Paranoia

Is that what they're saying about me?

My Internet connection has been mysteriously dysfunctional since the weekend. I hardly need to tell you how hugely off-pissing that is. I do not wish to become one of this city's legion of wi-fi nomads.

This kind of service interruption happens pretty regularly (though usually just for a few hours or half a day at a time); so it is entirely possible that it is simply down to the fact that the Chinese Internet architecture is extremely rickety and that the complete lack of competition between the two main service providers leads to them both being equally crap.

However, I can't help fretting that perhaps it is a piece of targeted censorship (or harassment, intimidation, call it what you will). It's getting to be that time of year again. And I definitely suffered a lot of this in March and April last year (targeted harassment, I mean: phone taps, nuisance calls, diversion of e-mails, the whole bit). When given a choice of the conspiracy or cock-up explanations, I generally choose cock-up. But this time, I'm not so sure......

And to add further to my woes.....

On Sunday lunchtime I managed to leave my bank card in a cashpoint. I get paid in cash most of the time, and very seldom have to raid the cashpoint for readies - and so I have become somewhat incautious about the procedures you have to follow when using them here. (In the UK - at least, back in the 80s and 90s, when cashpoints were new; I can't recall what the form is now - you always used to get your money last, after the card had been returned to you. That seemed a sensible course to me, since very few people are going to forget to walk away with their money, but it is very easy to forget to walk away with your card once your primary need has been satisfied. When I first encountered money first/card last machines in Canada, I lost my card in them 5 or 6 times during the course of the year.)

This should be a blessing in disguise - since the card is very old, the lamination is flaking off it, and many cashpoints decline to recognise it as a result. I am long overdue for a replacement, but.... I have been terrified about asking for one, and putting off the evil day. This is not only because trying to achieve anything in a Chinese bank is an awful rigmarole that typically involves an hour of more of waiting and then taking 10 or 20 minutes to process your simple request (or NOT process it, as often as not), but more particularly because a year or so ago my bank stopped recognising my PIN. The PIN was still good for the cashpoints, but it suddenly didn't work on the keypads at the teller's windows, so I wasn't able to authorise even the simplest of requests any more - not even for a statement or a new passbook.

[One of my Chinese banks (I've had several in my time) refused to issue me with a passbook, so the bank card was the only evidence I had of the account, the only reminder I had of the account number. I thought that was just crazy, and closed the account down as soon as I could. Mind you, I'm not sure that the other banks place much trust in a passbook alone.]

And I have long been terrified of the extreme incompetence and obtuseness of Chinese banks in establishing customers' ID. My main bank account has managed to fuse my first and middle names together, and I suspect this aberration is responsible for the fact that numerous attempts by various employers to transfer money directly into the account have been refused by my bank (account number alone is not good enough, apparently!). Moreover, most Chinese bank staff cannot speak or write or read a word of English, and so cannot easily recognise foreign names - or find their way around supporting ID documents such as passports.

In short, your bank card is, in practice, your only means of accessing your bank account. And if you forget your PIN (or the bank changes it without telling you), then you probably won't be able to get a new PIN or a new passbook or a new bank card or to gain any access to your account ever again. The chances of you being able to establish your identity as the owner of the account based on your passport or whatever other information you wrote on your original application form are slim to none. Without your PIN, you are, to put it bluntly, completely FUCKED.

Yes, I am living with the very real fear that virtually my entire life savings are now lost to me forever - appropriated by the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.