Scanning my wife's new passport just now I was reminded of the post by another member in another forum. He wrote how, when travelling to Australia, he had just one empty page left in his passport and enough space on another page for the Australian entry and exit stamps. He asked the immigration officer if he would kindly place the stamp on that partially used page. The officer acknowledged the request with a smile, stamped the passport, and when the traveller afterwards checked his passport he found the stamp more or less in the middle of the empty page.

On my wife's brand new passport the Australian circular exit stamp is on the third page available for visas and immigration stamps. I took the trouble to measure the margins, with the following result:

left: 24 mm

right: 25 mm

top: 45 mm

bottom: 47 mm

I can't help admiring the precision with which the Australian immigration officer placed the stamp practically dead-centre on the page.

The Australian entry stamp, incidentally, is on page 28, in the lower left quarter of the page.

No complaint, just an observation triggered by the memory of that other post I mentioned.

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Maestro

My experience of immigration officers suggests that at worst they can be the most petty and mean minded officials that any bureaucracy could offer but given that their duties involve them in having to deal with the travelling public, a dreadful body in the main, I suppose we should extend a little charity.

Perhaps the endorsements simply evidence the pique and whimsy generated by a general dissatisfaction otherwise powerless to express itself.

given that my australian passport gets zapped in and not stamped, this is interesting.

Reminds me of my American stamps though, always placed in the middle of a fresh page taking it all up.