It's been a while since I posted. I've been busy with many projects.

Here's another story from the old days of flying.

Since the crews are expected to do more flying than the normal public, the custom rules are a bit different for the crew members in some countries. For instance flying into England the crew was subject to tighter customs inspection than most other countries. England was very strict with a very small allowance for cigarettes, no cigars and no alcohol. 

Sometime during the flight the Purser, or now called Service Manager, would hand out crew declaration forms that each crew member would fill out and the Purser would collect them prior to landing. We would leave the plane via the jet-way stairs with our luggage and board a bus ramp side to go to the hotel. Along the way the bus would stop at customs and the Purser would hand carry the crew declarations to the custom person. Most times the custom official would wave us on, but from time-to-time they would require the entire crew to clear customs. We would have to get off the bus, gather all our luggage and file into the customs hall. This was one of those times.

In earlier stories I mentioned a Captain named Bernie Dunn. We would say "flying's fun with Bernie Dunn." Now Bernie and all the rest of us were in the customs hall about to go through a check of our luggage. We would place our opened bags on a low, flat table and the custom inspector would review the crew declarations and ask each us some questions about what was in our bags. When he got to Bernie's bag he looked around in the bag a discovered a bottle with a clear liquid. He asked Bernie "what's in the bottle?" Bernie said "holy water." The inspector gave Bernie a long look and picked up the bottle and opened it to give it a sniff. The inspector said to Bernie "this is gin!" Bernie fell to his knees with his hands clasped... saying in a loud voice "Oh my God, it's a miracle, it's a miracle!" The custom inspector looked at him and the rest of us and said "get the hell out of here!" We scrambled back onto the bus and Bernie grinned like a Cheshire Cat all the way to the hotel.

Yup, flying's fun with Bernie Dunn!