In which Josh cleverly avoids deportation

Mackenzie has a job here in India, so she has a business visa. I, however, am here just for fun - so I have a tourist visa. And the government of India, out of an apparent distaste for tourists, has attached all sorts of weird rules and stipulations to the use of a tourist visa. One of these rules says that if I leave the country, I can't re-enter it within two months, unless a certain set of arcane conditions is met. When I left India to go to Singapore and Cambodia, I believed I could fulfill these conditions. I double-checked with the visa company in the US, and I double-checked with an Indian customs officer on the way out of India, and they told me I'd be fine.

Of course, I wasn't fine.

We arrived at Singapore Changi Airport and attempted to check in with Singapore Air for our return flight to Delhi. The counter clerk looked at my passport and refused to give me a boarding pass. She said that Indian immigration might not let me in, in which case I'd be detained and then possibly deported back to the US - and Singapore Air would be fined for permitting me to take the flight. I said no, I was fine, because I had met all the arcane conditions. She was still skeptical, so she called in her supervisor. I explained the situation to him. He called in HIS supervisor. I explained the situation yet again. We all stood around for an hour, arguing over exactly what the rules were and exactly what horrible fate would befall us all if Singapore Air let me on their plane. We called half a dozen Indian embassies and consulates around the world; nobody had any idea how to deal with this apparently exceptional situation. Finally we got the Indian immigration authority on the phone, and they said... I would be deported.

So it turns out Singapore Air knew what they were talking about. I guess it helped that, unlike the various government officials I'd talked to, they had a financial incentive to know what they were talking about.

Singapore Air kindly allowed us to reschedule our flight for free, and Mackenzie kindly agreed to keep me company (instead of just going back to Delhi without me.) The upshot was that we got to spend an extra day in Singapore - and really, there are far worse fates than that. I had to spend the whole morning waiting in line at the Indian embassy to get my passport stamped. But in the afternoon we went to the Singapore Botanic Gardens - and also to both of the Hard Rock Cafes in Singpore that we had not already visited. (Mackenzie REALLY likes the Hard Rock Cafe.)