Luckily, I live in Hangzhou…just a 90-minute D-train ride from Shanghai—home of the US Embassy. I had visited their website about a year ago when I took another look at my passport when returning to Hangzhou from visiting the States and realized what little room there actually was in it. Turns out, in China, we are able to add pages when our passports get full.

So noticing that the time had come to do this, I again visited the Consulate General of the United States website.

http://shanghai.usemabssy-china.org.cn/adding_pages.html

I made an appointment and got my butt to Shanghai to avoid deportation due to lack of visa.

The office is open and available for appointments Monday-Friday from 8:45am-3:00pm. The system allows you to make an appointment as much as 2 weeks in advance.

If you are unable to go yourself, you CAN send a representative in your place, but you will still need to make an appointment.

When making the appointment with their online system, make sure that you use a computer attached to a printer (preferably one with ink and paper in it). You will need to be able to print the last page that has your appointment confirmation number and password, time, etc.

The appointment confirmation system gives you the address of the embassy in English, so it couldn’t hurt to have a friend that can write in Chinese translate and write it for you, especially if you go to Shanghai yourself.

They do have the address in Chinese on another part of the website:

http://shanghai.usembassy-china.org.cn/acs_contacts.html

OR copy and print this:
美国驻沪总领事馆美国公民服务处
American Citizen Services
American Consulate General Shanghai
办公地址：南京西路1038号（近江宁路）梅龙镇广场8楼
Street Address: 1038 West Nanjing Road (by JiangningRoad),
Westgate Mall (MeilongzhenSquare), 8thFloor
路线指示：地铁二号线（南京西路站）
Directions: Subway Line 2 (West Nanjing Rd Station)

The website includes a map, but it is pretty useless.

The website suggests arriving at least 15 minutes (another spot on the site suggests one hour) before your appointment to clear security.

Note that the Embassy is, in fact, located in a mall. Weird, right? When the taxi dropped me off, I was initially a little confused. You can go in through any entrance. Make sure that you take one of the elevators that actually goes to the 8th floor. If I recall correctly, they are in a section off to the far right.

Show your form or the address above to anyone on the first floor when you enter the mall and they can point you in the right direction to the elevators.

Something NOT included on the website is what clearing security entails… This was the biggest struggle I encountered while there.

First, you are not allowed to take any electronics into the embassy with you. You must turn off your cellphone and hand it over to security. This also goes for computers, iPods, cameras, etc. I had gone with the intention of staying overnight in Shanghai for some fun, so of course I had BOTH my laptop and my iPod with me.

Not having had access to a printer when I made my appointment online, I had emailed myself the page and saved it in my iPod. BIG mistake, as they wouldn’t allow me to take it with me. I had to beg for paper and a pencil to write the info down while security was trying to wrench everything from my trembling hands.

Treat the embassy as you would an airport. Wear shoes and a belt that are easy to take off and keep your change in a bag. Trust me, it will save you a lot of time.

Again, PRINT your appointment confirmation page and take it with you—don’t make the same mistake I did.
The second thing to make sure of is printing and filling out your forms before you go. They DO have them at the embassy, but you have to go to a window and ask for them—they do not have them available in any of the lobby areas as I had expected them to.

I tried using the computer they have there first, but it was so slow that it was basically useless, even though it is set up to only go to the US Embassy website.

https://pptform.state.gov/?Submit=COMPLETE+FORM+DS-4085+ONLINE

When you get through security, they will direct you to the correct room for adding pages. Despite the fact that you have made an appointment, you still have to take a number from the machine inside the door of the room. At least people that have made appointments get their own button and set of numbers.

All in all, despite my security and form struggles, it really only took about 45 minutes total and I was done. Now I have 22—count them, TWENTY-FREAKING-TWO!—brand new pages to continue filling with visas. As an added bonus, the new pages are much more colorful than the old ones with historical American scenes and quotes from famous Americans on them. Looking through it will certainly kill a bit of time on the train ride back to our fair Hangzhou.

Thankfully, our fair city has plenty of indoor options. Restaurants (and increasingly better ones), bars and clubs abound in Hangzhou.

So grab some friends or your sweetie and find a hotspot to bunker down in on this blustery Tuesday night!

http://www.palau.org/news/story/china_trip_successful_344

A good half of the bar is outside – large downstairs terrace and good outdoor space above lets you see out easily. The location is on the way back from the Qiantang River on the Hupao Road junction with Jiuyaoshan Tunnel and so makes a fitting stop on the way home from your Meijiawu bicycle trip. The pints came a little slow – that’s only important for the first pint I guess, but the first is the most important… And the din that is Hupao Road can be a little oppressive at first. But if you have been in China for more than a week I bet you can block that out with a little mental effort.

At night there is supposed to be a band and a good vibe.

Now all I need to know is about flights from Amsterdam to Midlands, UK and I can skip both London and Shanghai… Wow.

