Hi! On december 2013 I applied for one semester Chinese language training course at Yunnan Normal Uni.

International Students Office told me everything was ok and that they would send at my place relevant documents for Visa applying.

After 2 months waiting for the documents without telling me anything about the process they informed me that they're in Spring vacation so can't send the documents and then that there were problems with the process..not specifying which king of problems.

Now I'm forced to come to KM with a tourist visa valid for 1-3 months before registration time (24 feb-1march), but as you know tourist visa requirements changed and now you have to provide round trip air booking record and hotel reservation for the entire period signed in the air ticket..

So my problem is the air ticket reservation, shall I book from, for example, 27 February to 10 March? Do you think University will be able to change it in X visa in 10 days?

My second problem is accomodation, tourist visa now requires hotel reservation for the all period you'll stay in China, so am I forced to book a room in a hotel for 10 days? It will be very expensive

My idea was to come now to have the time to search for a room in an apartment but the university destroyed all my plans..some adivices are welcome

Looking forward to be in Km, thanks to all!

Jenny.

Hi,

I had the same problem as you do and Yunnan university told me they were unable to change a tourist visa into a student visa. Funny, my current university is able to. I also offered to pay for a fedex/dhl/ups shipment of documents, they refused. They are quite unhelpful, like they don't want foreign students to come.

If you want to come on a tourist visa, beware that it's now only valid for 1 month, renewable 1 time. So it's for less than 2 months in total. The change took the better part of one month back in September.

Air ticket: book a return flight ticket one month away from your arrival (30 days) that is exchangeable. Once you've got your student visa, you can exchange it so that you'll leave after the end of the semester.

Accommodation: many websites allow you to book a room without deposit. Do that, apply for your visa, and cancel the room. I would advise keeping at least a couple of nights booked as you will need a place to stay at during your search. Btw, you probably don't need a reservation for your entire stay, the first few nights should suffice, but better safe than sorry.

Good luck!

just come man, but don't come to normal uni, it is the worst place to study chinese, trust me i study there, maybe you can try one of these private schools, there advertise themselves right here on gokunming, and they can offer you visa and accommodation at about the same rate, if you really have to go the the normal uni for the purpose of visa, then yeah come with a tourist visa and then there are a million ways of extending your visa while you are here