Rant Part 2 by NS – At the Chinese Notary

Like magic, WeChat once again rescues a bureaucrat from her web of inflexible rules and regulations.

View from China with an Austrian School of Economics Perspective

For clarification: China has no private notaries. All notaries are state-run, and typically require many days to notarize almost anything. Moreover, you have to tell them exactly why you need the notarization, in many cases provide a bunch of irrelevant documents and write out various declarations and affirmations by hand. Finally, they often insist on VIDEOTAPING you restating everything. Of course every city and province has its own rules, many of them contradictory, superfluous and/or incompatible with reality. And yet, as is so often the case in China, when push comes to shove it seems there is almost always a workaround.

Part 1 is here.

I lost it again yesterday. Went to the local notary to get the marriage certificate notarized. Aaaand, as I should have guessed:

“Sorry Sir, your current passport number and the passport number on your marriage certificate are not the same.”

No shit Sherlock. That passport was issued 22 years ago and it’s from a country which no longer exists. It's a passport I would eventually use to travel to China, it’s on the marriage certificate, and also on my daughter's Chinese birth certificate. I still have it (cancelled) but didn't bring it with me. I do have a scan/photocopy of it.

“ Oh no. That's not gonna work. You will need to certify and notarize that photocopy with your government.”

So let me get this straight. I come to China, learn Chinese, spend 15 years working here, paying taxes, get married to a Chinese girl, buy (her) two apartments, have a daughter, who is a Chinese citizen, you don't let me into the country for three years and although I was perfectly ready to go through all the self-financed quarantines, you leave a 13-year old Chinese girl fatherless for two years.

Then when you finally let me in, in order to give me a pitiful 1-year residence permit, so that a CHINESE CITIZEN can live with her father, you want ME to prove to YOUR GOVERNMENT that the document YOUR GOVERNMENT ISSUED TO ME is real, but that is not enough, and now we have to involve the United Nations FUCKING Security Council to confirm that an expired passport of a country that no long exists is real.

WHAT IS YOUR MAJOR MALFUNCTION (毛病)?

The entire hall goes silent (it's a DMV type of situation), everybody stops what they are doing to look. This is all delivered in Chinese so everyone heard it, everyone's Chinese there, I am the only foreigner. I kind of feel bad for the girl (30-ish, kind of cute actually). What does she know. She's just doing her job: the numbers don't match. If the glove doesn't fit, you must acquit.

“ We can do it if your wife requests it, then your passport number is irrelevant.”

SHE IS OUT OF TOWN.

"Can you bring a photocopy of her ID and a power of attorney?"

Yes, but I don't have a photocopy of her ID with me and I have to get all this done within a week because I have to meet a 30-day deadline your government has set.

WeChat to the rescue

My wife proceeds to send a picture of her ID via WeChat. The notary girl explains to her on WeChat how to write out a power of attorney on a piece of paper, which she immediately does. She takes a picture of it, sends it back on WeChat, the notary takes a picture of the picture of the power of attorney using her phone and then prints it out. Does all the paperwork, the fee is $20.

"It will be ready on Monday. Do you want it delivered?"

No I will pick it up myself, don't want to risk it getting lost in the mail.

It's not over yet, still a few other things to prepare.

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