Chinalbeit

Just a quick note.  This is not a new post.  About a year into my stay in China, I ran into some trouble with the law.  I never found out why I was targeted, or what exactly happened to bring this about.  In retrospect, it wasn’t that big of a deal, though it did certainly change the way I viewed the country and the way I behaved and acted toward people here.  I’ve obviously changed quite a bit since this incident happened.  It was pretty interesting to read it again.  I haven’t changed any of the wording of the post, so some of it might seem a bit strange.  Obviously, I decided to stay, and I’m glad for that decision.  I’m certainly much more careful about my visa situation here, and I’ve been able to help out some other people with their problems as well. I was pretty angry when I wrote this, so there is a lot of swearing here.

Anyway, without further ado…How I got Deported from China:

Okay, I suppose that the title sounds a little more exciting than the actual story. But it’s still true. Yes, I was kicked out of China. I must say that this experience has showed me just how much beauracratic hell the millions of immigrants, workers, and exchange students have to go through in my own country everyday. I am comparatively lucky, I suppose. Have you ever heard of a Chinese person overstaying his VISA in America? Of course you haven’t, and I’m sure his family never heard either.
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Update
It looks like most of my suspicions were confirmed. According to this article there was a lot of suspicious stuff going on.  First of all, the land was purchased by the developer at an extreme discount of only 640RMB per square meter.  Other developers in the area paid over three times that amount for similar developments.  Suspicious connections much?  As well, the developer, which did not have a license, was granted a “temporary license” by the gov’t for the express purpose of joining the public bidding, which the gov’t has confirmed was not truly public.  Color me completely unsurprised

Original Post

As you may or may not have heard, an apartment building (luckily still unoccupied and under construction) in the compound “Lotus Riverside” in Shanghai’s Minhang district fell over in one big piece on Saturday.  Below are some pictures.  You can find some more high resolution photos at EastSouthWestNorth

Toppled Building

Toppled Building

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