drydruid and ollie’s travels

Normally, something with that title would signal impending financial disaster.  In this case, it’s the other kind of visa.  The one we didn’t have.

 Being law abiding and conscientious folks, we obtained Chinese visas before we left Doha.  For some reason, the Chinese Embassy in Nepal canceled them and replaced them with Tibet travel papers as we were driving into Tibet.  When it became clear that Lhasa was no place for someone who couldn’t adjust to the altitude, we asked the Tibet travel agent if our papers were in order when he put us on the plane.  No problem! as he waved goodbye. 

After a few days at an altitude supportive of human life, we trotted to the Public Security Bureau to have our visas extended as they were about to expire.  Big problem.  No, can’t be done, you need a paper from Lhasa, you must return to Lhasa. We emailed the Nepal agent and explained the problem as best as we understood it and he arranged for the Lhasa agent to fax us the paper.  Back to the PSB the next day.  No, wrong paper, must return to Lhasa.

Returned to the hotel and asked for a referral to a local travel agent and found Yin and Coco at Regent.  They issued a Letter of Invitation to China for us and Coco even went back to the PSB with us.  No.   The reason our visa couldn’t be extended was because we didn’t HAVE a Chinese visa and were there illegally.  Go back to Lhasa.  Mind you, if it had been the US, we would have been detained and deported immediately. So, we caved and asked Coco to book us a flight to Lhasa where we’d get it sorted out. 

Yin called later and said sorry, we aren’t allowed to sell you a ticket back to Lhasa because you have no visa.  We then called the US Embassy folks who were sympathetic, but unhelpful.  Their suggestion: return to the PSB.

So, the next day, Saturday, we went back for the 4th time and somehow were rewarded for our patience with an official who decided to issue us a visa.  The catch: it took a week, during which time we couldn’t leave Beijing and then was only valid for 4 additional days.  We scrambled to make new plans as neither of us want to experience a Chinese jail.

The moral of the story is that despite trying to do things right and even working with local travel agents, things sometimes get lost in translation.