Are you visiting the US after this?

A couple of months ago, I wrote a blog called The Ideals of the Country, and I mentioned that I once managed to talk Korean officials out of deporting Ben from South Korea. I mentioned then that this story would be the topic of another blog post, and this is that post.

Ben and I got married in 2015, right before I got a new job at Duke Kunshan University and we moved to Kunshan. In other words, this wasn’t the best time to go on a honeymoon, though we did spend two nights in a nice hotel in Shanghai. We were busy packing and moving. I also had to update my work visa, which I came to learn involved fingerprinting and ultimately a trip to Hong Kong. I then had to get my appendix removed. In other words, it was a busy time.

For Christmas, we would be going to Atlanta with Ben’s parents to have our US wedding, and we didn’t have much time in the Spring to travel. This meant that our honeymoon ended up happening the following summer. We decided to go to the island of Jeju.

Jeju is the island at the southern-most part of South Korea, and it was ideal destination for many reasons. One reason is that we could get there in a couple of hours. I didn’t want to be exhausted just from traveling to our destination. I also happen to be a big fan of Korean food and Korean drama, from which I learned some of the language. Plus, the island has a large mountain that we could hike and beaches where we could swim. What really made us consider Jeju, though, was that there would be a salsa festival there! This meant we could dance salsa together on the sandy beaches. For those who are not aware of the meaning of salsa for me and Ben, I will write about how we met in the next blog.

However, there was one even more attractive component of going to Jeju for our honeymoon: neither of us would need a visa.

While I am accustomed to traveling to other countries for short trips without needing a visa, Ben is not able to do so as easily. After all the trouble we went through to get him a visa to visit France a few months earlier, we were enticed by a honeymoon destination that did not involve proof of insurance, invitation letters, or visa photos.

When I went to book the flight to Jeju, I had two options. I could fly to Jeju directly from Pudong airport (in Shanghai), or I could fly through Gimpo (in Seoul) from Hongqiao airport (in Shanghai). To make that a little clearer, I could either do Pudong > Jeju, or I could do Hongqiao > Gimpo > Jeju.

On the surface, a direct flight is obviously the best way to go. However, one needs to understand the difference in travel time between going to Hongiao airport and Pudong airport. To go to Pudong airport, which is at the far east of Shanghai, I would have to take the high-speed train for 20 minutes. I would then take metro line 1 to metro line 2. That would take another 20 minutes. Then I could stay on line two all the way to the airport, but I would be on that subway for another 90 minutes. So, from door to airport, with transfers, it’s takes 2.5 hours at best. Three hours is a better estimate.

On the other hand, to go to Hongqiao airport, I would take the high-speed train for 20 minutes. I would then take metro line 10 for two stops, and I would be at the airport. In other words, I could get to Hongqiao airport in less than an hour. When I did the math, a short layover in Gimpo airport was still more time-saving than going all the way to Pudong airport and taking a direct flight.

Just to be safe, I had Ben check online whether or not he would need a visa to transfer through Gimpo in Seoul. You see, while Ben did not need a visa to travel to the tourist destination Jeju, he would need one for the rest of the country. After some research in Chinese, Ben concluded that he did not need a visa for the transfer. I did some research myself, but I couldn’t learn very much about this topic in English. After all, this was an issue related to Chinese citizens going to South Korea.

In the end, we both felt fairly confident that he did not need a visa to transfer through Gimpo to Jeju, and I booked the flight.

On the day of our flight, the security guard on the Chinese-side stopped Ben and asked him about his visa. Ben explained that Seoul was not our final destination. He was going to Jeju, and he didn’t need a visa to go to Jeju. The security guard seemed unsure but let Ben pass. It was only at this point that I started to worry but thought they wouldn’t let us pass if he really needed the visa. Right? As we waited to board, Ben did more research. His results this time were inconclusive. Some people said he needed the visa, but others said he didn’t. At this point, we hoped that the latter were right.

They weren’t.

When we got to Gimpo airport, it became clear that we would need to leave the international terminal and go to the domestic terminal to catch our flight. The problem was that customs stood between us and the domestic terminal. In reality, one has to take a short bus ride to go to the domestic terminal, and a person could easily just take a different bus to anywhere in Seoul even if they were destined for Jeju. So, you couldn’t leave the international terminal unless you had a visa to go to the mainland of South Korea. Even so, we tried to pass customs. I told Ben to just explain, like he had to the security guard in China, that Jeju not Seoul was his destination.

They didn’t let him pass this time, though, I would come to learn later.

As I waited beyond the customs gate for Ben to come through, the other people from our flight went by. I had lost sight of Ben, and when everyone had already past customs, I still couldn’t find him. I stood there by myself with the customs officials either in their booth or getting up to take a break. Where was Ben?

After a few more minutes, an official came to call me. “Ma’am, are you waiting for your husband?”

I said that I was, and she took me back to the other side of the custom’s line and lead me into a small room where I finally saw Ben. Besides Ben, there were two other men in the room. First, they confirmed that Ben was not just my friend but my husband. I assured him that Ben was my husband. Then one of the men said, “Ma’am, we are going to have to deport your husband. He does not have a visa to enter South Korea.”

