The Curse of Lin (Part 2)

Although we missed the last bus back to our town and the bus station was closing up, the presiding guard told us of another station that would have a bus to our city until 7 pm.  We began our journey in search of that station, all the while wishing either of us could better understand the local dialect.  As we ran through CQ city, we passed countless American chains - Starbucks, McDonald's, KFC, Pizza Hut - and each time, a small piece of me died...knowing that I could not stop and partake of anything remotely familiar.  We finally reached the other station with plenty of time to spare - at least a full 15 minutes - and rushed to the counter to buy our tickets.  The agent informed us that they were sold out and I grew concerned that my student would have a panic attack (or full-fledged nervous breakdown).  She felt fully responsible and could not believe that she was failing her teacher in such a way.  I did my best to reassure her and convince her that we should stop to eat (I hadn't had beef in ages and there was a McDonald's in the bus station for crying out loud!).


As we headed upstairs to eat, I called a friend who was familiar with CQ and she suggested we just get a hotel for the night because trying to get out of the city would now be much too complicated for someone who does not speak the local dialect.  She gave us instructions on finding a cab to a nearby hotel and I went on to order some food while my student lamented the death of her cell phone battery.  Shortly after receiving our food, an employee informed us that we must leave because the gates to the bus station would soon be locked.  I had never in my life been kicked out of a McDonald's up until that point - things truly looked desolate.  We ventured out of the station and into the dark, rainy night, in search of a taxi that could take us to the hotel, but none of them understood our destination.  Finally, a tuktuk driver registered the Mandarin words and confirmed that he knew where we wanted to go.

For those of you that have never seen a tuktuk, this should give you an idea of what a brand, new one looks like on a cheerfully bright, sunny day (quite the contrast to our experience):

As I sat in the back of the damp, dark tuktuk slowly chewing my cold, soggy french fries, I took a moment to evaluate the choices that had brought me to this point in my life.  No direct conclusions were reached.  A few short minutes later, we saw the gleaming lights of the 7 Days Inn and prematurely rejoiced.

We went into the nice, warm lobby and looked to each other in confusion as the desk clerk used the local language to ask if we had a reservation.  Switching to Mandarin, it became clear that we needed a room for the night and things were going quite well until she asked for our ID.  My...ID.  My passport.  That I had safely left in the pocket of my other purse while choosing a more convenient bag earlier that morning.  At home.  Where I could not get to.  And therefore needed a room to stay the night in CQ city.  Oy.  There was simply nothing that could be done - it is a requirement to register any foreign guests with the local PSB and they could not effectively do so without my passport.  Upon being struck with the full realization of the desperation of our circumstances, I lowered my head to my hands.  And laughed.  I had a good long chuckle at the pure incredibility of the day and everything in it, at the seemingly hopeless situation we now found ourselves in, at the lack of any solutions happily presenting themselves, at it all.

I got my friend familiar with CQ city back on the line while my student used the hotel's electricity to recharge her phone.  My friend spoke with the clerk about arranging a private car back to our city and hung up, but the clerk was then unable to find a driver willing to make the trip.  I believe it was somewhere around that point that my poor student fell into hysterics.  I tried, rather unsuccessfully, to comfort her as she sobbed and as the legitimate guests of the hotel bustled in and out of the lobby while looking on with a sort of detached interest.  As my student's phone charged enough to power on, it began to ring incessantly.  She answered and sobbed even deeper while trying to get it together enough to communicate effectively with whoever was on the other end of the line.  As she hung up, she informed me that a way had been made - that her Chinese English teacher, Grace, and boyfriend were in town and about to head back to our town in the boyfriend's car, but the hotel where we were waiting was on their way and they would arrive to meet us shortly.

This now marks the second time in my life that I have been so sweetly, inexplicably, and undeservedly saved by Grace when all seemed lost beyond redemption.

