If the wind changes direction, this man is in deep trouble. His mouth is so firmly down-turned that I wonder how he feeds himself.
He shoves out his hands, and I take two steps back. He stares at me, my little wine-red book on his counter.
The muscles in his face are drawn taught, toughness without any sign of strain. Only his eyes move: up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down. Matching photo to face, face to photo.
He flicks through the document, then slides it into a machine and stares expressionless at his monitor.
He returns to my face and my photograph. Except for his eyeballs, his face is completely frozen – do they teach that in border control school? Continue reading Crossing the Border