The Well travelled Teddy Bear

When the kids were babies they both received Teddy bears from a place in Australia called the Teddy bear shop. It’s sort of like Build-a-Bear except you don’t build them. They are ready made with names given but these bears come with birth certificates and passports. Grand Master D has a bear named Stanley and Miss Gremlin’s little man is Hammond. These bears have been everywhere! You know how it goes, have passport, will travel.

Whenever we go anywhere the bears come with us, although Grand Master D might be a little past that now. Stanley didn’t come to The UK and Ireland last summer. Hammond however was almost not admitted into Ireland 😉 the immigration official told her he looked like a dodgy character and to keep him under control. I love it when they interact with the kids and make that process more fun and less intimidating. And he wasn’t wrong because when we flew back into Dublin from Paris on our last day, Hammond got lost at the currency exchange and it was quite an ordeal getting him back, not to mention almost losing the duty free he was guarding!

Sometimes immigration is grumpy, like in Vienna, on our way through to Italy, when I asked for the stamp the officer was very mean, he did it but I was rather scared. And they had armed militia dudes walking around the airport with very scary looking guns! We couldn’t wait to get out of Austria.

The Americans don’t really like to play either but we do get a good agent every now and then, mostly when I ask they glare at me, stamp it and wave me off. Another reason to hate the TSA. Why do they have to be so mean. 🙁

One time coming into OZ, Stanley was searched for illegal contraband, it turned out the weight in his bum was sand and they were worried it was foreign and disease containing. When I explained he was a homegrown  Aussie, they let him go. Phew.

But mostly, the bears are well behaved world travellers and have racked up quite a large amount of frequent flier points… if only we could use them!