The Curse of Lin (Part 1)

Fear is now rampant among the foreign teachers here in CQ.  They seem to think there is some sort of ever-increasing curse involved with me traveling to and from the city - the Curse of Lin, if you will.  Thing is, they just might be right.

It all started about 2 months ago when I visited my friends in Changsha.  It was nearly impossible for us to get a cab...even the one that agreed in advance to take us from the airport back to my friends' home.  When I returned to CQ city, the driver that planned to take two other teachers and myself back to our town defected.  Then, so did another.  We were effectively stranded.  Thankfully, the teachers had made friends with a lady at their hotel who was originally from our little city (about an hour away) and she worked with a taxi driver to get us to yet another taxi that could get us home (though he did complain vehemently about how I could not understand his local dialect...that much I got!).

The next trip into CQ, we were sure everything would go just fine.  We had a private driver from the school and I would be with the dean's husband for the entire trip as we bought supplies.  However, after dropping off the dean and her assistant, the driver informed us that we were on our own as he needed to have the vehicle repaired...urgently.  Thankfully, our lovely waiban (aka the person appointed to handle us foreigners) acted on our behalf and made sure the driver did return us safely home (if only about three hours after the agreed upon time).

Given my history of deflecting drivers, none of the other foreign teachers were all too anxious to join me when I decided to go into the city about a month ago.  However, I determined to be a wiser, more prudent traveler this time around.  I decided to leave in the morning to avoid a time crunch and I took a student with me (we were planning to visit her classmate in the hospital).  We decided to take the bus...surely a more reliable system!  It was a bit of an ordeal (as per usual), but we made it into the city alright after a highway closure and a police checkpoint.  Along the way, I found out that my student is not a local CQ person, but is actually from another province altogether.  This proved important as it means that she does not understand the local dialect, but only the "common"  language of Mandarin.

After riding the bus to the end of the line and arriving in CQ city, we discovered that instead of being located in the bustling district we were told of, the hospital would actually be much further out of the district and out of the city altogether (by about an hour...then up a mountain).  We made it there in time for a late lunch with my recovering student, about 4 hours after we first began our journey.  We had some amazing dumplings, climbed a nearby mountain that claimed to be home to "Forest Disney" (what, isn't that what you do with all recovering surgical patients?!), returned my student safely to her hospital room, and headed back to the bus.  Unfortunately, it took a bit more time to return to the bustling part of the city where we'd catch our return bus home.  So, my student asked all the friendly, old men on the bus to confirm our stop, only to have them respond to her in the local dialect.  It was actually a bit reassuring for me to see a Chinese person experiencing the same level of struggles/frustration that I do when trying to get around.  We hopped off the bus when cued and began sprinting through the city to find our ride home.  We had just missed it.  The last bus back to our town left at 5:30 pm.

What happened next?  Did we find another way?  Did we ever make it back?  Are we still stranded???

(Stay tuned for part two...)

Work Visa/Residence Permit

I recently posted about how I obtained my latest tourist visa a year ago October.  Getting my Chinese work visa was certainly more complicated, but much less stressful.  The university requested a number of things (such as my passport, photos, degree, etc) and sent me forms to fill out, including a physical exam requiring my physician's authorization.  My dr. got quite a kick about testing me for "toxicomania" and the like.

After receiving my documents, the university dealt with everything they could in China.  They then express mailed me the approved documents that needed to be sent (with my original passport) to the consulate in the states.  I had to hurry to find an agent that could get everything to the consulate and back to me in less than a week - when I was already scheduled to fly out.  Everything went smoothly.  After I arrived in China, our foreign handler (waiban) took us to register at the local Public Security Bureau (PSB).  Soon after, the school helped us with our residence permit application (which supersedes the work visa).  This involved more documents and copies of all the previous documents.  From there, I needed to visit three organizations in the city: 1.  Healthcare Center  2.  Office of Foreign Experts  3.  Public Security Bureau (a different branch from the local one we first visited).

