I got my identity back !

I finally got my passport back yesterday from the Chinese officials. (And they did not confiscate it because I was Indian, every student has to get a residence permit)

It wasn't an easy process to get a Chinese visa in the first place for me. Indian passport, US visa, staying in the US. I had to go to shady Chinatown in Atlanta to find an agent who would get the processing done for me as none of the standard companies would accept my passport. Obviously the agent was Chinese and the service fees were half of what the other companies charge but it did take some digging around to get it done. At the end I did get my visa in the US. The "X" visa - Chinese student visa. I don't know why they did not pick a better alphabet. "X" sounds like you are doing something wrong, or that you are a reject.

Once I got to Peking University, I had to apply for a residence permit. The residence permit requires the original visa application, health forms and around $70 in cash. The story about the health forms will be a separate post. I can't seem to get anything travel related right in the first go. So after running around with the forms, I finally applied for a residence permit. That meant that now I did not have my passport for the processing time of 2-3 weeks.

I also have gotten locked out of my room twice because I do not have my residence permit. The dorm here assumes that you will get your residence permit in 30 days. If you don't, they cancel your card access. That happened twice. First, at the end of the 30 days and the second time when they updated my access but my passport still hadn't arrived.

All is resolved now though. I have my passport back, my electronic card works and I am not scared of being imprisoned indefinitely without an identity !