Alien Permanent Resident Certificate (APRC) Application

Around Chinese New Year it dawned on me that having been in Taiwan 183 days or more consecutively for five straight years without a break in my Taiwan Alien Resident Certificate (ARC), I could avoid the bothersome mafan of applying for an Alien Resident Certificate each year (thus having to renew my scooter and driver licenses annually as well) . The relative freedom of acquiring an Alien Permanent Resident Certificate (APRC) sounded attractive!

Others have done an excellent job here and here (and probably other places!) laying out the process step-by-step as to how to obtain Taiwan’s “Green Card.” However, I have found during my 15 years here  in Taiwan that regulations vary slightly with regard to interpretation when it comes to taxes, ARC's etc. depending upon where you live, and perhaps even more importantly, who you know. (In fact, one time a tax office worker assigned to work with foreigners actually recommended to me that I didn’t need to pay taxes because the officials at the airport would most likely never bother to check!)  While my experience may not differ significantly from what is written from a northern Taiwan  perspective, here’s my take from the countryside—the western coastal plain of southcentral Taiwan.

First, as others have written, it really is true that the first step—the criminal background check from your host country-- is far and away the biggest hassle! First, how to pay for it? They don’t accept personal checks.  My local bank located in the nearest small town about 20 minutes away was not able to supply me with either a bank check or money order to send to TECRO  (Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the United States) and the FBI. Neither was the post office or another local bank I checked. When I checked with Citibank in Taichung, I was told they only offered this service to their account holders. Finally I resolved the problem by having my stateside bank send bank checks to a 3rd party in the US, which then sent one check to TECRO and the other along with my fingerprints over to the FBI ($15 and $18 USD respectively).  Even this small first step incurred  a lot of unexpected time and energy…

To get the fingerprints, first I went to the local police station, which then sent me to the larger police station in a township 15 minutes away. This police station then referred me to the County Police Station nearly an hour away. This Police Station then sent me to the Immigration Office in the same city. Thankfully, the buck finally stopped here and for a service fee of 100 NT I was able to get the fingerprints and mail them to the FBI along with my criminal background check application.

After mailing my fingerprints, I waited about five weeks before calling the FBI. One unexpected problem I experienced is that in confirming your identity, the service person will ask you for the address of the party to which you applied to have the results sent. I did not have this information handy, but the gentleman was very patient as I looked TECRO’s DC office up on the web again. To avoid this small setback, make sure  you photocopy your applications before sending them off!

To my surprise I was told that the current waiting time for FBI processing was 9 weeks!  However, thankfully by the 8th week the FBI had already sent the results to TECRO in Washington. TECRO was very quick (their service should be quick, being as all they do is collect your bank check and put a seal on the FBI letter… no translation). To save on their ridiculously high fee for mailing back to Taiwan, I had them sent the results to the third party in the US (just had to include a self-addressed envelope). The results were in my hands in a little less than two weeks.

Getting the physical was relatively straightforward, but for me it was nearly a one hour drive each way to the hospital, and I had to make two trips. The day of the physical, they almost gave me the standard physical for English teachers in Taiwan by mistake, so be careful to insist that they double-check it is the physical for APRC. Cost for physical: 1,570 NT.

Getting the Taiwan police report was also a breeze (Except that I no longer have in my possession the passport with which I first arrived in Taiwan—see below). Service Fee: 100 NT (also included 45 minutes of driving each way).

A second hurdle I experienced involved dealing with an Immigration Office which rarely handles APRC applications, and in particular, with an agent who had never handled one. Before sending my fingerprints to the FBI, I had already  verified with the office in Chiayi that I actually qualified within the 5 year period. Once I knew the crime check results were in the mail, I dropped by my local immigration office to make sure the rest of my documents (health check, local crime check, tax and employment records, etc.) were in order. However, in dealing with the agent of the county in which I live in southcentral Taiwan. I had to make 3 additional trips before the application was submitted (about 1 1/2 hours driving time each trip). She was very friendly. However, since she was just as new to the process as I was, it seemed each trip I made resulted in hearing I had to acquire another piece of documentation or authentication.

