Photo by Karon.

Airport customs inspector has to be one of the worst jobs out there, right? After all, there’s so little glory in it: you’re at the front of the line when threats pops up, and an inconvenience to people when things are calmer. Not only that, but the most “exciting” part about the job is likely dealing with bizarre situations like this, which happened at Dulles International Airport this month:

U.S. Customs and Border Protection seized animal parts, blood and soil from one suitcase…The suitcase contained two elephant tails, bloody sheets, chicken feathers, chicken blood, a dried hedgehog, two dried chameleons, grass and a jug filled with soil, herbs and blood.

Emily Babay’s report on the incident notes that the man, who was from Ghana, had only declared that he was carrying “dried herbs and clothing.” I’m certainly not trying to single out this individual — who obviously held a firm dedication to whatever it was he needed all of that stuff for — but I don’t doubt that this happens quite a bit at the air terminals of metropolitan Washington. It can’t be that much fun to rifle through this kind of stuff, day in, day out, can it?

Perhaps I’m being too pessimistic: after all, a couple of dried chameleons doesn’t seem quite as disturbing as discovering a severed seal head or some Brady Bunch-themed pornography inside someone’s bag.