Toy Traveling

Can't beat Duke on passport security detail.

I do most of my toy shopping on eBay. 'Most' being an understatement. I'd put it more at 99%. But every once in a while this little African kid leaves Mother Africa in a big jet plane and subsequently loses his mind. And since my work often has me overseas, this blessing and curse is happening with the frequency of Dr Who whipping out his Sonic Screwdriver. Trawling the 'bay is one thing; but encountering toys you actually can't live without in the flesh is something else. Restraint becomes a foreign concept. And buying in person means you pay only face price- there is no postage cost lurking ominously around to hemorrhage your credit card some more. But a new challenge emerges. To score any kind of advantage by buying overseas you engage in a delicate balancing act. Airline baggage limitations are no joke, and if you tip the scales you might wind up paying more than the equivalent postage cost in overweight charges. And that is quite shit.

Another issue is space. Fitting your loot into your luggage can present a problem when purchasing larger items. Like an AT-AT.

Or a Millennium Falcon.

Okay. The second picture is a cunning photoshop-job. But in 2009 I did in fact travel to Shanghai and within the first two days had located and become smitten with the updated (and outrageous) 2.5 foot long Falcon. I checked that puppy into the hold, and not the ones used for smuggling, neither. I came in under my weight limitation and fortunately I was permitted two items of hold luggage. The only snag I hit was trying to go through customs on the South African border with a very big and very new looking box. Made worse by the fact that the price sticker was still applied proclaiming the price at RMB1800.

That value, plus the value of the Masterpiece Optimus Prime, Masterpiece Grimlock and assorted other treasures would have had the South African Revenue Service tax my ass off for importing valuable goods without declaring them. What was I to do? I was trapped.

But with some quick thinking, slippery Steve thought to blag that all the prices were in Thai Baht (I had stopped over in Thailand, fortunately). So out came the officer's trusty currency conversion chart. And I was in the clear.

If you're left scratching your head, fear not. I'm being as vague as an author of my mediocre pedigree can be. Five Thai Baht will get you 1 Chinese Yuan. And on that scale, in the eyes of the Revenue Officer my score wasn't worth batting an eyelid. And who's to say you can't buy a 2.5 foot scale model of the Millennium Falcon for approximately 80 US Dollars? No-one queried my practiced chicanery and just like that...

... I was gone.

The AT-AT was more straightforward. But I did have to turf out a goodly number of t-shirts and shoes to fit it. I hope the matron at my hotel found a good use for the second-hand threads. They weren't all from the C-list.



My last trip's luggage looked like this:

But contained this:

I was slightly overweight, but I charmed the pants off the woman at the check in desk and got away with it. That's how I'm gonna remember it, in any case.

So I've been doing this for some time now and I consider myself a bit of an authority. I feel no shame carting a 1988 Tiger Fly through check-in, long lines, security checks, frisks, x-rays, immigration, customs, boarding... all the while with kids wanting to poke my vintage toy and adults wanting to poke fun.

Can you spot the vintage toy-fan? I long for someone to come up to me in a departure lounge and have a full-blown conversation about the cool vintage toys I'm smuggling. But I'm not holding my breath.

 As I sit in my Cardiff hotel room tonight, I face what could be the biggest stretch of my career.

Tomorrow I am going into town to visit Forbidden Planet. And at this particular Forbidden Planet, oh object of my desire, they have the oh-so-sweet Star Wars Vintage Collection Slave 1. That's Boba Fett's craft. It's also an Amazon exclusive of a year and a bit back, so it fetches a hefty price these days. And hefty is the word, as she's a big 'un and a weighty lump of plastic. Sensibly I packed light on this trip. But I've had to laden myself with gear I stashed at my brother's house from the last time I visited England. And I only stashed that stuff (heavy winter jackets, I'll add) in order to make space for the haul in the above picture. So I am suffering from the knock-on effect of my last trip and not loving it. Does that throw my Slave 1 chances into jeopardy? Add to that the fact that I'm not exactly getting it for a song, it's on a par with eBay prices, less the postage of course. And the biggest misfortune yet, my return airline has a weight limitation of only 20 kilograms! That's 44 pounds and that ain't much.

I'm screwed.

So tough decisions have to be made tomorrow. I'll let you know if I went through with it. And if so, how I went through with it.