A third hurdle had to do with the translation of the criminal background check. I was told by the local immigration office to go to the county courthouse. However, at the courthouse, they told me to go to another address (associated with the courthouse but located in a regular office on the other side of town) to have it stamped. All he did was take my personal translation, ask me if I had knowingly lied in my translation, and authenticate it. But of course he also managed to pocket a service fee of 500 NT. In the link above, the person says the translation does not need to be authenticated, so be sure to check on this for your area.

A fourth temporary hurdle I encountered had to do with my earliest passport in Taiwan having been confiscated by AIT after I had pages added to get the words “chuan2jiao4shi4” removed from my passport visa prior to trips into Mainland China. They performed the service, but kept the old passport! The immigration agent wanted all of my passports. However, she took my word for it in the end.

Fifthly, however, when looking up my travel  records in her computer, the Immigration office worker discovered that the airport had apparently typed one digit incorrectly in my earliest passport, meaning there were potentially two of me in Taiwan when I first arrived here back in August, 1997. She had the airport merge the records, but this resulted in another trip on my part. Service Fee for  having the arrival/departure dates printed out: 100 NT.

The same immigration office worker interviewed me and formerly accepted my application materials on May 25. One of the questions in the interview was “did you borrow money” to apply for this application? Thankfully, since I did not not have to submit my bank records for examination (which did indeed include a small loan for a time, but afterward I transferred out more personal monies), I did not need to answer this question—it did not apply since I qualified on the basis of salary requirements alone.

Presently I  find myself desperately hoping the APRC application processing time does not take the 1 month (plus additional 2 weeks after paying out the 10,000 NT dollar fee) others have written about above. I am scheduled to fly back to the United States on July 2, and if for any reason the APRC is not approved, I will still need to apply for the regular ARC (relatively simple procedure, thankfully!).  Stay turned to see how things turn out!

6/18 Update: Hallelujah! I was granted and paid for the APRC. Since I was able to prove I am flying out of the country in two weeks, they are expediting it and It should arrive in the mail in a few more days.

There was still one BIG final scare, however! The immigration officer told me that in order to retain my APRC, I had to be in Taiwan 183 days out of  the year BEGINNING FROM THE DATE WHEN THE APRC WAS ISSUED. Fortunately, after I questioned this twice by telephone, she made an additional phone call and corrected herself. As the web site says:  “The APRC holder, starting in the second year after receiving the APRC (beginning January 1st of the next year), will face APRC revocation if failing to stay in the ROC for more than 183 days in a calendar year.” This gives me several extra months of breathing room. Enough said.

The First-Digit Phenomenon

I just finished a fascinating book by Mario Livio called The Golden Ratio: The Story of Phi, the World’s Most Astonishing Number. In the last chapter “Is God a Mathematician?” one of many surprises Livio offers up makes me want to run over to a local gambling den, or to the local temple (where prayers are believed to be answered by the gods using blocks similar to dice). I would then challenge those present to ask their gods the answer to a question while I consult the “Mathematician” God.

This would be the challenge: choose any set or sets of random numbers, such as a listing from a table in the World Almanac, a chart listing death tolls from major earthquakes, the population of places in given states exceeding 5,000 or more, the numbers listed out on the front page of your daily newspaper in a week, or any combination of anything like the above. What will be the probability that the first digit of any given number is  1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 or 9?

Common sense tells us that the numbers 1-9 should occur with the same frequency among the first digits. Right? Wrong!

Benford’s law states that the probability P that digit D appears in the first place is given by the equation P = log (1 + 1/D).

That means the probability of a 1 would be about 30 percent; 2, about 17.6 percent; 3, about 12.5 percent, all the way down to 9, about 4.6 percent. Counter-intuitive, isn’t it?

