At the check-in counter, the staff contact the supervisor and minutes later tell us a chaperone is on her way to escort us to the lounge and immigration checkpoints. We are delighted for another set of hands – a big help, especially with a baby in tow. This is the first time we have had a chaperone escort us to the plane. The check-in staff issue our tickets, 1A and 1B, the same seats we get on all our travels.
A young Thai woman in her twenties, immaculately dressed in Martin Grant’s new Qantas uniform, arrives. She speaks softly, almost whispering the salutations.
“Good afternoon, Mr Brunsdon and Mr Elias. I am Nikki; I will chaperone you all to the lounge and later the plane,” she says almost inaudibly.
We return greetings and head to the immigration checkpoint. So far, so good.
When we get there, Nikki points out the VIP entry and tells us she will meet us on the other side. She isn’t allowed to enter the passengers’ area due to strict airport regulations. We assure her we are fine to manage from now till we see her again on the other side. She smiles and leaves us to our next steps.
At the baggage X-ray machines, we are met by a barrage of airport staff, most of them excited when they see Roman. As the bags go through the X-ray machines, the airport staff start to ask about Roman. In an unappreciated joking tone, almost rude, they ask which of us two is his mother. They have figured out we are a gay couple and think it is funny to ask and pry into it. We are not entirely impressed at the lame joke but bite our tongues. They giggle away and joke in Thai to one another at our expense. It is like, “Look at those queers with their new baby.” I have been warned several times to be as friendly as possible, especially since we had come so close to the end. While I am hating the insensitivity on their part, the silly jokes at our expense are unnecessary. I reply smilingly that he has two fathers and no mother.
“Why no mother?” the conveyor belt luggage inspector jokes again.
“Ha, no, he is OK with two daddies,” I reply.
“Thailand good place for gay?” another asks and then laughs heartily.
“Very good. I love Thailand; the people are beautiful.” I look at them, hoping for a change of course – maybe if I praise them, they will give us preferential treatment.
I notice one of the staff is on the phone; she is smiling and staring in our direction as she speaks. I ignore what I have just observed, choosing to collect my inspected bags. The staff are still joking away and laughing, and the tone of the laughter now seems more callous, cynical in some way. Maybe I am imagining things but the roar sounds like a warning, like something drastic is about to happen. I ignore it and as I literally bolt out of the space with my family, a staff member calls out in English, “Be careful.”
We head to the immigration checkpoint and passport control area. A customer service agent in her thirties is behind the counter and asks for all our passports. I give them to her. She glances through them before looking up at me to ask where the certification and paperwork for Roman is.
I quickly dig into my bag, take out the important documents from the embassy and hand it over to her. Before she has a chance to look at them, a group of officers – six of them, four men and two women – march towards us. Out of nowhere they appear, one of them literally snatching the documents from her hands and saying something to her in Thai. I don’t understand but it sounds serious. She freezes and lets him take charge.
They look like they are military police. One minute the VIP exit gate was empty, the next there are these six fierce-looking officers surrounding us. I am shitting myself, and my heart has just dropped.
It is like we are being arrested. Everything is happening so fast we don’t have time to digest it. We sense something horrible is about to happen and that there would be unfolding problems.
The ringleader of the group is a mean-looking Thai officer in his early forties, wearing a uniform decorated with multiple insignias and glasses – scary, almost like he could poke your eyes out kind of scary. He is obviously a person of authority. He waves our passport and papers with one hand before pointing to us with the other and shouting loudly in front of the entire checkpoint area.
“Where baby mother?” he asks, almost ignoring our presence, the documents still in one hand, now pointing to Roman with the other.
The words “baby mother” ring in my head like a siren, and I imagine a bomb exploding any second.
“Baby mother is not here, this is baby’s father,” I reply in a muted tone while pointing to Jayson.
“No, Nooooo, no…I say where baby mother?” he screeches again, almost ignoring my previous answer, uninterested in the father’s presence.
“We have important documents from the Australian Embassy for you. This document inside says baby mother has allowed baby to go home,” I say as a matter of fact.
Again, he ignores me, this time pretending he doesn’t speak much English.
“No! No! Where baby mother?” He now raises his voice at us, shaking his head in disbelief at our stupid attempt to abscond without her and he screams out. “No baby mother, baby no go.” His spit is coming out of his mouth in anger.
“Who baby father?” he fumes again.
“Baby father.” I point to Jayson once again. I am so scared I want to cry. I am shaking inside. Jayson is about to have a heart attack.
“Where you wife?” the officer asks rudely, while he can’t even bring himself to look in Jayson’s direction.
“I don’t have a wife,” Jayson answers truthfully.
“Ah, why no wife, baby got, no wife.” He screeches angrily as he repeats the words “no wife” at Jayson.
His five colleagues are standing in unison, haggling over our documents, shaking their heads in disbelief and waiting to pounce at us. We are trembling at this point. It is as though they have discovered the evidence to prove we are criminals of some sort, human traffickers trying to abscond with a baby. Who the hell knows what this bunch is going to do to us ?
