Getting into a Miami was interesting. Spirit airways has the smallest seats, and its a discount airline so you psy for your seat, your bags and pretty much anything they can charge you for. I guess that is the principle of a low cost airline but it does take some getting used to after the airlines in India. The 5 1/2 hour flight was only the beginning of the welcome to Miami!
We got in and queued up for our immigration. The non American citizens queue had about 100 people ahead of us while the American citizen queue probably had 4 times that many people queed up. Two hours later there were about 70 people ahead of us, while maybe 600 Americans had gone through their queue. Not surprising, given 7 agents were taking care of the Americans, while our queue had one! When asked, we were told that it was federal American policy to make sure the American citizens were taken care of first!
We were still ok, but a bunch of poeple ahead of us missed their connecting flights and they weren't even given an apology! WELCOME TO AMERICA! And they wonder why Americans are hated everywhere in the world! Its not the people, it is the govt and policy like this that makes them so popular! What pissed me off even more was the officer asking me how we were this morning,when we finally go to the counter? I asked him how he thought we were, given we were waiting in a fucking queue for 3 hours while American citizens breezed through!
Selfishness is ingrained in the American psyche...the country is built on that principle, so maybe I should not have been surprised, but to see it this obviously shocked me! Funny thing is most Americans I've met hate their govt, but somehow that doesn't change policy! Last time I enter through Miami even if it costs me more! Having vented, I think this is a Miami problem because the last few times I entered the US through NY and I haven't ever faced this kind of in your face discrimination. Also everyone we met enroute had warned us about this particular treatment in Miami.
Anyway, we put that behind us, got into our nice hotel, and hit the beach. Apparently, there is no public transport to the beach on sunday, or at least it is so infrequent that its not worth waiting for. So we shelled out $40 to take a cab ! The beach was nice, a bit of a fashion parade but its trying to be a latin american beach, so its forgivable! Fried calamari and buffalo wings were great, the poeple we met really nice, so all in all a fun time.
Since I cursed America, I must write a line about the Americans we met in Miami. We got chatting to some really nice middle aged bikers from Alabama. With them was Patricia, who worked at the hotel bar. In a bit we were ready to eat so we asked her where we could go. It was time for her to finish work so she actually took us in her car to a nice restaurant even though I don't think it was really in her way home. The staff at the hotel were super nice too! Once again, the American people save the country from its ridiculous policies!
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