Some lists of numbers do not obey this law (for example, numbers in telephone books where the same few digits repeat in any given region).

Ethical Reasoning and Mother’s Day

This past Saturday, the day before Mother’s Day, a coworker had one of her best plants stolen from in front of her house. Her reasoning is that perhaps some child (or adult?) stole it to give to his/her mother for Mother’s Day.

Amazingly, I had exactly the same thing happen 2 or 3 years ago, also a day or two before Mother’s Day!  Someone heisted my best potted plant (only recently purchased because anything I take care of for any amount of time quickly degenerates into something no one would want to steal). So why all the plant theft prior to Mother’s Day?

In chapter 7 of Richard W. Hartzell’s Harmony in Conflict: Active Adaptation to Life in Present-Day Chinese Society, we read about Comparative Ideals of Obedience: Ethical Reasoning. Hartzell writes: “as a social doctrine which came to prominence in a society of subsistence agriculture, where Social Security, Medicare, retirement pensions, or other types of retirement benefits were unknown, Filial Piety has a basic level of coherent rationale in dictating that the children must provide for the economic support of elderly and/or medically infirm parents, and that consideration of the parents should come first.

He then gives an example: One young boy was visiting a friend, and was treated to eat oranges. As he was leaving, two oranges which he had stolen from the platter rolled out of his sleeve. He told his host “My mother loves oranges very much, and I wanted them for her.”

Pick one alternative:

The host 1) scolded the boy for his stealing and excuse-making, 2) commended the boy for his care and concern for his mother, 3) praised the boy for his devotion to his mother, but criticized the dishonest way in which he went about getting oranges for her.

According to Hartzell, the Chinese answer is #2. In addition, the host gave the boy a large bag of oranges. That’s because when the values “Rule of Law” and “Filial Piety” clash, the latter wins out (this can sometimes have scary implications).

So what’s the lesson of the story? Next year before Mother’s Day, bring your best plants into the house! Or buy a lot of extra plants and leave them intentionally out on your porch.

VIZIO SV421 Television Disappointing Customer Service and Vizio Remote Control Policy

Last year we bought a Vizio SV421XVT for use in our organization. One feature that was absolutely essential for our needs was  a USB port for thumb drives to view mp4 files in our weekly meetings (we typically only use the television set for an hour or so on Saturday afternoons and again on Sunday mornings). The television itself has not disappointed, but our experience with customer service and Vizio company policy here in Taiwan has been disappointing. Fortunately though, our story has a happy ending.

After we bought the set, almost immediately it became apparent the remote control and the TV were only sporadically talking. Sometimes the remote would work; sometimes it wouldn’t. We called Customer Service: “Have you put in fresh batteries”?  Duh, yes, we tried three sets of batteries in the first week!  In addition to repeatedly calling into doubt our intelligence by asking this question again and again, they refused to send us a replacement remote control at their expense insisting that the problem was on our side. Their instruction was to buy a new remote!

We then called 3C, the chain store from which we purchased the set  the previous week. They quickly dispatched a worker out to visit us, who confirmed with his instruments that indeed there was a problem with the brand new remote that came with the set, and that it was shipped this way with delivery. Armed with this authentication, Vizio had no choice but to reluctantly send us a new remote control at their expense.

For the next 8 months we got by using the set in our weekly meetings. But from the start for perhaps as many as 1 in 4 or 5 meetings, we would suddenly discover that the remote was not communicating with the TV. This usually resulted in us panicking to change the batteries, rubbing the contacts, or resort to hooking up a computer to the TV and inserting our thumb drive into the computer since the USB functions are not available from the TV buttons (reflecting, incidentally, a very poor design).

