Passport to Gaol

It was during my last month at my gig in Germany that I got an urgent mail from my brother saying that my father wanted to talk to me on an important issue.
A bit puzzled, I called India after work, from the office phone (the money for phone calls was deducted from my salary by the shrewd German overseer).
The first thing my father wanted to know was whether I had applied for my passport twice. I was bewildered. No, I replied. My father went on to inform me that the local police had come a-visting twice to my home in Kerala wanting to know whether I had committed the crime of applying twice for a passport.
I didn't take the matter too seriously at that moment. I was convinced it was a routine blunder by the police which they are so bound to make. I told my father I was sure this was some bureaucratic blunder and would sort itself out.
When I returned home to India, the police came visiting again. I was not at home. They informed my father that I had applied for a passport twice and they wanted to investigate. My father called me on my mobile and I talked to the police person who quizzed me on my passport number and other details. With a straight face I told him all I could. Then, a bit annoyed, I retorted, saying they were the people who had my passport details on their records and that I found it strange them asking me about it.
The policeperson was not impressed.
A few weeks later I got a letter from the regional passport office saying that they would have to confiscate my existing passport since I had committed the crime of applying for a passport twice. I made two trips all the way to the passport office at the State headquarters and met the passport officer in charge who said that the police had reported that two attempts were made to secure passports and the law would follow course. I even showed him a copy of the application letter that I had written out for the passport and tried to make him understand that I had no interest and no valid reason for filling out a second application. All this fell on deaf ears.
The next time the police came a hunting (again I was out) my Dad shelled out a couple of hundred rupees. The policeman realising that nothing more could be gained from this venerable looking gentleman quietly took the money and left.
There ended the mystery of the double passport applications.
The strange tale did not end there.
While waiting for my train home at Kochi railway station I found myself sitting next to a middle aged man. He was just on his way back from the regional passport office at Kochi. And he had a tale to tell similar to mine. He had been in the middle east for a good many years and when his passport was about to expire, applied for a fresh one. But he was now charged with illegally applying for a passport twice. And he faced the same punishment - confiscation of his passport.
But he said with determination - "I am ready to go to court on this matter, but I shall not bribe a policeman to get things sorted out." Brave words from an Indian, in a land where court cases are prolonged to no end and are a waste of both time energy and will power.
what other ways would these goons come up with, I wondered, to make a few extra bucks?

Chills at Frankfurt Airport

I have been reading several hilarious incidents at the airport by Mac and one by 3inOne. Well I too have a tale - one that happened on my visit to Germany a few years back.
I was working for a fully German owned firm and I had to be onsite for a couple of months as part of the job.
This incident happened on my return trip back to India.
My German boss had an intuitive dislike for Indian office products and he wanted his newly started office at Kochi to have the latest German stuff, right to a German-make stapler.
The night before I was supposed to leave Germany, I was awake late. After I had cooked supper, washed the dishes, had a bath and did a hectic quick luggage packing before I fell into bed like a log after putting the alarm for an early morning rise.
Next morning I overslept and when I woke I found I was just in time to board my commute to the railway station from where I would proceed onwards to Frankfurt to board my flight to India.
My boss had earlier mentioned to me that he wanted to add some stuff for his office in my luggage.
My check-in baggage was already fully packed, so there was only some space in my carry-on baggage where he could put stuff in. I didn't have a chance to notice what all he stuffed into the remaining space as I was busy with my last minute travel check list. I knew he was putting a dismantled CPU of a computer, because he had mentioned that earlier. All this he was packing into my carry-on baggage which I was supposed to carry onto the aircraft, the check-in baggage having to go into the freight section, to which I would have no access during my journey.
I arrived at Frankfurt airport in good time ( The train terminates just below the airport complex).
At the airport I had my luggage checked in and awaited the frisk of my carry-on baggage by the airport security. The guy who checked my luggage was a tall slim blond haired guy - a stereotype German.
As he passed my rucksack through the X ray machine, I thought I was finally done.
But staring at the screen he called me aside, and conspirationally asked me whether I had a pair of scissors in my luggage. I said I had: a small pair of surgical scissors that I used to trim my moustace. But he said it was something big, gesturing with his hand- did I have anything like that? I was nonplussed. Then he showed me an image of a huge pair of scissors that was silhouetted in blue on the X ray screen. He handed my rucksack over and asked me to open it. Nervously I opened it and put my hands into only to come up with a huge pair of scissors.
It came to me in a flash. This was one of the German stuff my boss wanted for his German office. There was sticking tape, a stapler and some other office riff-raff. But the scissors posed the immediate threat and I would be hard put to explain its presence. And the times were not too auspicious for this to happen too, it was not long before that 9/11 had happened and the security was as tight as ever at most of the airports I had passed through, particularly Qatar airport, on my transit.
Breaking my reverie, the security guy asked me if I would be returning to Germany again. I said no, which was the truth. But he seemed unhappy with the answer and repeated the question. Putting two and two together I got the point he was trying to make. "Yes", I said. "I will be returning soon. Or someone else from my company will for sure", which was not untrue.
Satisfied with my answer, the security person took the offending object wrapped it in a brown envelope noted my name on it and placed it on a rack. He then handed me a receipt and told me I could collect the item on my return back to Germany, but it was surely not allowed on the aircraft. That was indeed very diplomatic of the security officer. Thanking my stars for this not too sad ending, I boarded the plane with a light heart. A mallu hijack indeed!
You can read more of my German adventures here.