dolorosa_12 | (Reply)

From:

A number of my most notable travel mishaps involved forgetting my US student visa paperwork, which happened with increasing frequency as my PhD progressed. As a Canadian student in the US, I didn't have an actual visa, only an 8.5x11 paper document that required an up-to-date signature at all times that proved my student status. The first time I forgot it was during my research year in France, when I realized as my train was passing Laval, one hour into a three-hour train trip to Paris where I was scheduled to fly out of de Gaulle that afternoon, en route to Kalamazoo, that I'd forgotten it in my room in Rennes. I was able to email the international student office at my university in the US from the airport, who provided me with a scan of the document that I printed off and used to get back into the US. The same thing happened again a couple of years later when I went to a conference at the University of Prince Edward Island, and again, I was able to use a scanned copy to re-enter the US. The third time was when I back at my parents' place for Christmas the final year of my postdoc, and that time I had to actually rebook my flights and wait for a new copy to arrive.

I also nearly missed a flight in 2019 because I stupidly booked a trip into the US as two one-way flights, and in combination with my history of multiple US student visas, that came up as a red flag and sent me straight to a lengthy visit to second-step US customs!