Metal detecting in a foreign country?

[DetectorGuy]

The Mexican customs have a weird lottery system for who they check. They only check every tenth person. I never heard of them just checking one bag of the tenth persons luggage. I had the detectors in my checked luggage and did not have any problem with them until the return trip. We had a 1.5 hour lay over in Houston. When we left Cancun they couldn't get the door shut for 1/2 hour and made the lay over only 1 hour. when we got to Houston we needed to claim our checked bags, go through customs,and then get them back on a different plane in 1 hour... during this the tram broke down with us on it between one end of the airport and the other. (keep in mind we had 4 kids with us) We got to the gate at 5 minutes to the scheduled departure and then they told us that Houston airport will shut down for 2 hours because of bad storms overhead. When we got to MPLS at 2:00 AM all of the checked luggage was there except for one of mine with the two detectors in it. I filled out the "missing bag" forms and expected the worst. They sent my bag to my house via a courrier two days later. everything in the bag was there and intact with no "inspection tag" inside. I dont know if it was just a fluke or if security didn't like the detectors ) I did take the batteries out of the detectors and I had them all dissassembled to prevent breakage. The "Security" in Mexico (if thats what you want to call it) WOULD NOT hand inspect the underwater 35 mm film and after arguing with this "Pancho Villa wannabe" for 5 minutes I backed down and just ran it through the X-ray. The learning lesson for me was that Im not going to screw around with 35 mm film anymore and I just talked my wife into letting me purchase the SeaLife Reefmaster Mini digital camera (SL325) with the external flash and the seperate wide angle lense. I know there are better cameras but this will fit my needs well I think. I havent pulled the trigger on this purchase yet so if anyone could help steer me in the right direction, I would appreciate that.