Well, not really. Their performance was less than stellar in this regard. After paying $45 and mailing my finger prints to them on April 17 of this year, I just now received confirmation that I am in fact not a criminal (at least in the US.) That’s good to know, but it would’ve been nice to know sooner than 4 months later. Oh, but I’m sure you’re thinking that they needed all that time to write up an official looking letter and actually sign something. Well, not really. All I got back from them was my original finger prints with little more than a stapled Post-It note attached saying “No Criminal Record.” The envelope is the most official looking thing of all, and I’ll be lucky if the NZ Immigration Service doesn’t laugh in my face when I take this to them. Now you’re probably thinking that they have a lot of other important things to deal with, and I’m just bitching for the hell of it. Well, not really. Their little note was actually dated May 22, 2007, so basically someone took care of it, forgot about it for two months, and then decided to mail it to me.

I would like to make one thing very clear though. I have every confidence that the US government is constantly looking for ways to increase the service level to its citizens. I’m sure their marketing guys are scanning the blogosphere right now, will read my post, and quickly brainstorm a number of ways to prevent this from happening again.

As reported by the New Zealand Herald:

Mr Cooke said the airport X-ray machine identified the possible explosive device yesterday in an incoming parcel.

“They placed this package into the explosives safe and called us this morning,” he said.

Defence Force bomb disposal personnel arrived this morning but initially had difficulty opening the safe, Mr Cooke said.

Inspector Matt Sillars of the police northern communications centre earlier said he believed the package was probably harmless.

He said: “You’ve got to bear in mind that it’s gone through 30,000 feet of air travel and has probably been kicked, dropped and whatever else.

“The chances of it being anything sinister are probably quite remote.”

Even though the package turned out to be harmless, Inspector Sillars was making quite a bold assumption here. Maybe someone should remind him that cell phones have been used to remotely detonate bombs, and sometimes really weird things happen and maybe a bomb could survive a trans-oceanic trip. Nevertheless, someone should really ask him what’s more important: the safety of Kiwi citizens or waiting ’til morning to check out bomb scares because it’s just too much of a hassle.

To be fair though, I can somewhat understand how a Kiwi would be more inclined to take such an action. This place is quite peaceful and chances of anything *bad* happening really are quite low. And let’s face it, people here can be quite apathetic. That being said, New Zealand isn’t the only country with such issues. America had a similar mindset, albeit with a much larger issue, prior to 9/11 and most Americans couldn’t have conceived of such an event happening even though terrorism has been around since the beginning of time. But still, I think a good rule of thumb for any country would be to immediately investigate any bomb scares, no matter what time of day it is.