Passports
Observing that my passport would be expiring fairly soon, I sent it in to have it renewed. The new one arrived yesterday. I hadn't quite realized it would feel a bit mournful to see this stiff-covered fresh thing.
The old one was rather crumpled, covered with various stickers I had never bothered removing--from Northwest Air for some reason, from a company that got me a chinese visa. Inside, two visas from Japan, one as a college student, one as a 'specialist in humanities'. Two from Italy, so cheaply made and prone to peeling off the pages that they were a source of constant suspicion for the teutonic border control agents at Frankfurt. One for China, one for Sweden.
Assorted stickers from Japan, certifying that I had the right to leave and return. Entry-and-exit stamps for Mongolia and the UK. A set of additional pages, sewn in at the embassy in Stockholm--unnecessary, as it happened, since I never got a stamp in them, but had filled every square of every page in the initial section. Overfilled, when we consider the Italians had a habit of just stamping the book where ever they felt the urge.
The old one was rather crumpled, covered with various stickers I had never bothered removing--from Northwest Air for some reason, from a company that got me a chinese visa. Inside, two visas from Japan, one as a college student, one as a 'specialist in humanities'. Two from Italy, so cheaply made and prone to peeling off the pages that they were a source of constant suspicion for the teutonic border control agents at Frankfurt. One for China, one for Sweden.
Assorted stickers from Japan, certifying that I had the right to leave and return. Entry-and-exit stamps for Mongolia and the UK. A set of additional pages, sewn in at the embassy in Stockholm--unnecessary, as it happened, since I never got a stamp in them, but had filled every square of every page in the initial section. Overfilled, when we consider the Italians had a habit of just stamping the book where ever they felt the urge.