“He no wife, girlfriend, baby mother is his girlfriend,” I reply, thinking it is best to respond with something. I also slightly raise my voice so he doesn’t think he can just bully the two homosexuals and that we are to cop this aggravation from him. Jayson remains quiet. The stories we saw on TV, witnessed and read about Thailand immigration at the airport – it is happening right here, this minute, to us, and we aren’t prepared for any of this.
“Who are you?” he challenges me.
“Friend, friend of baby father,” I say, pointing to Jayson and then me.
“You friend, no come here, you go, baby father stay, he no go…baby mother come first, we talk,” he says.
“Why we no go? We have paperwork from embassy, we do no wrong,” I ask defiantly, as a wave of courage possesses me.
“You go, go now!” He points to the exit, chasing me away as if to say, You’re free to leave and don’t need further aggravation. But Jayson and Roman must stay.
Nikki, who had been waiting for us, joins us and offers to help translate for us. I ask her to explain to the officers that we have a permit to leave and all the documents required to exit Thailand. “There are no reasons to hold us here.”
She reiterates what I just said to the officer, whose face turns red. He shouts in Thai at Nikki.
“Thai baby go to Australia with no mother, this not a very good reason?” he yells at Nikki, and he will not allow the child out without his mother being present. He insists I leave immediately or I will be forcefully removed.
“Tell him, please, I am not leaving under any circumstance, not without my friend and our baby. Arrest me, but I won’t go. There is no reason to hold them.”
She interprets my response. This time he is angrier and storms off with our passports. I worry he will return with handcuffs to arrest us.
A sympathetic woman officer heads over to speak to Nikki.
“The matter is of no personal concern to him. It’s about a foreigner trying to traffic a baby out of our country illegally.”
“She says it is a serious charge but they want to speak with baby mother first.”
The thoroughfare is mounting with other commuters. I am scared beyond belief. I fall silent and do not want to leave. I won’t leave without them.
“Where has he gone with our passports?” I ask the woman officer.
“Not sure,” Nikki replies.
I can’t believe this is happening at the last minute, and never expected the public harassment. More officers arrive. Nearly ten of them now surround us. The public checkpoint area has banked up with passengers waiting to get through. They stare at us, wondering what we have done to cause the hold up.
An Australian woman recognises Jayson and walks towards us.
“Good afternoon, my name is Amanda and I am an Australian legal practitioner. I recognised you because I am a big fan of your clothes. Are you OK? Do you need any help?”
“Thank you, but they are detaining us for no reason. We don’t know what to do,” I reply.
“May I ask why?” she replies.
“They won’t let my partner and our baby through despite having papers from the embassy. He’s a surrogate baby,” I tell her, pointing to Roman, who is sleeping.
“I would call the embassy immediately. Have you called them?”
“No.”
“I would call them immediately,” she repeats.
I have been so scared about what is happening that I forgot about the most rational thing to do, to ring Trudy.
The mean male officer, who has been away for about twenty minutes, returns. Ignoring me, he speaks to Jayson.
“Where baby mother, your girlfriend, where she go?” He directs the questions at an anxious Jayson.
The chaperone intervenes politely, asking him if he will let us go when Porn arrives.
“Do you want us to call baby’s mother?” I ask him.
He nods, wanting to speak to Porn, while the others still scrutinise our documents. I reach out for my Australian mobile phone in my bag, thankful for having charged it before leaving the hotel.
“OK, OK,” I say, “I call baby mother,” pointing to the phone.
He strikes me as homophobic; the aggravated verbal assault on us makes it obvious. Roman, thank goodness, has been fast asleep since we got to the airport. Keeping my voice low, I ring Kay to explain what is happening.
“Do you want me to come?” she asks.
“Maybe not a bad idea,” I reply.
“OK, I am on my way.” She gives me Porn’s number, and promises to ring her immediately to warn her of the call. She confirms she is leaving now for the airport; maybe her presence will soften the worsening situation. We have about an hour and a half before the flight departs, and we’re worrying we may not make it.
More passengers arrive and everyone stops to stare, wondering what illegal act we have committed. I ring Porn, who was expecting my call.
“Hello, Porn,” I say, my voice thinner than usual.
“Hello? Yes, yes, Porn.”
I thank my lucky stars she is on the other end. “Hold on.” I hand the phone over to the woman officer in the group, the softer-looking one; smart thinking on my part, to tap into her maternal side.
She takes the phone off me and speaks in Thai. Nikki translates the conversation for us quietly.
“Are you the baby’s mother?” the female officer asks.
“Yes, I am,” Porn replies, I assume.
“Have you given consent to this baby leaving?”
There is a short pause.
“You have…You went to the Amphoe office to get the correct paperwork?” she asks.
Another pause.
“I know, I can see that, but you must come here. My colleague won’t let them go without you here. He wants to verify your ID and discuss with you the consent you, a mother, has given for your child to leave the country.”
“Well, you must come now then…How long will it take you to get here?”
“An hour?” She stresses again. “OK, come now. When you get here, come to the immigration checkpoint. Your baby’s father and his male friend are detained here until we speak to you.”
