Hi Nicole,

Thank you for the considerate reply.

I think there’s a difference between lamenting the weakness of the passport and throwing around whiteness and colonialism. To me this article reads as a rant about everything being racist when as you said the underlying issue is passport power. For instance, UAE, Japan, South Korea and Sinapore are all in the top 5.

Like you I’ve rarely faced problems because of my colour abroad. Weirdly, the most trouble I had was trying to convince an Arab country that I was actually from the UK because they were convinced I was Arabic despite me not even being Muslim!

Passport strength is generally a function of the country’s stability and relationships with other countries. It’s not racist that Canada has a stronger passport than Sri Lanka which only finished a long, difficult civil war a decade ago.

I’m glad that you haven’t faced many difficulties travelling! Japan was the one place where everyone was perplexed that I was from the UK but it felt more like curiosity than malice.