Showing posts with label passport. Show all posts
Showing posts with label passport. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

If you can't trust your neighbor...

As all Canadians know, we are on the eve of having to show a passport in order to cross the US/Canadian border. In our 200 history as neighbors, this is a disturbing precedent, and yet both Clinton and Bush confessed to having absolutely no knowledge of it when they came to speak together in Toronto. The two former US Presidents came to discuss global and domestic challenges facing the U.S. and Canada and both of them were ignorant about it. That such an important step is implemented without their knowledge is beyond belief. How are we Canadians supposed to feel?

http://www.thinkaloo.com

Saturday, March 29, 2008

The fingerpass to replace passports?

This thought was posted on Thinkaloo on 29 March 2008 by member kanool

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Wouldn't it be more efficient, more secure and more eco-friendly to replace passports with fingerprint and eye-check only? Why do we need to carry paper passports when we can digitize some of our most unique body parts that serve as the best and most accurate form of identity? Don't you agree that paper passports will soon become a thing of the past?

what determines identity?

This thought was posted on Thinkaloo on 27 March 2008 by member kirool

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In a recent thought I posted I received an interesting from another user " Gaea " .

I'm pasting Gaea's comment:

" So, I guess my question now is: what determines identity? Is it the fact that you have a passport of that country? Or that your parents are from that country? Or that you were born in that country? Or simply that you’ve lived for several years in that country? "

I'm also including the link of the topic which initiated the conversation and the comment.
Title: Do you call yourself European?
http://thinkaloo.com/ideas/view/view_idea.php?id=326

To those who want to express their opinion they can do it here.

** I'm editing my thought here ***

To answer the question what determines identity I believe there are two types of identities. The one that's related to how we feel and the one which is linked to our passport.

Legally speaking the passport is the paper which defines our identity. But as a human being I'm more defined than just a paper. And this is my culture, my believes, my heritage, my history and most of all my feeling.

So coming to the second identity, it's the one that's linked to how we feel about a place and where our heart belongs.

When I travel in Europe and I'm in Paris for example I claim that I'm from Norway. But when I am somewhere far away (for example the US, or somewhere in Asia; never been there ) I personally feel as much European as someone who's from Norway.

There are differences between the European countries, but being in the US to me everything in Europe looks and feels the same. So I believe it's safe to claim that I'm European.

Have you ever traveled from the US back to Europe. Wherever you land you get the same feeling. Back in Europe.

I don't know if that's only me but that's how I feel.