So let's talk about everything you need to know about a passport as you know it's a cool little booklet featuring iconic scenes and quotes from American history but there's an even cooler feature it grants me access to other countries these blue books are valid entry and exit ID everywhere in the world except north korea because they had to be that way but how exactly does it work? well, a passport is effectively just a form of ID but one that other countries also recognize and can stamp upon entry and sometimes also upon existence.
Passports are effective representations of your nationality and a way to prove who are you, Now before we get into all the fun little details about different passports around the world let's talk about some basic passport protocols you know just some stuff you need to know about your passport at least your US passport and what you can not do your passport is admitted to you by your government and is the exclusive property of the government it does not truly belong to you it's just a document your government grants you to prove who you are and what country you come from to foreign and local border control.
The first page of the US passport [ which is not the ID page for some seasons] states "The secretary of state of the United States of America hereby requests all whom it may concern to permit the citizen /national of the United States named here in to pass without delay or hindrance and in case of need to give all lawful aid and protection" basically it's the US government saying "we've got your back bro", now a few things for you to keep in mind.
First, as US government property you are of course required to surrender your passport if asked to do so by a US government representative or to a border control or police officer from any country, however altering or mutilating your passport or carrying someone else's passport or altering or mutilating someone else's passport are all strictly forbidden like you're probably going to jail for bidden the only people who are allowed to make any alterations in your passport are of course border officials like the people in the airport who flip over to a certain page and put a stamp there.
Okay now on to the fun stuff of course as well all know from a previous award-winning video of mine not all passports are created equal different countries' passports grant their holders different visa restrictions, for example, Mexico's border control requires everyone entering on a Kuwaiti passport to have a vise issued to them by the Mexican embassy in their area whereas American passport holders can essentially just show up to the border, however, this is, of course, the exact opposite from how it's done in Saudi Arabia.
Interestingly most Americans don't actually possess a passport of their own and many never have for many Americans a passport simply isn't something we only need if we want to travel to another country and we all know how often Americans do that, however things are different in some other countries in Russia for example Russian citizens often have two different types of passports one for eternal travel [basically a normal passport ] and something called an internal passport, the internal passport is a document required for all Russian citizens above the age of 14 and is used as documentation for travel.
Around Russia usually, when boarding trains it's not just Russia's internal passport system either most countries around the world grant certain citizens differing types of passport for the US passport [just to keep everything simple] there is more than just the regular passport like what I have, some notable example also includes the gray-covered service passport for anyone doing work abroad to support the US government the maroon - colored official passport largely used by politicians and military personnel serving abroad the black-covered diplomatic passport for high-ranking politicians and diplomates.
And of course, the emergency passport just in case you've stuck abroad and need to get a passport quickly as you may have guessed diplomatic and services passports also often have different visa requirements than regular passports as diplomats and government workers will have different protections and priorities for the host country than regular tourists, in the olden day passports were just little booklets with ID info and a bunch of pages to stamp but most countries around the world in recent years have been shying away from this for biometric passport which you can identify with this little rectangular logo with the circle thing in it.
Nowadays passports are often issued exclusively instead of their non-biometric counterparts as many countries are starting to require travelers to enter with biometric passports, they are just like regular passports but with a special microchip inside which saves data about the user's biometric info. which helps with things like facial recognition [ for automatic passport checks ] fingerprint info and even iris scan info, finally onto the fun cultural stuff since passports are essentially little booklets that display your nationality it's perhaps no surprise that many countries take the chance to put many different national symbol and features on their passport covers.
In essence, passports are more than just travel documents; they are symbolic representations of identity, nationality, and the assurance of support from one's government, So see you all soon I will upload my next blog very soon thank you for giving my blog your precious time.
This is my participation post for Initiative:APRILINLEO