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ResourcesVisa & Immigration LawVisa NewsPost COVID Travel: Emigration Versus Immigration

Post COVID Travel: Emigration Versus Immigration

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the POST-COVID travel scene if you will, the lay of the land and discussing Immigration versus Emigration. The first thing I would like to say is I don't really like it when the people use this term "post COVID", I really dislike the term the "New Normal" for a lot of different reasons. I do understand, COVID-19, or I should say the Government response to COVID-19 had a tremendous impact on logistics pertaining to travel. That is just a fact. The reason for this video is that I don't think that it is overly correct to view COVID-19 as A.D. versus B.C., it is not a moment like that. I honestly think 50 years from now, yeah COVID will be mentioned but the Spanish flu was a major event as well and yes it had a tremendous impact within the five years if you were comparing the 5 years before and the 5 years after, but I think with COVID, in my opinion, I do think this will fade away more than people right now on all sides of the issue really give it credit for. But one thing that it has brought to the forefront is understanding the different dynamic associated with international travel. 

There is a difference between Emigration with an "E" and Immigration with an "I" and with COVID or I should say the response to COVID, the various Governments around the world and their regulations pertaining to inbound and outbound travel with respect to COVID, you have really seen this interplay on a much more micro level than I think we have ever seen in an international travel context; maybe truly ever.

Emigration, you don't often hear that word used but that is when you are leaving a place that is when you are going abroad. You often hear it in a historical context. You hear about the Emigres from the French Revolution. These were folks that just sort of got out of France, in some of their cases while the getting was good so they didn't lose their heads, and got to Britain or got to other places outside of France. It is not necessarily fleeing, it is just leaving a country for whatever reason. Now under certain circumstances, it may be maybe really terrible reasons. You may have a refugee situation but in some circumstances it is just leaving a country departing a country. Right now, there are departure protocols that frankly haven't been around for a long time or ever at all.

Meanwhile, Immigration is the process of entering a country and we definitely see more protocols associated with this, especially with Thailand and the US, that we have ever seen since I have ever been dealing with Immigration Law. The long story short, the reason for this video, it is a good idea to understand this as sort of a bifurcated proposition or a two phase process. There is the process of leaving a country and then there is the process of entering or being admitted to another country. This overall process can be rather cumbersome on both sides and it often requires a really meticulous approach to looking at how you are going to get from point A to point B or maybe I should say point A to point C and B in the middle for example a country where you may have to lay over. That may have ramifications. We have seen that a lot with travel between the United States and Thailand and vice versa where there is a third party country you have to lay over in. 

So again, the purpose of this video is just to provide some insight as far as context, nuance and I hope a bit of a paradigm shift with future travelers in understanding at least for the next year probably18 months, you have got to really focus on the difference between the protocols for leaving a country versus the protocols for the country that is going to be admitting you and having to deal with being in compliance with all of them.