Various other forms
Obtaining a residence permit in China without the help of some serious guanxi is a mind numbing experience. I've spoken to plenty of English teachers at Yantai University and other schools who have said, "What's the big deal? I gave my passport to my school and had mine in two days. The police even hand delivered it to my house."
For those English teachers out there who didn't have to do anything (or pay anything for that matter).... bite me.
Here is a summary of what it has taken me to get my residence permit (god-willing, will be waiting for me next Monday):
- Get full medical in Yantai (700RMB)
- Obtain Work Permit from Yantai Labor Board (required 6 forms, all with official red stamp)
- Obtain Temporary Residence Certificate from Yantai government (required 6 forms, all with same red stamp)
- Obtain (yes I'm serious) form granting permission to apply for a residence visa (required 4 forms)
- Go to Hong Kong to obtain Z-visa (700 RMB, plus travel expenses, required 2 letters of introduction, official permission to apply for residence visa, photocopies of passport, work permit, and official company license to conduct business)
- Go to Laishan Police department and obtain Guarantee of Social Order Responsibility for Aliens.
- Get the ID card of my landlord
- A copy of my lease
- Go to Muping Police station for next permit... am told that I have to go back to the US.
- Go to Yantai Police station and told that I don't have to go to the US, but I do have to go to Yantai Human Resources Market (presumably where they sell humans) and obtain my Employment Permit for Aliens (300 RMB, required 10 forms, all signed in triplicate and stamped with those damned official red "chops")
- Go to Muping Police station and be told that my Company work permit (not to be confused with my Employment Permit) is not on nice enough paper and needs to be presented in a decorative red folder (I'm dead serious). Also told that my passport photocopy must be oriented in a landscape orientation, not portrait orientation.
- Have a Chinese staff member write a letter in Chinese, declaring that I feel safe enough in my residence, and waiving my right to have the local police install surveylance cameras in my home to monitor me 24 hours per day and ensure my safety. (As it has been pointed out to me, I ruined a major opportunity to have some fun with the Chinese police by performing a naked dance ritual everyday in my living room).
- Go back to the Muping Police station with 10E14 forms, 800 RMB cash, and a partridge in a pear tree. They placed it all in a manila envelope, stamped it 57 times with their official red chops, and told me to deliver it to the police station in Yantai.
