So many things track their origins to ancient civilizations - in B.C. times, seemingly disappear ( blame the Goths), and then come back in the 19th century (typically with the steam and rail revolution) and then transform into something sophisticated in the 20th - 21st centuries (our computer/information age revolution).
So it goes with Passports. Passports existed in 450 B.C. - the referent is to Nehemiah, an official serving the King of Persia, received a letter from the King to the governors of Judah, the province beyond the river, requesting safe passage.
It became a "passe port" - to pass through a port in French, when King Louis XIV of France granted many passports. However, with rail travel in the mid-19th entry it got complicated and everyone abolished passports. Of course, then a war happened in 1914 and passports were brought back for security reasons.
Even today a passport carries a letter of request, asking for safe passage and protection for the holder. Between 1920 and 1947 there were 3 passport conferences that resulted in Canada adopting a booklet-stye passport, written in two languages, valid for at least two years and preferably for five. It's electronic now, even though one carries the little booklet.
Just as in ancient times, when we read about the COVID passport, we understand intuitively that it is about 'safe travel'. Most of us aren't involved in diplomatic passports, government official passports, emergency passports, collective passports (e.g. children on a school trip), Some countries are complicated = Latvia and Estonia have non-citizens of Russian or Ukrainian ethnicity who have resided there since the Soviet era. The U.K. is very complicated with their overseas nationals.
There are all kinds of other types of travel documents. And then there are proofs of vaccines for entry to a number of countries. Israel started rolling out their vaccine passport in February, so will have some experience for other countries to learn from. The articles all point out that doesn't particularly apply to Palestinians as most haven't been vaccinated.
Here's the first passport joke in the upjoke.com list
When applying for a Palestinian passport... In the section where it says "occupation" .. do you just put Israel?
Australian Passport control just asked me if I had a criminal record Didn't know I still needed one.
I found this in the archives from 2019's visit to Ottawa. This was on the side of a trailer selling plants at the market.
No comments:
Post a Comment