Soldiering through the murky waters of customs....
This weekend is The Echo Art Fair in downtown Buffalo and I'm delighted to report that I will be one of the fairs exhibitors! This year I thought I'd be a bit less lazy about the shows I applied to and go beyond my usual 5 km radius; Buffalo was one I thought was close enough to home but that would get me in to the States and thus a whole other marketplace. Somehow the fact that it is actually in a whole other country and as such there are certain formalities one must go through to enter said other country didn't dawn on me until last week.........
Fortunately for me the folks at Echo had a contact at a customs broker and put me in touch with my new best friend Josie who has been super helpful deciphering all the various forms and codes: SCAC's, PAP's, HS and NAFTA's to name a few (Free Trade anyone????). True to form (no pun intended) the necessity for all of this didn't dawn on me until it was too late to apply for one of the most important of aforementioned codes - the SCAC - a Standard Carrier Alpha Code used to identify road transport companies (?!???!!) yes, even I, who is crossing the boarder in my personal vehicle with paintings I have created myself am supposed to have one of these. The lack of available time meant I had to call the US customs office at the boarder and prevail on the "good nature" of the answering officer to grant me a "one time exemption" of said code, after some considerable groveling I got a lecture as well as the exemption!!!
Oh yeah, did I mention that I also have to supply provenance for all the pieces??!!! Along with photographs of each painting, and no, "made by me" doesn't count....
Friday morning I will be at the boarder at 7am with my novel size stack of paperwork, 17 paintings and my (up until now) extremely patient husband hoping to all that is holy that everything is in order and I will be clear to cross. Bloody hell - I just realized it's Friday the 13th this week, God help me.......
Stay tuned.....
Kari