How to search for a missing American in Bejing
 

My nephew is visiting Bejing, and is a few days overdue to contact his mother by email. He has previously studied there for an entire year, but this may be his first independent visit. I realize that 25 year olds do not attach the same significance to these agreements as do their parents, but he has a track record of reliable reporting.

The parents intend to contact the USA embassy, but I do not know if they will receive the level of personal attention that they expect. What else could they do remotely, or in person, to check if he is hospitalized, arrested, etc? I think they know "approximately" where he is living and studying, but I do not have those details.

I'm looking for procedural guidance, not detective work ;) .

US embassy is the right place to contact. (Assuming he is an american :)

That will answer question such as whether he is arrested, or hostipalized.

Thank you. I started the thread, left to do the weekly grocery shopping, and with ten minutes received a text message that he had been located. He "forgot" to call. It seems to be a revelation to his mother that this could happen at age 25 ;) .

My brother knew that the embassy would know about arrests, but was not sure about hospitalizations.

Glad that things turned out OK.

For future reference, US embassies (but not most other countries) have a registration mechanism for those being overseas for extended periods...for the chinese one, I seem to recall one had to get onto vpn first in order to be able to register...

Not sure how they would know about hospitalisations otherwise.

tb

There is on-line registration with the state department gov site. Or you can walk into any embassy to do it in person. We lived overseas in different locations for many years and it was normal practice for us to register each time [back them no on-line, did in person]. This is helpful for many reasons. They know where to find you in case of emergency, your passport is registered and on file in case it's lost or stolen, you can get travel and/or warning updates.

Even for those of you well past needing permission notes from Mother, it's ALWAYS a good idea to let non-traveling family and/or friends know what your plans are, and [U]especially if travelling in the more rural areas of China and hiking, trekking, climbing, rafting, or camping. I'm by no means an alarmist, but in the past decade there have been a surprising number of missing Westerners--not all American--that simply vanished off the face of the earth while traveling in China and not seen since. Google "David Sneddon" or "Ada Gershovich." For some reason, rural SW China--Sichuan and Yunnan--seems to be the Bermuda Triangle.

And as these people were not the type nor in situations to want to purposely vanish or run away from there regular life, the only conclusion one can come to is that they either met with foul play, they got lost, or Mother Nature dealt them a bad hand. I tend to discount fanciful theories about being clapped into a Chinese prison, or abduction by aliens/North Koreans, etc. At least if one disappears after regular contacts with home, people will know where to start looking.

While registration with your home country Embassy sounds all warm and fuzzy, it doesn't really do squat in a practical sense for short-term travelers on the go. It's more useful if you live in a city, in case of civil disturbance or natural disaster, so you can get SMS or email "heads up". Certainly do it if it makes you feel better, but it's not a substitute for family and friends that have your back from afar.

Thank you, Ms mia and I have a second home in the UK and use this service, although it doesn't handle "frequent visits" very well because it requests a beginning and ending date as if it were a single trip.

I have mentioned it to his parents for the future.

That has to do with the Chinese - the government there is pretty efficient at notifying the embassy about these things. Most of the large hospitals are government run, and a hospital will notify the police when a random foreigner with no visiting family lands at the hospital unconscious.