On a long cross border trip, I was traveling with a African lady as interpreter, “ don’t tell them we are crossing the border at the police checks they can be really difficult, leave it to me.”
So I greeted the police in the local language, then she carried on telling them we were visiting mother in law in her local village. This broke the ice immediately and after a short banter we carried on to the next check point and repeated the routine 7 times!.
Arriving at the border post she fast tracked us through, nothing like local knowledge