Vigilant Hong Kong customs officers prevented a daring smuggler from crossing into Shenzen, China together with his hidden contraband.
“Upon inspection, customs officers discovered that the pockets of the trousers the passenger was wearing were packed with six canvas drawstring bags sealed with tape,” said a statement from Chinese customs authorities, Agence France-Presse reports.
“Once opened, each bag was found to contain living snakes in all shapes, sizes and colors,” it said.
The statement said officers seized 104 of the scaly reptiles, including milk snakes and corn snakes, many of which were non-native species and are banned from entering mainland China without authorization.
Meanwhile, a Korean blogger shared in a 14 July post that she brought with her 20 bottles of a popular brand of cooking seasoning when she recently returned home from the United States.
The Trader Joe’s Everything But the Bagel (TJEBB) seasoning mix, however, came out of the Incheon airport’s luggage conveyer belt with a yellow lock on them, CNN reports.
A sign at the airport said that TJEBB contains poppy seeds that are restricted from entry into the country. Popular with influencers and regularly spotted in recipes on TikTok, TJEBB contains salt, minced garlic, sesame seeds and poppy seeds.
“Papaver Somniferum L,” an ingredient of the poppy family designated as a narcotic substance under South Korea’s narcotic drugs control law, had been detected in the woman’s bag.
“Seed products with narcotic substances have always been banned from being brought into Korea,” according to bloggers and CNN.
The blogger with the TJEBB bottles explained the seasoning mix to customs officers, but they still did not release the mix to her.
Ultimately, “I gave up the seasoning bottles and then I was let go,” she said.