Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Monday, November 20, 2006
Chinese Driver License
How to get a Chinese Driver License?
Hard to say. Depends on the city and province you live in, but mainly it depends on the officer who you deal with :)
I read in the net that at the Shanghai Hongqiao Airport Traffic Police Station I could get it more easy than in the main station in Minghang.
A Chinese friend called them to ask what I need to bring and they said just Passport, Residence Permit and my German Driver License.
Since I am a tourist here and not a worker I don’t have such permit. I only have a "Registration Form of Temporary Residence" in Shanghai. Its called yellow paper but its actually pink.
I went there and they couldn’t speak really english. Gave them my passport and the registration and they seem to be ok. Start filling out lots of forms for me in Chinese. I signed all. than they send me to a hospital to make a medical test. There I wait two hours until they tell me I need to bring a picture first, only than they can make the test. Ok, so back to the station, they make the pic and finally after a funny hearing and seeing test I get the document from the hospital.
Back at the station I get a booklet to learn 100 questions. After 45 minutes they bring me to an PC where I need to answer the same questions in the same order...just the order of the buttons are not A B C, there are C B A, but I know that before. Got 96 points and after another half our they give me my license. Somehow I got the real one with C1E mean you can drive car and two wheelers. License is valid for six years.
By law they shouldn’t gave me that one as we found out later when I wanted a replacement and they insist on the real Residence Permit. Still got it. In China you have luck or you don’t. Depends on the day, so just try it :)
500 meters after I left proudly the police station my clutch cable broke. Took me four hours to get a new one. So much about luck. Haha.
Hard to say. Depends on the city and province you live in, but mainly it depends on the officer who you deal with :)
I read in the net that at the Shanghai Hongqiao Airport Traffic Police Station I could get it more easy than in the main station in Minghang.
A Chinese friend called them to ask what I need to bring and they said just Passport, Residence Permit and my German Driver License.
Since I am a tourist here and not a worker I don’t have such permit. I only have a "Registration Form of Temporary Residence" in Shanghai. Its called yellow paper but its actually pink.
I went there and they couldn’t speak really english. Gave them my passport and the registration and they seem to be ok. Start filling out lots of forms for me in Chinese. I signed all. than they send me to a hospital to make a medical test. There I wait two hours until they tell me I need to bring a picture first, only than they can make the test. Ok, so back to the station, they make the pic and finally after a funny hearing and seeing test I get the document from the hospital.
Back at the station I get a booklet to learn 100 questions. After 45 minutes they bring me to an PC where I need to answer the same questions in the same order...just the order of the buttons are not A B C, there are C B A, but I know that before. Got 96 points and after another half our they give me my license. Somehow I got the real one with C1E mean you can drive car and two wheelers. License is valid for six years.
By law they shouldn’t gave me that one as we found out later when I wanted a replacement and they insist on the real Residence Permit. Still got it. In China you have luck or you don’t. Depends on the day, so just try it :)
500 meters after I left proudly the police station my clutch cable broke. Took me four hours to get a new one. So much about luck. Haha.
Sunday, November 19, 2006
My new ride! Yamaha TZM
What a big City. Shanghai had much for me to see and I was exploring it by feet, subway and bicycle. Now I wanted to see the real China. Just how?
I was searching the net for scooters and found an offer but the guys where saying something about inter provincial travel is forbidden for this 50cc scooters. Than he showed me this nice looking bike.
A '98 Yamaha TZM 150cc 2-Stroke motorcycle.
Nice, but even I got a motorcycle license back home in Germany I had never driven a bike after driving school. Just Scooter, Cars and a Camper. I start searching the net for all info on driving in China. Not too many info that gives you hope. I checked with the guy and he showed me the doc's that would come with the bike. A small blue registration book and the original invoice. Since I don’t speak any Chinese and didn’t want to get cheated I wrote the license plate number down and went to a police station to check if its stolen, but all was fine. They said I could buy it. I would just need to renew the license until the end of the year.
Month later I figured out that it was a duplicated license. They make 5 bikes with the same frame and engine number but register only one. Than claim they lost the doc's and apply for new ones until they have enough for all the bikes. I learned it the bad way when my bike got confiscated in October 2007 in Shanghai. Only because I had the real invoice and the invoice I did with the seller I got my bike back after paying a heavy fine and was forbidden to drive it. But sure I didn’t stopped driving.
After making a contract on the back of a KFC tablet paper and handing over 7000RMB (about 700euro) it was mine and I drove off into the chaos of China.
This baby would carry my ass around all China
I was searching the net for scooters and found an offer but the guys where saying something about inter provincial travel is forbidden for this 50cc scooters. Than he showed me this nice looking bike.
A '98 Yamaha TZM 150cc 2-Stroke motorcycle.
Nice, but even I got a motorcycle license back home in Germany I had never driven a bike after driving school. Just Scooter, Cars and a Camper. I start searching the net for all info on driving in China. Not too many info that gives you hope. I checked with the guy and he showed me the doc's that would come with the bike. A small blue registration book and the original invoice. Since I don’t speak any Chinese and didn’t want to get cheated I wrote the license plate number down and went to a police station to check if its stolen, but all was fine. They said I could buy it. I would just need to renew the license until the end of the year.
Month later I figured out that it was a duplicated license. They make 5 bikes with the same frame and engine number but register only one. Than claim they lost the doc's and apply for new ones until they have enough for all the bikes. I learned it the bad way when my bike got confiscated in October 2007 in Shanghai. Only because I had the real invoice and the invoice I did with the seller I got my bike back after paying a heavy fine and was forbidden to drive it. But sure I didn’t stopped driving.
After making a contract on the back of a KFC tablet paper and handing over 7000RMB (about 700euro) it was mine and I drove off into the chaos of China.
This baby would carry my ass around all China
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