anaroundtheworld

Noooooooo, I am not at all angry at the French ambassy in Beijing... I can even give you their phone number : +86 10 85 32 80 80.
I can also give you their answer : "I'm sorry but there's nothing we can do". If you're lucky that might be "I'm sorry I am not sure but I think there's nothing we can do".

How come I know them so well?
Let's see, day by day, how you can totally mess up your so-well-planned trip...

Day 1 : Thursday
We arrived at Xi'an in the morning. I realise I don't have my passport. Oh I know!!! I think I left it in the drawer in our hotel in Shanghai... No problem! They'll find it and with UPS I can have it delivered in Beijing in 2 days...
Problem is after 5 phone calls and much ordering around... the hotel never found my passport anywhere.
1st call to the French ambassy : I have lost my passport, I will arrive on Saturday morning in Beijing... what do I do? Well they can have a new passport done in 30 minutes as I faxed them the copy of my old one. OOooooh even on Saturday? Oh gosh no I'm sorry not on Saturday. Come on Monday.
Well problem was the trans-mogolia leaves at 7AM on Monday. Not enough time....
Weel you can always come on Saturday as we have always somebody on call here for consulate matter. Maybe somebody can sign you passport but we can't garantee it. Just come as soon as you arrive. In the meantime go to the immigration office to declare your loss... and if you can jump on the next train today it would be better!!!

The Immigration never wanted to make that declaration because I was not sure I lost it in Xi'an. Whether go back to Shanghai or to Shenzhen, were you entered China....

No place in the train leaving today, can't take the plane without passport. I'll arrive in Beijing on Saturday. Nothing else I can do...

Day 2 : Friday
Lots of phone calls to get a plane, to be sure somebody can sign my passport but "we can be sure there will be somebody". So why is their Consulate on call officer??????

Day 3 : Saturday
I arrive in Beijing at 7AM... go to the immigration to report the loss of my passport... AGAIN. I wait a bit but still my story is about losing my passport at the train station at 7 and already being there at 9, it makes the lady police officer raise an eyebrow...
at 9:30 I got it and go to the Ambassy. No Miss, you are not an emergency.... come back on Monday.

Luckily, even if I can't take the train I got a plane at 3AM on Tuesday so I can still arrive even before Louis in the train.

Day 4 : Sunday
Nothing to do... enjoy Beijing

Day 5 : Monday
I run to the Ambassy, get my passport done, almost throw up looking at all these old creepy guys who speak English like a Spanish cow to an almost mute young Chinese girl tryning to get a marriage authorisation, a visa or whatever.

"Do you need a chinese visa?" asks the French girl at the Ambassy. "Oh nooooo. I leave tonight... I'll stay in China less than 24h" (you see I am from a country where we force people in planes so they get out of the country...) "Ah ok" she says....
I run to the Mongolian Ambassy. Get a rush visa.
At 5PM I got everything, as well as my plane ticket for tonight.
I go the airport and say bye to the guys.
Get to the airport, check-in, go to the boarder control... "why don't you have a visa?" "Because I lost my passport, this one was made this morning, here is the copy of my original visa..." "wait a minute" she says...

And here starts 2hours of talks and negotiation. The thing is, I guess, if they had a clear procedure and had told me straight away "we can't let you out, you need a new visa" I would have been less angry.
But there it seemed they were delibarating for hours and finally, looking at me, thought "ok you can't get through".
I call the ambassy... "Sorry there's nothing we can do..."

So after hours of negotiation and depression, I am not allowed in the plane, they give me my bag back. It's 4AM and I am at the airport, not even with an address because I left my travel guide at the Hostel, I thought I wouldn't need it anymore.

The Next week :
back to the immigration, I still have hope I can get a rush visa, be 1 day late. I would miss the Naadam Festival but I still have 2 weeks in Mongolia.
The officer tells me they don't do rush... A visa takes 1 week. Then the other one tells me "No no... ask him if you want quicker". I ask again and the guy starts screaming at me... Most pleasant!
So I call the Ambassy again, I had not gave up on them yet... I get the girl who did my passport and talks to me as if I was the last idiot on earth not to know I need a visa to get out (you could have told me before bitch, not as if you didn't know I was suppose to leave the same day). So anyway, do they have any leverage on the speed of the visa? Is there any case when they could speed that up? "Sorry, there's nothing we can do"

The immigration gives me my receipt for the next Tuesday. I haven't slept in 48h... evrything is cool!!!! I have to go and register at the police station next to my hotel.

So there I go; and they send me to another immigration sub-branch, who doen't know why I am coming to register. They don't do it.
So I call the ambassy again. They might know what a French citizen waiting for a visa has to do with the local authorities because there is no way the next Tuesday the immigration tells me I can't get my visa because I didn't do some stupid registering somewhere. "Sorry we don't know this kind of things, but we know Chinese officers are a pain in the ass..." Thanks for the help!!!

But if I have trouble the next Tuesday I can call them. I guess so they can tell me again there's nothing they can do...

I got my visa the next Tuesday, got on my plane for HK with 1h30 delay, almost missed the connection to Taipei. Lucky I got it otherwise the next plane was at 11PM instead of 5PM.
I am here in Taipei, and Louis just told me he forgot his camera in the Jeep, with all his picture of Mongolia...