They have total control

All person that enter China needs to register there presence to the police within 24 hours. You dont have to think about this if you are living at a hotel, since the hotel staff is demanded to handle this issue for all there foreigner guests. They will take copy of your passport, including the visa and send it to the governments administration.

Two times I have staid in China until the very last days before my visa expire, and both time the hotel stuff contacted me and warn me about the situation. I dont know if it is the hotel it self that have this control, or it it is the police that contact the hotel.

Anyway, the hotel looks very carefully into the passport. When I should change my living last autumn, and where and bargain about the price they initially asked to see my passport. When I later use the argument that I will stay for several month in the hotel, then I got the replay:

"...but your visa expire within three weeks?"

This days I had been at the bank so I also had my other passport with me with a long term visa inside (In Sweden its OK to have two passport if you have a good reason)

This caused an even worth reaction. To have two passport seams impossible for a Chinese. The really thought that this was corrupt in some way.

I took some time to convince them, but it was a happy ending, and I have now lived here for almost a half year.

Extreme Propaganda

In my exchange money I find a 1 Yuan bill with some written text on. The text was nice and elegant, and did not look like a regular note, and could actually have been printed on the bill. I was sorry to realize that the text include to many, for me unknown characters, so I could not understand the contents.

I show the bill to a Chinese, that reacted very strong and actually like to take the bill from me. I was not allowed to get the meaning from the text!

Very interesting of course, so I asked some of my Chinese friends that stand me closer, and they translate the contents to me, and also they was obvious affected about the message, and gave my strong recommendation to not spread this information further.

I have now also by my self gone through the text with a dictionary, so I am pretty sure about the contents.

The text tell a very hard propaganda against China, which based on natural reasons not so often run into here. Specially not as a foreigner. Now it is so bad for you reader that I have made a promise to my Chinese friends to not spread this meaning, so I will not publish the message, not even the Chinese characters. Further more I dont believe the contents, and according to my judgment it can not be true.

(As addition I can mention that China belong to the group of countries where it is un-legal to write in the money)

The Propaganda-bill, with the special text to the right where I (its better) have covered the main part with the red area.

...but who the f..ck care?

As mentioned a few times, this year the rules for the fireworks is more strict then before. Specially inside the 5:th ring road. A lot on information posters is to be find everywhere that tells what is allowed and not, so nobody can have missed this.

There are time limitations. Only the first and the last day of the year, you are allowed to shoot 24 hours. After that it is from 7 AM until midnight for the 15 first days of the year. The rest of the year it is totally forbidden - included 31 december. I am actually writing this post before 7 AM, and I have already started to hear the bombs outside.

You are not allowed to shoot outside schools, hospital, bus stations, train stations, historical buildings, embassies, military buildings, electrical centrals, gas stations and a row of other listed places. I am living next to Beijing's military hospital, this is not a peaceful zone. The even shoot inside the hospital area.

You are only allowed to shoot at open spaces, and not close to houses or from balconys. There are also "soft" restrictions about respect towards other peple, and that children only is allowed to shoot with supervision of grownups.

That means pretty reasonable regulations and limitations - but who the f..ck care about these rules?

I think actually that pretty many tries to follow, but there are still enough number of firework-crazy Chinese to make the streets feel like anarchy from time to time.

For a while I was wondering why they often places there bombs in the middle of the street, and now I have the theory that they try to follow the regulation about shoot on open spaces...

This type of posters about the fire works regulations is to be find everywhere and an many different versions.