I was awoken today by somebody leaning on my entry buzzer at 8am. I was enjoying the first decent lie-in I've managed in a long time, and was disinclined to respond. They got in somehow, and started knocking on my apartment door. I ignored them some more and they went away.
They tried again an hour later. I happened to be on the loo, so had an ideal excuse to ignore them again.
Fearing that they might try every hour on the hour throughout the day, I went out on a long shopping expedition before 10am rolled around.
Usually, untimely hails from the front-door buzzer are just spammers who want to shove leaflets under everybody's door advertising pizza delivery or illegal satellite hookups. But they don't knock on doors. Or immediately follow up with phone calls (to my landline - who the hell has my landline number??). I suffered a bit of a panic attack that it was the police come round to check on my residence registration (or something) - and, as you may recall, the last time I registered my residence I had a bit of a nightmare experience because I'm on a 'dodgy' visa and don't have all the supporting details of my ostensible employment at my fingertips.
When I left at 10, there was a cop (of sorts - actually a chengguan, one of the quasi-police regulatory enforcers.... I don't think they usually deal with visa stuff, do they?) loitering outside the front gate of my apartment block. Another brief surge of panic for me. But he didn't attempt to speak to me - even when I smiled and made eye-contact and mugged a brief "Hey, what gives?" in his direction.
Maybe I managed to pull off one of those Jedi mind tricks on him: "This is not the foreigner you're looking for."
Or maybe the pesky bell-pusher was just the water-meter reader....
Alas, I spent the rest of the morning in a raging funk, madly pondering all the possible reasons the police might want to talk to me (the blog? delinquent tax returns? a malicious complaint by my former landlord?). Probably I was just worrying over nothing. They didn't come back again this afternoon.
It's just an unfortunate reminder how precarious our position as foreigners is in this country - our right of residence, and even our personal liberty can be snatched away from us at any time, with no warning and no reason given. This is still a 'police state'; and the 'midnight knock' on the door does, unfortunately, still happen - though it's usually just the local people who suffer that; for us foreigners, most of our less pleasant encounters with the police - checking up on visa paperwork - are the result of their occasional over-zealousness and lack of consideration, rather than wilful harassment; but, even so, it becomes rather wearing to have that hanging over you all the time.
They tried again an hour later. I happened to be on the loo, so had an ideal excuse to ignore them again.
Fearing that they might try every hour on the hour throughout the day, I went out on a long shopping expedition before 10am rolled around.
Usually, untimely hails from the front-door buzzer are just spammers who want to shove leaflets under everybody's door advertising pizza delivery or illegal satellite hookups. But they don't knock on doors. Or immediately follow up with phone calls (to my landline - who the hell has my landline number??). I suffered a bit of a panic attack that it was the police come round to check on my residence registration (or something) - and, as you may recall, the last time I registered my residence I had a bit of a nightmare experience because I'm on a 'dodgy' visa and don't have all the supporting details of my ostensible employment at my fingertips.
When I left at 10, there was a cop (of sorts - actually a chengguan, one of the quasi-police regulatory enforcers.... I don't think they usually deal with visa stuff, do they?) loitering outside the front gate of my apartment block. Another brief surge of panic for me. But he didn't attempt to speak to me - even when I smiled and made eye-contact and mugged a brief "Hey, what gives?" in his direction.
Maybe I managed to pull off one of those Jedi mind tricks on him: "This is not the foreigner you're looking for."
Or maybe the pesky bell-pusher was just the water-meter reader....
Alas, I spent the rest of the morning in a raging funk, madly pondering all the possible reasons the police might want to talk to me (the blog? delinquent tax returns? a malicious complaint by my former landlord?). Probably I was just worrying over nothing. They didn't come back again this afternoon.
It's just an unfortunate reminder how precarious our position as foreigners is in this country - our right of residence, and even our personal liberty can be snatched away from us at any time, with no warning and no reason given. This is still a 'police state'; and the 'midnight knock' on the door does, unfortunately, still happen - though it's usually just the local people who suffer that; for us foreigners, most of our less pleasant encounters with the police - checking up on visa paperwork - are the result of their occasional over-zealousness and lack of consideration, rather than wilful harassment; but, even so, it becomes rather wearing to have that hanging over you all the time.
Just as I was starting to recover my spirits, and to chide myself for succumbing to foolish paranoia..... the taxi driver who brought me home from my shopping trip asked me if I wanted to go to my old street name. Now, it's in the same neighbourhood, sure; but I had told him fairly precisely where I wanted to go, and hadn't mentioned my old address at all. What are the odds of me getting a taxi driver who's driven me before and remembers me? Pretty damn long, I would think.... unless there's a central database of where all the foreigners live??
And just as I was starting to dismiss the taxi driver incident as a meaningless oddity..... Witopia went down again.
It soon came back online again, thank heavens.
But, boy, am I jumpy today!
2 comments:
Just because you're paranoid it doesn't mean they're not out to get you... .
I guess this means I shouldn't tell you about the PSB's rumored "Project Dental Fillings?"
The knocking might've been the local cop shop -- there are apparently registration checks going on. It's just an exercise in pointlessness: they'll knock on the door, ask if you're you, and then leave. Usually they don't even ask to see your passport.
Chengguan don't have anything to do with visa issues. Technically, neither do the police: visas are under the jurisdiction of the entry/exit bureau; residence registrations (what with the threat we pose to public security) are the police's business. The two didn't talk to each other for years, and they're only just getting around to linking their systems now, which means that the police will now call and remind you that your visa will expire in 30 days, or whatever it is.
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