What you think your rights are and what your legal rights actually are, are entirely different. And if you are using your real name here, you are even dumber than I initially thought.
The imaging device operators are trained to spot bundles of currency that are in extreme excess of $20k or other currency equivalents. So while you may get away with 22.....23.....25k, the risk of being caught with, say 30k, is quite high.