The Lugano Experience

For those of you in the know, you are aware that my Mother-in-law is staying with me for the month (she leaves back to Russia on the 25th of November).  For those of you not in the know, now you are part of that elite group called, “the know.”  Welcome aboard.

I had expected that having another Russian woman living in my house for a month might be cause for any number of comical sketches, rants and other wanderings of my grey matter.  Unfortunately, gentle reader, it has not proven the case and has been a rather uneventful visit considering that I have had two Klingons living with me.   With of course, a couple of interesting exceptions…

Klingons?  Yes, Russians are Klingons.  I don’t mean this in any kind of disrespectful way, but if you know a Russian and you know a Klingon, they are probably one-in-the-same.  And I am not talking about the kinder, gentler Klingon called Worf.  I mean the original-Star-Trek-take-no-prisoners-I-am-eating-your-face-while-you-watch kind of Klingon. 

Now I say this in all loving and kindness… It is a cultural thing.  For you trekkies out there, you know that the Klingon language is filled with violent outbursts that sound like the speaker wants the consonants to split through the air and rupture your eye like a firecracker filled grape.  Russian, I think, is the same language.  Some of the smaller words in the Russian language have 32 syllables each starting with the letter K.  And this is merely to ask, “Pass the salt, PLEASE.” 

In addition to all of these hard consonants, Russians speak with vigor and verve (this is a nice way to say that they sound really, really pissed off).  Again, this is merely my observation of Russian communication.   It is probably a hold over from such a cold climate - their teeth were clanging so hard together due to the frigid Moscow winter they had to shout to make their jaws work.  So, Mama and Lena have been talking and shouting and gesticulating and while it has been interesting, it has luckily remained uneventful and without bloodshed (I have hidden the knives, just in case though).

How the hell did I get on the subject of Klingons… I really am a nerd.

Anyway…

What I really wanted to write about was one stand out experience - going to Milan with Mom-in-law.

Now, since Mama is Klingon, it pretty much means that she needs a Visa to get, well, anywhere.  Those of us that have a U.S. passport (or Canada or EU or about 20 or so other countries) pretty much have immunity of the visa thing to travel around.  You just show up, show your passport, say the magic word “tourist dollars” (two words, but who’s counting), and you are in.

For Klingons, it is very, very different.  You need a Visa to go anywhere.  And, in order to get a Visa, you have to either: A, Be in the mafia or; B, Be in the mafia.  Since my mother-in-law is decidedly not in the Mafia, we had to go route C which is to fill out about 57 forms, sign 32 waivers and go to the embassy and grovel. 

Now it turned out to be a mildly bureaucratic nightmare, but much easier than the U.S., so we were satisfied (especially since the end result was in our favor).  The downside is that the Visa we got her was for Switzerland only.  If we wanted the all-in-one-pass for Europe, we had to choose option A or B above (not possible for Mama to join the Russian Mob - she is way too nice) and pay a fee of 500 Euro (and that is actually not an exaggeration).

Ok, so all of that to say that she does not have a visa to go anywhere but Switzerland.

“But Sven, uh, isn’t Milan in uh, Italy?  How did you get there?”

By train, of course. 

We took a gamble that they would either not stop our train to check at the border,  or if they did, they would see Lena and my US passports lying lazily on the tray in front of us and just pass us by.

“Really Sven?”  “I mean, seriously, that was your plan?  To just ‘blend in’?  Really?”

Well, it was so crazy, it seemed like it might work…

And, as you may have guessed, we got stopped at the border.  Mama is sweating bullets and we are all trying to put off that “casual” aura.  You know the one.  It’s that aura that your dog puts off when you come home from work and open the door to find trash strewn over all of the house, the Christmas tree on its side with every present torn to shreds.  The new couch has one arm chewed off, and the cat is wide-eyed and dangling, spread-eagled from the curtains.  And Fido is laying in the center of the room and lazily looks up  at you and says (with his eyes) “Hey, what’s up?  How was work?  You have a good day?  Ours… well, ours was pretty boring…”

Yea, it didn’t work for us, either.

So, the nice man in the Italian Gestapo uniform (their uniforms really are fascist looking) stopped and says “Passports.”

Here we go.  They don’t throw people in prison for trying to get across the border do they? Mama turns eight shades of green.  I am frantically trying to get my eye to STOP twitching.  And we are all looking casual.

I hand the man the passport and he quickly looks through the two U.S. and gets to the Klingon…  Mama might as well have been wearing a red shirt - cause this landing party was about to get one person smaller.    Pause.  He leafs through the passport.  Pause.  Leafs through again and mutters.

I am now checking the exits.  We are completely blocked off… There are four border-patrol-gestapo-fascist-looking Italians crowding the train car.  Who had this idea?  Did I think this would work?  What the hell was I thinking… I wonder if Italian jails have big cell mates named Bubba.

“Uh, are you all together?”

Split second decision time. 

No - no getting out of this and staying married in the process… And I do like being married (specifically to Lena - my own personal Klingon).  Suck it up Sven - prison can’t be that bad.  You’ve seen Midnight Express - he escaped… Eventually.

I explain that we are together and that we are going to Milan.  I smile.  He smiles back.  Ok, now I am really, really off guard.  He is being really nice and explains that Mama needs a visa and that she only has one for Switzerland.  Then he asks to see our tickets.  He asks if this is a day trip and we tell him yes, and we tell him we live in Lugano.  After some calculation he decides that we are not going to sell Mama on the open Klingon market in Milan and…

HE LETS US GO…

Err, sputter, hrk … Huh?  I mean, WHAT?!?  There is no “please follow me?”  No, small white-hot spotlight interrogation room, torture, water boarding or cavity searches?  No “Where were you on the night of December 7th 1972?”   A civil servant that thinks for himself and uses discretion? 

I am completely impressed (and dumbfounded) and thoroughly sure that we would have had a MUCH different experience at a U.S. border crossing…  Sigh.

The train ride continued without any further incident (there were a couple of ritual high-fives and “I told you this would works”).  We were pretty much quiet for the rest of the trip - each of us wondering when Gestapo Garibaldi was going to show up with a change of heart…  I am glad to say that he did not.

And, no sooner had we walked into the Subway than we were being hussled by a Milanese con artist!

But that, dear reader, is another story…

Coming Soon:  Sven gets hussled in the Milan Metro…