The crazy impulsive trip to China : Rejected Chinese Visa to TWOV

As an impulsive traveler, I've made a decision which I am not proud of: I decided to book a trip to mainland China because my mom and sister were traveling Shenzhen and I said why not ?

I can do whatever I put my heart into, and if there's a will there's a way right ?

First, I had to decide how to get there, flying into China was over 1000$, flying to Korea was 600$.

Second, I had to create a visa to get in. I've searched Reddit and everyone seems to have a relatively straight forward experience, and as a Canadian passport holder who has never really faced any issues with immigration I preemptively decided that I WAS going to easily get a visa.

So I decided to book basic economy United, two weeks to Korea and figure a way to get into China from there. 

Visa Rejection

T-14 days before China:

So I went to the SF Chinese Visa consulate, and boy was I wrong about it being easy to get a visa. First, I went on Friday morning, which was packed (guard told me every day except Monday and Friday are calmer, later during the day is better too). Second mistake, me, being a smartass, thinking it was better to have too many documents than not enough decided to add bunch of extra stuff like an invitation letter, the ID of the inviter and (guess what), my HK ID.

You can skip this part if you don't have a HK ID:

This was the BIGGEST mistake. They started questioning me on my HK ID, why I am not applying for a home-return permit instead (an HK specific document), my past entrances to Mainland from China, which I did not remember as I was only a kid back then and my mom did everything for me. Then they basically rejected me, telling I have to gather all my parents documents, their past passports, their naturalization paper, even though I was born in Canada and am only a Canadian citizen with no dual citizenship.

I ended up sending them all the documents but they never gave any definite answer, I've called everyday asking if there are anything missing.

T-7

I keep calling, no answer. I emailed, no answer. I start to panic, and look at options online. I can't refund the ticket either and don't actually want to spend 2 weeks in South Korea only.

I look at my online options:

• Visa on arrival Shenzhen for 5 days
• Transit-without-visa: 6 days
• Trying again for visa with an agent in Los Angeles, but this time not make the dumb mistake of showing my HK ID, but I'd have to spend money on sending my documents, getting an agent, paying rush fee
• Try again in Korea Chinese Consulate, pay 400$ rush fee, get an agent that speaks English and Korean

If I try for a visa, I would for sure get in, and not be stressed the whole trip, and if I try for the visa on arrival or TWOV it'd be a total gamble and they could reject me like they did.

T-3

I still have hope that the consulate would call me and say that I can come pick up my visa, or some kind of miracle. I even sent them more information, a personal declaration begging for a visa, more clarifications on how HK ID works and how I am not a resident there as I only have "RO" status (never lived in HK or was not born there), but no answer.

T-0

Picked up my passport from the consulate. They never gave me my visa, I decided to just gamble my entry to China praying that everything goes fine.

• I bought my ticket from Seoul to Shenzhen, landing at 6PM. 
• Then I bought a train ticket from trip.com Shenzhen to Hong Kong, 6 days after my arrival to Shenzhen, but a bit later than when I arrive, which would be at 11PM. 

TWOV Process

After a few (lowkey stressed) days in Korea, I finally onboard to my gamble flight to Shenzhen. The check-in desk asked if I had a visa at the airport, I answered no, and mentioned I was going to use the Transit Without Visa. The agent started to look a bit puzzled and unsure, which made me stressed a bit. They talked to their agent then asked for my train ticket and the address where I am going to stay.

I luckily printed everything out, and the agent took pictures from their phone, made a quick call, and finally gave me my boarding ticket after a good 20-30 minutes. 

SO DO GO TO THE AIRPORT EARLY.

Boarded the plane and arrived to Shenzhen Bao'An Airport. Now this is where if it's going to determine if I have a good trip or this whole thing was the stupidest plan I ever made.

I landed, and I followed the baggage claim sign. Then there were the Chinese immigration border. I see an arrival card and some foreigners there so I take a card too and start filling it out. I thought it was the right card because it said "visa free" option, but then I went all the way to the left as I thought it can't be this simple. I spoke to a lady, she told me the form I filled was actually wrong, and gave me another form. 

Wrong from:

 Right form (missing the top arrival form since it was given to the immigration officer). You keep the departure card for when you depart.

Then she took my train ticket (thank God I printed it out), my passport, my form and went inside and told me to sit outside and wait. There were a few other people sitting and waiting, I was honestly so stressed again, it had that stupid question of if I have been to China before and I was so scared that they were going to question me again on how I got into China before or if they look into their database and find out that I have a HK ID, or if they start questioning that my transit is not really a transit but I am here to visit my relatives, or what if this trip.com English ticket is not legit enough ??

Thankfully she gave me back all my documents and told me to wait to the immigration line. I walk up to the officer, gave all my docs, she asked me a few basic questions, then gave that sweet stamp to my passport, I GOT INNNNNNN.

What the stamp looked like:

 

Then I got sick the next day with a swollen eye, allergies, stomach flu, fever and cold. I think the stress got to me lol.

Changing the exit route

So originally I have bought a ticket from Shenzhen North to Kowloon West but my mom decided that we should go Zhuhai instead which is valid under my visa because it applied to the whole province of Guangdong, I have double checked that.

We've called and it is OK to change the exit station as long as it is within the duration.

On the day of departure, I go to the Zhuhai-Hongkong station, as I exit, they did look at the passport stamp a bit longer, not sure what they said in Chinese, then said it was OK. I gave the departure card with no bus written on it since you buy the ticket after the immigration office but they did not even take the card or look at it so I guess it was fine.

I've managed to exit without much stress, but my bus ticket, got to Hong Kong, no more passport checking after that.

LESSON LEARNED

This honestly was stupid. I've asked bunch of questions on Reddit about my situation and got roasted the whole time for being dumb to book a flight two weeks out without a visa... and honestly I agree. 2 weeks is way too risky when you need to apply for visa. I am never risking this again, I'll get myself a 10 years Chinese visa next time I renew my passport.

Thanks for sticking with me to this adventure :)

 

TL;DR TIPS

1. Please get your visa first before booking your trip to China incase things fall through
   
2. Get an agent preferably or wait a very long time at the consulate. Agents are pretty cheap too.
   
3. If you go to consulate in person, go later during the day, not on Mondays or Fridays.
   
4. Do not show your HK ID if you're trying to go for visa with your passport, or if you are an actual HK resident, just get a home-return permit, apparently it's better.
   
5. If you do show it, get ready to dig up your ancestors decrepit documents... and never even get your visa.
6. Go to the airport EARLY, some agents are more confused than others, will ask you a lot of questions, take pictures, need extra documentation, they need to make sure you can get in.
7. Print all your necessary docs like hotel/family address, ticket out of country. I even wrote in Chinese the TWOV name in case they don't understand what I am saying.
   
8. Make sure it's TRANSIT which means you can't do Country A -> China -> Country A. It has to be Country A -> China -> Somewhere else (it could be HK or Macau though).
9. You can change exit once inside China, but make sure it's within allowed time and province, apparently they check your visa if you leave the province.
10. r/ChinaVisa is a good subreddit but a lot of repeated questions (which I also contributed to hahaha) that you have to sift through. The most common reply is: "Don't call it a visa call it a transit WITHOUT visa" 😂