She hands the phone back to me. I am trying to stay calm and polite. Jayson murmurs to me how frightened he is. I ring Trudy at the embassy to let her know what is happening. We are Australians and there are no reasons why they should detain us against our will. The Australian government has a pact with the Thai government and this shouldn’t be happening.
“There will be no problems going home.” Trudy’s words ring in my head about the trip today, which many Australian families have made since September last year without any problems.
Maybe someone tipped off immigration. I build conspiracy theories in my stressed head. Maybe the demented TV journalist is lurking somewhere with a hidden camera and this is all a setup. I look around but I don’t see anyone suspicious with a camcorder.
The phone rings, and I pray silently for Trudy to answer.
“Hello, Trudy here.”
“Trudy! Oh my god, I am so glad I got you. We are at the airport. There’s an hour and a bit to go but they have detained us, they won’t let Jayson and Roman leave, only I can go and I am staying with them till they release us three. They are awful, screaming at us, took our passports and now they have asked Porn to come. What do we do?” I rattle at a hundred miles an hour.
“Why have they detained you? They have no reason to do this,” Trudy asks, sounding aghast.
“I don’t know why, but we are really scared. I feel like crying, I’m shaking inside and this man is just awful, has been very awful to us both.”
“Hang in there. Put him on, let me speak to him. This shouldn’t be happening, we have all the paperwork in place, and we informed the relevant people up there in the offices today. His boss knows about you guys. Put him on,” she says, clearly upset now.
I hand the phone in his direction, saying someone wants to speak to him. He seems oblivious as though I am invisible to him. I try again.
“Excuse me, but someone wants to speak to you.”
“Who this?” he finally ask after a long pause.
“The Australian Embassy,” I reply.
“No embassy, no speaking. No, no baby mother, no go…Baby mother come first, we talk.”
“Trudy, he won’t speak to you,” I tell Trudy.
“Aaron, it’s not Trudy, this is Mali, Trudy’s colleague.”
“Oh, hi, Mali.” I realise that she is the Thai-speaking officer at the consulate.
“Aaron, are you guys detained in a private office?”
“No, we are all standing here in public and it’s embarrassing, people are staring at us. What do we do? Do you think we will be able to go home today?” I protest with fear.
“Pass the phone to him.”
“But he won’t take it.”
“Tell him if he won’t take the phone, I will go to his boss.” Mali sounds angry.
“How will I say this in Thai?”
“Is there someone else besides him you can give the phone to?”
“There’s a woman who just spoke to our surrogate Porn a few minutes ago.”
“They spoke to her?”
“Yes, they did, and she is on her way here.”
“She doesn’t need to come to the airport. Why are they doing this?”
“Well, that’s not what they said. They have insisted she come, she is on her way, and my agent is too.”
“OK, we will get you out of there in no time. Be patient. Do you have your passports with you?”
“No, I don’t. They took them, that guy disappeared with them.”
Jayson is so nervous and upset at this point he has to sit down. We have less than an hour before our flight leaves and it is boarding in ten minutes. The thought of going back to Bangkok, even for another night, makes me feel sick.
“Hand the phone to her, please,” says Mali. “I
want to speak to her.”
I hand the receiver to the officer and tell her someone wants to speak to her. She reluctantly accepts the phone and starts speaking in Thai. At several points in the conversation, she stops to explain to the mean Thai officer. He shakes his head, not wanting to budge. The phone conversation between the three of them goes for more than fifteen minutes. When she finishes, she hands the phone back to me.
“Mali, what do we do now. The flight is leaving shortly and we were assured this wouldn’t happen.”
“Count this your unlucky day. For some reason, they are detaining you and they won’t let you go. Here’s Trudy.”
Trudy comes to the phone.
“Trudy, bloody hell, we can’t miss this flight,” I say.
“You won’t, we are working on it, and we have people at the airport that have just gone upstairs to speak to the head immigration officer. You will be out of there in no time. Stay with me on the phone, in case they try to bully you with questions. Don’t say anything. Leave it to us, we will have a resolution soon.”
“OK, but the next flight is not till tomorrow arvo. This means we will have to find accommodation in Bangkok if we do miss it.”
“It won’t happen,” she consoles me. “We will get you on the flight, and we have spoken to our Qantas contact and asked them to wait for you guys. They know to expect you. Don’t worry, the flight won’t leave till you are on board. I have everyone here working on it.”
Several immigration officers make their way back to us. One is in his fifties, tall and clad in an officer’s uniform, a man of authority with many more medals and insignias than the previous – a high-ranking officer is my guess. He has our paperwork and passports in his hand. The mean officer follows behind him, looking frazzled. This one speaks English and is more sympathetic to our plight.
“Who is the father?” he asks.
I point at Jayson while Trudy urges me to keep her on the phone.
“Do you know you have overstayed in Bangkok for five days?” he asks.
“No, we didn’t. What does this mean?” Jayson humbly replies.
“You have to pay a fine. It’s five hundred baht for each person per day you overstay.”
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