We called the company once or twice during this period but they did not offer any helpful insight or assistance. Finally, this past week, we had enough and decided to do whatever it might take. After hearing the repeated “have you put in fresh batteries?” a few more times, we were then told we should buy a new remote (They cost $NT1,200)  Huh? Two remotes with the same problem, and we need to buy another one? Our secretary asked if they were intentionally selling flawed devices. She also somewhat jokingly but firmly asked if forcing customers to buy extra remotes was a scheme for making extra money?

Vizio finally relented by sending out a repairman to check on the TV’s 感應器  and told us if the problem was with the remote, then we would need to pay a $500 NT service fee, an arrangement to which we agreed. The friendly and helpful repairman was able to verify that the set was fine, and that the problem was indeed with the remote. However, he told us it was against company policy for repairmen to repair the remotes. They are not even allowed to carry extra parts to fix TVs or even sell remotes. Policy required us to buy a new one directly from the main company. Furthermore, when we told him the customer service representative on the phone had told us it was possible to control USB functions from the buttons on the set, and asked him to show us, he confirmed our earlier conclusion from reading the manual that it was indeed not possible.

Fortunately a well-connected friend who shall remain unnamed was able to re-solder a few of the connections inside the remote for us for free in just a few minutes. He told us of someone who had encountered a similar problem with their Vizio set. Following company instruction, they bought a 2nd remote. When even the 2nd remote did not work, the company finally relented by sending a repairman who fixed the set. When the customer then asked what they should do with the second unneeded remote for which they had paid good money, the repairman simply shrugged… Certainly a scheme for the company to make money! 賺錢的手段！Let the prospective Vizio customer beware.

Solitary Soldier

Yesterday afternoon I drove my scooter over to the local park. I brought along my pet cockatoo as a conversation starter. Before I even got off my scooter, I was greeted by two sets of parents whose kids we teach every Saturday at our Children’s English Club. I exchanged small talk with them for 45 minutes or so as their kids spoke with the cockatoo.

Then an elderly gentleman approached and sat down next to me. We exchanged greetings and a few words of casual conversation. The two couples moved away 5 yards or so almost immediately and continued their conversation with each other in the middle of the courtyard. Why did the parents  gradually move  away?

In the town where I live there is a man who – as far as I know -- lives isolated emotionally and socially from almost everyone in the community. I first met him 6 years ago. We were checking out the viability of this area for a church plant, and I wanted to pay a visit to the old Presbyterian church which was founded here 60+ years ago (It’s housed in a tiny house and has never had more than 7 or 8 adherents—Presbyterian leadership welcomed and encouraged us to come here as they had no leader and no plan for the church at the time).

On that day 6 years ago I knocked on the door and met a kind elderly brother. However, I could hardly understand a word he said. Since then I came to know that he was a soldier in the Kuomintang army which retreated from China after having lost the Chinese Civil War which ended in 1949. His dialect of the Chinese language is very different from those which are spoken here. As far as I know, he has never had any family – other than his own church family in this community.

On an earlier occasion last summer in the same park, we were playing football and frisbee with some other kids we know from the English Club and elementary school. When this elderly brother approached, the kids confided in me they could not understand a word he was saying. So apparently lots of people keep their distance from him. Although I saw no one being rude to him, the situation seemed sad and perhaps a little cruel.

As an international worker with only a high-intermediate level of proficiency in Mandarin, and a low-intermediate grasp of the Taiwanese Hoklo language, I can certainly relate to this gentleman’s situation. I often feel similar feelings of emotional and social isolation, largely due to the cultural and linguistic barriers. Oftentimes people don’t have a clue what I am trying to communicate, or they assume they cannot communicate with me and do not even try. One man even used this language barrier as an excuse to try to steal our church people.

On the other hand, I am fortunate here in that there are a few other foreigners around I can communicate with, as well as a small but growing family of believers we are working with. Furthermore, because we are the only westerners here in this town (and I’m taller than the average Taiwanese) most people are generally friendly to us. We tend to stick out in the crowd! It’s not easy… In summary, let me just say I admire this gentleman’s continuing perseverance and reliance upon His God these 60+ years.