It had been nearly two years since I flew American Airlines out of Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 3. Back then the carrier used to install large, humourless and frankly irritating men who scrutinised passports before passengers entered the mazy check-in line. But last week they weren’t there and so it was straight to the business class check-in desk, where a smiling, middle-aged woman beckoned me to come forward.
“Good morning sir,” she beamed. “New York is it?” The beam was short-lived. Expertly thumbing through my passport, she seemed to stiffen, and, with greater scrutiny, went back over the pages and pages of Lebanese stamps. Would I mind answering a few questions? It appeared that these humourless types hadn’t gone away after all.
“And where have you come from today sir? How did you get here? How long did that take? Is that a good time or does it normally take longer? What do you do for a living? Do you enjoy it? When did you start writing? Did you study that at university? How do you spend your spare time? The last one threw me. My spare time? Really? Reading and listening to music seemed to satisfy her.
I was still on UK soil but I suspect I had just caught a whiff of what the US Transport Security Administration calls using “risk-based security measures to identify, mitigate and resolve potential threats at the airport security checkpoint”.
The interrogation stopped almost as dramatically as it had begun and I had to admit, for a ticket agent, she really was very good. As she printed my boarding card, I asked why all the questions? “Oh it’s nothing sir.” The smile had returned. “They’re just random questions we ask all passengers.” I wasn’t entirely convinced.
“We used to have security personnel.” She motioned to where humourless men had once stood. “But the airline decided it would be more efficient if we did it. American [Airlines], United and Delta all do it, but BA and Virgin don’t.” Did she have to be trained? “Oh yes,” she leaned in conspiratorially. “A week-long course and we have to pass it if we want to carry on checking-in passengers.”
I am prone to mild paranoia and I had to reassure myself that this wasn’t my first taste of Donald Trump’s America. But be that as it may, the president-elect may have done a U-turn on his promise to scrap the Affordable Care Act and his infamous wall on the US Mexican border may have now been downgraded to a “fence”, but his election pledge to get tough on Muslims appears to be very much on the table.
And travel to the US for US Arabs, Muslim or Christian, first world passport or not, will surely become more fraught with suspicion.
Ironically, many Lebanese of all faiths cheered for Mr Trump, mainly because they felt he wouldn’t meddle in the Middle East, but I suspect they will come to rue their support for the real estate billionaire and former reality TV host when they find out that they also fall under the new spotlight. Already Christian Lebanese friends with overtly Arab names – Omar, Selim, Karim, the list is endless – have told me about being pulled out of the line at departure gates and asked “random” questions when flying to the US.
But the fact remains that the Lebanese American – and the wider Arab American – community has, over the course of 150 years, established itself as honest and hard-working, marrying the Levantine thirst for commerce with the opportunities afforded by the New World.
According to the Arab American Institute, there are at least 3.5 million Americans of Arab descent, with Lebanese Americans being the largest demographic.
American Arabs are better educated than most Americans; just under 90 per cent work in the private sector; the average household income is around US$60,000, roughly 20 per cent higher than the national average and mean individual income is 27 per cent higher than that national average of $61,921. Of the $7.2 billion in remittances that went to Lebanon in 2015, just under $500 million or 7 per cent came from the US. It is a community that punches above its weight economically and culturally. Let’s hope it stays that way.
Checking in at John F Kennedy International in New York with British Airways took all of 20 seconds. They probably could not wait to get rid of me.
Michael Karam is a freelance writer who lives between Beirut and Brighton
business@thenational.ae
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