have a great one, everybody.