Too easy!

This is another expression I picked up from my boss (other than "cheers and beers"). Of course to get the full effect you have to say it in an Australian way, "Too (in a rising tone) Eeeasy (emphasize the e- sound)!"

"Too easy" is how I feel when traveling in Australia. I just came back from a two-day trip to Perth, and this is my second time flying within the country. I was actually in shock after my last trip (to Melbourne) and could not believe how easy to travel in this country after my painful US experience. But now after the second time the logic part of me said "OK, this is for real (and let's blog about it)."

To start with one doesn't need an ID to travel, NOT AT ALL. All you have to do is to type in a booking reference number in a self-checking kiosk. Within 20 seconds you will get a printed boarding pass, which is all you need to check in your luggage. In the US at this point you have to show your ID, and don't rush in putting it away either--somebody will ask for it again before you going through security checking and once again. before you boarding your plane. But here, nobody seems to bother at all.

Also don't bother to take off your shoes and to throw away your water bottle/shampoo/lip stick at the security checking point as required in the US. Too easy, considering you cannot even bring water purchased after security checking onto your airplane!

Last, but not the least, as a foreigner entering Australia, I wasn't asked to leave my finger prints behind, which felt like an insult at least for the first time.

But one cannot blame the Americans too much. Perhaps the sheer comparison of my "too easy" and my "ouch" feeling of US travel is a good reflection of how much 9.11 changed their day-to-day life. How long is going to take for them to go back to the "too easy" stage and to live without the 911 shadow? Perhaps generations.