]]> http://www.viewhangzhou.com/2010/03/klm-does-the-decent-thing/feed/ 2 http://www.viewhangzhou.com/2010/03/valentino-restaurant/ http://www.viewhangzhou.com/2010/03/valentino-restaurant/#comments Mon, 29 Mar 2010 06:52:23 +0000 SWG http://www.viewhangzhou.com/?p=1696 Probably the best thing about Valentino Italian Restaurant at Landison is the view looking out over Hangzhou as you stand at the urinal to pee. Well, the rest of the views are pretty good too. But nevertheless, that makes the restaurant the most expensive public toilet in Hangzhou. The other restaurants in the hotel are good: Unkai has always been a favourite, as has the Oriental. Conceptually, Italian food on the top of one of Hangzhou’s better hotels should be a good idea, so what is it about this restaurant that fails to hit the spot?

Without a little guidance, you might not find the place. Thankfully Landison thought of that and have a waitress to meet you on the 25th floor where the main lifts let you out. Round the corner there is another tiny lift that takes you up to the 26th and 27th floors. The layout of the restaurant is a little weird, cant put my finger on why, but at least there is a still a smoking section.

Some menus leave you stuck with what to choose because you want to eat it all, and some leave you hard pressed to pick anything because for one reason or the other, you don’t want anything on it. Valentino’s definitely falls in the latter category of the two. First courses offer a fair show: soups, a range of differing antipasti, couple of salads. We opted to share a couple of the antipasti – a meaty one and a fishy one. Both were good, served with good bread. The problem comes with the main course. Pasta, pizza and steak to choose from. There is some grilled fish too, but the MP in the price column always makes me a little worried. Of course, if you are in the mood for a bowl of pasta, that is great, although the one I make at home is pretty good too. The steak is expensive with many of the cuts well into 300RMB, which frankly, is unnecessary these days. After much deliberation, I chose a Lobster Risotto and my friend a minestrone soup. The lobster was small – probably illegal in some countries and rice quite salt. The wine list offered nothing much very unique looking, except for the pricing which favoured the restaurant.

The piano was tinkling away in the background, lighting good and service attentive without being in your face.

I do not pretend to be an experienced restaurant critic and so I have no idea why this place just doesn’t quite do it. Perhaps simply a lack of joie de vivre?

Valentino’s Italian Restaurant | 26th Floor, Landison Hotel, 333 Tiyuchang Road, Hangzhou.

On a Friday afternoon it was a peaceful place. The happy little teahouse was thriving with chirping oldies strewing watermelon seeds just about everywhere except the bowls provided. There was one table in the middle of a feast of very local looking Hangzhou food – hongshao rou, bamboo shoots, fish heads, the usual. The rape is in full bloom and behind it some pretty purple looking things that made me think of linseed, but probably wasn’t. On one edge of the field is the Farmers Calendar etched out in stone detailing all the growing seasons, the stars, moon, and probably pi to 28 decimal places (apparently that was invented here too). The calendar was invented by Wang Zhen and recorded in his book finished in 1313. You cant so easily make out the octagonal shape from down here on earth; my friend even had to ask why it was called bagua. She got a kick in the ribs for that. There was nothing to be done except climb the hill.

Not before a quick wander into Yuhuangshan Town (玉皇山) for cigarettes. I asked two or three people about the ‘other’ bagua. I was kinda hoping there would be hushed tones, embarrassed looks and fidgeting, signalling that my advanced investigative satellite research had uncovered some covered-over secret landing site or something, but I’m afraid to disappoint you. Nobody had any idea what I was going about. Where were my horns? (Or maybe this is a really hush-hush facility, an Eyes Wide Shut playground for local officials?)

Of course, you always end up paying. The park farm is free, but the whole mountain is not. Got ya! Mr. Legacy is grinning. It is just 10Y to enter Yuhuangshan Scenic park, and I guess somebody has to pay for carrying all those immense stair stones up the hill. The place is littered with grottoes and temples and pavilions, allowing you to peak at one step over the West lake, and next step over Qiantang River. In Ciyun Temple (慈云宫) a few angry looking demons guard over the ‘Long Life Vegetarian Noodle’ place. The boss wasn’t anywhere to be found…

At the top, just a 20 min easy climb, you come to Zilai Cave (紫来洞), and this spectacular view from the terrace. What can I say?

Not liking to go back the way I came, and smelling on the wind a faint, but so definitely there, pint at the bottom, we went down the other side into the Jiuyaoshan tunnel cutting, and lo and behold on the corner with Hupao Road, was Norway Woods Bar. (挪威森林酒吧) The sun was still up and the pint beckoning to go down. Cheers.

Whoever Mr. Guo Shilin was, he must have had some cash and guanxi. His house was built in 1851 and to have the pull to get a spot right on West Lake he would have pulled some strings. Big strings. The house has smallish living quarters and large gardens stretching in all maybe 100 metres along the lake. The style is very much East China garden, with rockeries, ponds stacked with Koi, windows that somehow look like mirrors – except you are not in the reflection, solitude, and views, some manicured, some natural. Guo’s place faces absolutely east, so the morning sun rising must have been spectacular. From his err breakfast terrace Guo would have seen the whole of Sudi Causeway, an expanse of water and felt a cool breeze.

These days Guo’s Villa is a part of the extensive garden parks of Hangzhou that surround much of the Lake. Of course Sudi is still there, and in the hazy distance Hangzhou is shimmering.

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