Any of you ever been profiled and then ID checked by the cops?
Before I tell you the ordeal, I must tell you what I look like these days.
the profile picture is misleading, I let my hair grow and put on a bit of weight, I was wearing a navy blue cap, black t-shirt, black hoodie, headphones on, brown faded jeans, gray boots, with a back pack, both straps on my shoulder....
Now I was walking down 2nd Street by the wet market at Sheng Wan, down that steep hill towards the tram lines. There I was walking downhill, the two uniformed cops walking up towards me... my mom taught me not to look away when cops walk by, so I didn't, in fact, I looked at them both as they passed me, and they did pass me, then two more steps down, one of them, the skinny one with the glasses, walked back down towards me, taps me on the shoulder and asked me to stop.
I take my headphones off, the skinny cop with glasses goes, sir, can you stop for a moment, then came the 20 questions... "You live here?", visiting a friend I said, "Where does your friend live?" up the hill I said, "What street?" Dunham Road I said, then he asked if he could look inside my back pack, which when I handed it over, he must already know by the weight that it doesn't have much in it... what was in it was a copy of the Watchmen comic book, a few of my letters I picked up from home wrapped in a rubber band, and a plastic bag that I had with me from awhile ago for the "when I go out drinking and thought I might throw up on the way home" occassion. And it has been in my back pack since.
Then it gets worst, he asked me to empty my pockets, which became emberressing, since I had an old Bueno chocolate wrapper in the left and a bunch of rubber bands in the right...
Then he asked for my ID, by this time, all the afternoon shoppers from the markets had gathered around me and the two cops, pointing fingers at me.. he called my ID number over his radio and here is what pisses me off... he didn't do the head tilt from the photo on my ID to my real face move... you have to do that move, even if it's just to make a point... and I had a cap on, which should have been the first thing to ask me to take off when you are trying to pin me as a suspect for whatever their daily reports told them to go find that day...
Then without waiting for a reply from the station on his radio, he hands me back my ID card and says, "okay you can go..." now that pisses me off... because if he waited for the confirmation, they would have told him I was clean, no records, outstanding warrants... then he would have had to apoligize, but see... if I was a serial killer, bank robber, rapist, by not waiting for the confrimation, he would have lost the opportunity to protect the people of Hong Kong from me...
Then I look over across the street, there is a guy, with a tank top on, get this, with red streaks all over it... I assume he is a butcher, but who knows... jeans, cap, sitting on the railings smoking a cigaretter, tats all up and down his arms, yelling cuss words on his phone... And I am the one who gets ID checked...
The worst part is when he asked what I do for a living, I told him I direct tv commercials and stuff... he says, "in this economy, your job is probably not very secure..." probably not I said... "because you don't get a monthly paycheck..." he continues, to which I said, yeah you're right...
may be this doesn't seem like a big deal to some, but it was to me... I mean this is the guy we depend on to protect us... of course not all cops are like this one in particular... When I walked down near the harbor, I saw two more cops standing by a light, so I felt like I owed it to myself to try walk past them once more... which I did, I stood at the light next to them for a good 30 seconds, again, I made eye contact, I looked at both of them, they looked back at me, and nothing happened... that made me feel even worst, because if I were the serial killer they were looking for, they just lost one more chance to catch me... and that would have boosted my serial killer ego to go kill more people... as long as all I have in my back pack are comic books, plastic bags and rubber bands...
What I hate seeing is that they focus on the types of people they think are illegal immigrants, people who look "Mainland" the problem is, many mainlanders are here legally now, working, living in HK, where as, cops rarely ID check caucasians or blacks... I don't have anything against these two groups of people, but in a lot of cases, many Tourist looking people are overstaying their visas in HK too... many cops avoid Card checking english speaking people because of the language barrier...
So I urge all my foreign friends to make eye contact with the cops on the street, see how many of you get's Card checked, we can put up a tally and study the percentage of races most likely to be carded in HK these days...
Anyone else out there who gets ID checked alot???