“But we are only transferring to Jeju. We’re not going to Seoul,” I responded. At this point, I start to take out my phone to show them all the screenshotted confirmations of flights and hotels that I had booked. We would be in Jeju for 8 days. 4 nights would be spent at a small resort, and the other three at a beach-side hotel near the location of the salsa festival. They asked me why I had not booked a direct flight to Jeju. I said that I didn’t know that I had to. I explained that it was more convenient for me to fly through Gimpo, or so I had thought.

At this point, they asked me if we were going to fly to the US after we left South Korea. I would later learn that this was a question also posed to Ben by the official that he spoke to when going through customs. I said, “No, we are going directly back to China after this trip.” This was the wrong answer, at least as far as not having Ben deported was concerned. It was also the answer that Ben gave to the woman he spoke to. However, it was the truth, and we would stick to the truth throughout this ordeal.

The customs officials saw that he had the visas for both the US and Schengen countries in his passport, which is why they asked us this question. We came to learn that had Ben been planning to go to the US after his trip to South Korea, he could stay in South Korea for up to 90 days. The same was true if he were planning to go to any country in the European Union.

Since he was planning to return to China, he needed a visa, and they would have to deport him since he did not have one.

I went on to explain that this was supposed to be our honeymoon. I also asked them how it would be possible for us to know that if we transferred through Gimpo that we would need a visa. I said that this information is not clearly provided to passengers. I also clarified the circumstances under which Ben did not need a visa. So, you’re telling me:

1. If he had flown directly to Jeju, he would not need a visa.

2. If he was planning to fly to the US after his trip in South Korea, he would not need a visa.

3. If he was planning to fly to any country in the European Union after his trip in South Korea, he would not need a visa.

How would anyone guess under these circumstances that he would need a visa to just transfer through Gimpo to Jeju? How many passengers know the layout of the airport before they arrive? How were we supposed to know that the international and domestic terminals were not connected? There are many places where you can simply transfer from an international flight to a domestic one without ever walking outside. How would we know that this was an airport where that was not possible?

I just kept talking until they brought in a flight attendant who could speak both Mandarin and Korean. For some reason, I think they thought that explaining the situation to us in Mandarin would make me give up and accept things.

In any case, we explained the situation to the flight attendant in Mandarin. She responded by saying, “Well, Chinese citizens also need a visa to go to Jeju.” I said, “No, they do not,” and the Korean officials chimed in to support me. She then asked me like she might poor university students backpacking through Asia, “What, was it cheaper to layover in Gimpo?” I wanted to slap her across the face, but I simply explained that it was just more convenient to fly out of Hongqiao for us. It was clear to me that this flight attendant was simply bilingual, no small feat, but she wasn’t going to clear up the visa issue. So, I simply began speaking past her. I think the customs officials also realized that this flight attendant was only adding more confusion to the situation, and she was sent on her way.

At this point, we had been in that small room for about an hour. I had several plans in my head for what I would do if they couldn’t see the cracks in their own visa laws. First, I was going to argue that if their concern was us disappearing into mainland South Korea, they could simply have someone escort us onto our flight, or the next one. At this point, we would obviously not make our originally scheduled flight. Certainly having someone escort us onto a plane bound for Jeju was less paperwork than deporting my husband.

Second, I did not know what was involved in the process of deporting someone, but I sure was not planning to pay for it. It would seem to the financial benefit of the government to have someone escort us to the plane instead of figuring out what flight to put Ben on. But if none of that reasoning worked, I would just have to buy Ben a direct flight to Jeju from Shanghai for the next day. After he got back to China, he would go to Pudong airport, stay nearby, and head to Jeju the next day. I, of course, did not want Ben to be deported. I did not know what that meant. Is there now a mark on one’s record? Would that affect his application for a US green card later?

As I argued and planned, a woman walked into the room. I do not know where she came from, and she didn’t say a word to any of us. It was clear that she was also an official, but that was all. She went to her work computer and sat down. I didn’t pay her any mind as I couldn’t afford any distractions as I was making my case. To my surprise, the woman put down a piece of paper she had just printed in front of Ben and told him to fill it out.

It was a visa application.

I tried not to breathe a sigh of relief too soon, but I could tell this was progress. Why hadn’t I thought of that idea? Why hadn’t I thought to ask if he couldn’t just apply for the visa on the spot? In any case, he filled in the basic information: name, date of birth, and so on. Then in the large blank space they asked him to write that he has a US green card. Ben does have a US green card, right? We were again honest and said that he did not have one. My hope started fading a little here. They saw that Ben had a US visa. Why would he have a tourist visa if he had a green card?

However, all was not lost. In that blank space they instead had him write: “My wife is a US citizen, and she teaches English in China.”

At this moment I realized that it was not all my negotiating or logic that was getting us through customs, it was my US passport. The privilege of having a US passport weighted down on me in that moment. Had I been from somewhere else, Ben would probably already be on a plane back to China.

After the application was complete, they asked for the 50,000 Korean won application fee, and I again worried as I had not had a chance to get Korean money. I went into my wallet to see if they would take a credit card when I saw the 65,000 Korean won I had from my last trip to South Korea. I had forgotten about it in all the stress and worry. I paid them the fee, and they wrote a little note and signed a visa page in Ben’s passport and let us through the gate.

I couldn’t read what the note said and was amazed that these few pen scratches in his passport would get us into the country. I guess it says the Korean equivalent of “This man is married to a pain in the ass.”

**The featured image is of the beautiful beach in Jeju.

#interculturalcommunication #livinginChina #travelinChina