Working on A Clampdown

Ok, so this has nothing to do with starting up a media company in China, well nothing specific anyway, but I just wanted to make a quick query about police checking up on all of us foreign ne’er-do-wells.

After living in Shanghai for six years, three of them in the same apartment, I received a phone call from my landlord last Wednesday, informing me that the police wished to speak to me right away. I was overjoyed at the prospect that SOMEONE was finally reading my blog.

So I dutifully reported to the Nanjing Lu Police Station, (which is, of course, located on Yan’An Lu), bright and early Thursday morning. Once I got there, instead of having one of those exciting pat-down searches or even getting grilled a bit, they only asked me to fill out my housing registration form again. It seems that since I’ve been in this apartment for three years, and they were able to contact me through my landlord, they wanted to check that I still was who I said I was, and was really continuing to pay far too much rent for the privilege of living 50 metres away from Malone’s, Spot Bar and Big Bamboo.

Unfortunately, I was not able to really enjoy complaining about this police prosecution over lunch with my mates, as it ended up that two of them had received similar calls from their landlords to come in and renew the same formalities. Kinda spoils all the drama.

Just to renew my faith in the all-knowing, all-seeing powers of Big Brother, on Saturday afternoon, I once again received a call from the Nanjing Lu police station (the one on Yan’An Lu).

Big Brother: Hello? Mr Cole? This is the Nanjing Lu police station (the one on Yan’An Lu). Did your landlord call you and ask you to come in to see us?
Gaoming: Yes — I was just there on Thursday
Big Brother: Good — so when are you coming in?
Gaoming: I just came in and re-registered on Thursday
Big Brother: Can you come by any earlier than Thursday?
Gaoming: I WAS JUST THERE ON THURSDAY — I’VE BEEN THERE ALREADY!
Big Brother: So your landlord called you? You need to come in and register right away.
Gaoming: Yes, my landlord called me – that’s why I came to see you on Thursday!
Big Brother: You came to the Nanjing Lu police station (the one one Yan’An Lu)?
Gaoming: Yes, I came to the Nanjing Lu police station (the one on Yan’An Lu) and re-registered that I was still living where I have been living and am continuing to live there like I have been living there, and I did this on Thursday.
Big Brother: Oh, good. We will check on this.

All I can say is that with all the energy that we are putting into getting ready for the Olympics, everyone in China should get a medal.

Anyone else have to visit the police lately? (Whether it was on Nanjing Lu, Yan’An Lu or HuQiKuQi Lu doesn’t really matter).

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