Originally Posted by
jiejie
When it comes to Chinese visas, never, never, never assume that your situation applies to everybody everywhere. USA citizens applying in the USA get a special deal.
Yes on bad relationship. Also yes you need a visa, but for more than a transit through Beijing, nearly everybody else does also.
Two strategies:
1) Stay in China. Plane tickets are your initial inbound and final outbound. Just make booking for the entire time in Beijing, then after getting visa, cancel the days you don't need. Then you can make alternate bookings for other cities in advance, or wait until you come to China. Once you get into China, nobody checks your itinerary against your visa application documents. Not even the Norwegians.
2) Sandwich a round-trip to elsewhere like you are proposing. A more expensive strategy, regardless of where you go. For a short trip, Korea is probably OK and you can find enough to do. Certainly it will take less time (1.5 hour flight vs 3.5 hour to Tokyo). You could also look into flying back to Qingdao as your re-entry point and checking that out for a day or so then bullet training back to Beijing. Korea also has Jeju Island, if you are needing a break from big city. Tokyo will be hatefully expensive to get there/back and to exist. Another option is Hong Kong, which is great for a 3-4 day break.
I'd recommend strategy #1.
I agree with Jie Jie. Obviously, you should check with the consulate, but in all my travel around China, which includes by private car and taxi, I never showed anything other than my passport before boarding planes or trains (and never for cars or taxis). China really encourages tourism and I'd be shocked if they issued you a visa to go to Beijing and then put limits on you're going anywhere else.
China is, bar none, the most amazing country I've ever visited -- I could probably spend the rest of my life exploring it and would still cover only a small fraction of the remarkably varied and interesting places to go and things to see. I'd definitely recommend spending your entire trip in China, if you can. If you do, the folks in this forum can provide a whole range of suggestions for where to go.