Each school has an official party-appointed waiban, or foreign handler in charge of handling these affairs.  So, it is the responsibility of the waiban to coordinate these activities on our behalf.  I was exceedingly grateful to have Emma's (and her colleague, Peter's) efforts helping us through the process.  One morning shortly after arriving in our new home, we took the hour long ride into CQ city and went to the overcrowded Healthcare Center for foreigners and began filling out paperwork.  Apparently, the day we went was also the day that many universities in CQ city decided to have their foreign teachers tested and the center was absolutely brimming.  Here's a small taste of what it looked like just outside the front door:

The paperwork required our height and weight in centimeters and kilograms, respectively - not something many of us Americans knew offhand.  "Thankfully" there was a GIANT scale that would simultaneously measure both in the very center of the packed out room.  I took a deep breath, got in line, waited my turn, and climbed on.  I wish it were an exaggeration to say that a crowd of strangers gathered (closer) around and began vehemently discussing the numbers while refusing me the kindness of stepping down.  Apparently they believed there was some sort of inaccuracy with the calculations and thought it best to use me as a means of testing/retesting the scale - an impromptu posse of vigilante weighers, if you will.  After what seemed like 10 years and 1,000 humiliations, I was finally able to escape.  I completed the form and, with the help of Peter, pushed through the crowd to the desk that would do a forehead temp scan.

From there, the group progressed to the line for registration, then the line for admissions, and finally the line for payments.  After a couple of hours in the massive (and massively packed) receiving area, we were cleared to move upstairs for our actual physical testing.  Upon reaching the second floor and being made to understand what was expected of us, the foreign teachers joked that it was like some twisted video game: Successfully get your blood drawn?  Level up to the x-ray room!  Endure yelling of the ancient female dr. in a foreign language while being uncomfortably groped under an open window?  Pass thru to the toilet chambers of death...if you dare.  Lucky enough to survive the evil glare and goop of the enraged ultrasound tech?  Move onward to see if the EKG clamps will forever hold you in their 1950's-era grasp.

I'm happy to report that we all successfully conquered the "game" and were rewarded with a lunch at Subway.  Not just any Subway, either, but one located right next door to a Starbucks!  We had to wait for the results of the medical tests before being able to move on to the Office of Foreign Experts or PSB.  The results weren't ready to pick up until after the other offices had closed, so we headed home for the night and made plans to return the following afternoon.

We arrived at the Office of Foreign Experts - a nice, large, impressive building - and headed upstairs for our individual interviews.  The interviewer informed me that was sitting in for his boss while his boss prepared for what sounded like a "crocodile" party for the foreigners.  Though intrigued, I was slightly relieved he did not extend an invitation to me.  We chatted cordially for a few minutes before he concluded the interview and continued on with the others.  When everyone had finished, we went back downstairs to the large, quiet lobby to wait while our waiban stayed behind.  Roughly two or three hours later, she emerged with impressive, passport-looking "Foreign Expert Certificates" for all of us.  Yet again, the time for this endeavor took longer than initially expected.  So, we had no time left to visit the PSB.  We headed home and made plans to return to CQ city again the following day.

We arrived at the PSB the following afternoon and were amazed at the stark contrast between the Foreign Experts Office and the crowd at the small PSB office.  Our waiban submitted our forms as we stood waiting until we were assigned an interviewing officer.  The officer asked standard questions as a camera recorded our interview, informed us of necessary information, and provided helpful tips about living/working in China.  We had to leave our passports there, which was somewhat unsettling, but quite a relief when we received them back a couple of weeks later (just in time to travel for National Day!) with our shiny, new residence permits.

International visas/permits can certainly be tricky, time-consuming, and/or inconvenient, but in my opinion, the resulting experience has always been worth it.  Here in a couple months, I'll let you know if I still feel the same after the Myanmar, India, Nepal, Tibet experience!