It is a funny thing to observe people’s reactions when they find out what nationality you are. Many times, my reply that I am from the US gets a little bit of excitement and also wistfulness as the person I am speaking to tells me of their own desire to one day visit the US. Other times, well, the response is not quite as exciting. 🙂 But, even though I am happy to be an American, there was a nationality today that jumped out to me as being one of the coolest nationalities around – in more ways than one!
I was reminded about this as I was checking in for my Ryanair flight (gotta love that you can check-in up to 30 days before your flight!) and was scrolling down on my phone to reach the United States of America for the box that called for my nationality. In the midst of my scrolling, I saw Antarctica as one of the options of nationality.
Normally, I am skipping to the bottom fast to get through the booking process and never really check out the other nationalities. After checking some other booking sites, I realized that it is a common thing to have Antarctica as a nationality option.
There have been 11 children born in Antarctica and only one has been eligible to claim citizenship as part of British Overseas Citizenship under British Antarctic nationality law. He has not claimed that citizenship (he is an Argentine citizen). As to the other children born, they have not laid a claim to any Antarctic nationality. Still, wouldn’t that be something to be able to claim Antarctic nationality based on birth?! It sure would be pretty cool! 🙂
