• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team
  • HI folks the server that hosts the site completely died including the Hdd's and backups.
    Luckily i create an offsite backup once a week! this has now been restored so we have lost a few days posts.
    im still fixing things at the moment so bear with me and im still working on all images 90% are fine the others im working on now
    we are now using a backup solution

Census 2021

Keiron,

That's a bit like the airlines going to States with the forms you had to fill in an hour or so before your landed. "Are you or have you ever been a member of a terrorist organisation?". I wonder how many Yes answers they got to that? :)

Maurice :cool:
 
The census was a lot easier to fill in for us retired people, no questions about jobs etc.

After all the fuss about it I thought it may have asked where you were born , how many children you had given birth to etc.
so that it could be used in future the way the oldest census were.
I liked the answer about nationality, although we may be British on most forms I think that many of us who are proud of our heritage prefer to say, English,Scottish, Welsh or N. Irish.

Mikejee, Maurice, we went to USA from Canada at the Windsor crossing in the 90s, we had to go into a room and answer questions, our son was 20 and when they asked if he was or had been a member of the Communist party he thought it amusing and smiled , the look he was given by the armed official was scary.the return journey was quite different we showed our British passport and were told 'have a nice day'.
Alberta
 
When I went to New York in 1981 we were asked a few questions, but what stayed in my memory was how the officer was looking so intently at me. When chatting to the tour guide she told us that they were trained to look at facial expressions.

So maybe questions are asked to observe the response.
 
Alberta,

After a couple of years of regularly going to and fro between the UK and Pennsylvania. I quickly learned not smile or crack jokes as the people working for Immigration have absolutely no sense of humour. I also found that it was best to answer yes or no whenever you could. Including information that was not strictly necessary merely caused further questions in an effort to "trip you up" or divulge something that you had not intended to divulge.

Incidentally, my PA friend said that their lack of humour was partly due to their poor salary structure. But, of course, they are meant to be intimidating - its par for the course!

Maurice :cool:
 
Pedrocut said:
what stayed in my memory was how the officer was looking so intently at me.
Click to expand...

When I was in the military and crossed the Iron Curtain, my passport and documents were taken [almost certainly photocopied for the Stasi] which took a while. Then the military guard would salute me, to which I had to return a salute as a sort of mutual respect. It was all very John le Carré-ish. Living the Cold War dream eh?
 
I think the US Immigration form used to ask whether you had ever been convicted of an act of moral turpitude? Definition of this is "an act or behaviour that gravely violates the sentiment or accepted standard of the community". Always told that you had to put United Kingdom as country of residence. Back to the queue if you put England or Great Britain.
Regarding the census form, my wife has to specify Isle of Man as place of birth as this is in the British Isles but not the United Kingdom. It is a British Crown Dependency. A similar definition applies to Jersey and Guernsey.
 
I live alone so it was a 5 minute task for me to complete the census.
I've had problems with both superpowers ... USA and USSR when I travelled for work.
oldMohawk said:
My 1970s visit to the USSR during the Cold War .... to the other side of the Iron Curtain !
At Birmingham Airport the passport staff gave us some funny looks when they saw our Aeroflot tickets and Russian visas. At London Heathrow we noticed a man in a grey suit seemed to be shadowing us as we wandered around looking for the Aeroflot check-in desk, no one seemed to know where it was. Eventually the man approached us and pointed to another airline's desk and said check in there for Aeroflot. We boarded a Soviet Ilyushin 62 (copy of a British VC10) and a grim faced lady flight attendant glared at us and told us where to sit. We left Heathrow flying across East Anglia (over the US air bases) heading out across the North Sea and Baltic towards Moscow.

At passport control I apparently gave the wrong answer to the border official which annoyed him so much he forgot to stamp my visa. I soon discovered that without the stamp I could not obtain russian currency or travel inside Russia and needed help from the British Embassy. They were surprised that I had got into the USSR without the stamp and said I would not be able to leave without it. I was rather worried by now and they sent me to a russian man who worked in the embassy. He looked at my visa shaking his head but then typed a letter in russian. I looked on as he lit a candle and melted a large blob of red wax on to the letter, stamped it with a seal, put it in an official brown envelope and told me to take it to the Airport, find a high ranking officer and show it to him. At the airport, I looked for an officer with the most gold braid on his hat and uniform and showed him the letter, but he angrily waved me away shouting 'niet'. I stood wondering whether I was in a James Bond film when a young chap sitting at a desk called me in english and looked at the letter and my passport. He then opened a drawer to search amongst the largest collection of rubber stamps I had ever seen, chose one and stamped my visa. He then smiled and told me to leave the airport as soon as possible. Off I went and the next day travelled 800 miles eastward into Russia but that's another story !

Returning home we flew British Airways and when the Captain announced we had crossed the russian border everyone clapped and cheered. The steward said we all looked in need of large doses of champagne and the flight turned into a merry party.
Click to expand...
the follow-up of the above journey in the 'Cold War' thread

Visit to USA late 1980s
In Detroit on Memorial Day it was quiet so I got on a bus going to Windsor via the tunnel. No problem entering Canada and had a few beers as I sat looking over at the Detroit skyline. Took the bus back to the USA but their border control said my visa was only valid for direct entry from the UK. They added that I should go back to the UK via Canada and re-enter the USA.

Eventually sorted by a senior official who when I mentioned the company I was visiting said he had a daughter working there and after a chat let me back into the USA.
 
Our Census forms still haven't arrived. Tried to phone again this morning, the line was terrible and kept cutting out. The lady confirmed that the call was logged and we wouldn't get into trouble!!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top