How to get a Chinese Motorcycle License

[galenernest]

The point Jon made was meant to be ridiculous just as the statements made by other members about how a Dutch / Poland person can optain a full Chinese DL without taking the test !

Damnit... sarcasm on the internet sucks.

[cryptographicide]

Obtained Chinese License today. Let's go over the details.
Aug-2014 Arrive in China without drivers license. (taibenle)
Sept-2014 Find License. At friends house in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Hand license to a snail that hand delivers it to China. (snails meiyoushou)
Oct-2014 Read this forum thread. Ignore trollspam. Re-read important posts. Download Drive in China app. Download test questions. (wohuimeitianxuexi)
Jan-01-2015 Haven't studied one question. Better start that. No word from snail. (manyidian)
Jan-29-2015 Give up hope of snail. Attempt plan B. Use South Korean license (49cc-125cc) to obtain Chinese motorcycle license. Everyone laugh at foreigner. (ha ha ha)
Feb-08-2015 Snail reports successful ocean crossing in Shanghai. (nihao)
Feb-17-2015 Snail arrives with license. So happy that get drunk and sing "Queen" in underwear. (nixiangqu"ktv"ma?)
Feb-18-2015 Wake up with headache and fireworks. Everyone not in office. See you in a week. (xinniankuaile)
Feb-25-2015 More fireworks mean everyone returns to the office. Find police, get residence document. Find translator, get licence translated. Translators manager hires me. (wotingbudong)
Feb-26-2015 Bus to license office. Bus home with license. (wanle)

A more detail description.
Hey. I know there are a few detailed guides out there for how to do this. One more can't hurt. Other guides focus on what you need. Namely Soberpetes guide. It's on page 15 of this thread. I found his information to be accurate. I'll reference his post below. I'm going to focus on how exactly I found the correct buildings and personnel that were able to do it. I needed three buildings.

1. Police Office that my Visa was registered to.
2. Transportation License and Testing Center.
3. Foreign Affairs Translation Center for my city.

For number 1: You need to go to the police station to get a proof of residency form. To find the police station I had to ask the man in charge of foreign teachers at my school. He applied for all my visa documents and has a massive amount of contacts. I had to lie to him and tell him that the proof of residency form was for the registration of Canadians abroad at the Canadian embassy in Beijing. He bought it and told me where I could get this done. He is irrationally hateful towards motorcycles ridden by his teachers because he has had more than one of them buy their first motorcycle in China and then spend the rest of the semester in a hospital bed. At the police station they needed my confirmation letter of invitation and my passport with visa pages. This paperwork was free. The cops who did the paperwork were three cute women in a second story office.

For number 2. This one was tricky to find. So, I got the translation for "where do I obtain a drivers license in Shandong, Yantai?" using baidu translate. Then, I plugged that Chinese translation into baidu. The first result was a Baidu Answers link with a one word answer. Translated, it read something like "Yantai Municipal Transport Permit and Inspection Office". I used Baidu Maps to find out where that is. (If you've noticed, I don't use Google in China. Google is amazing...but in China it's just not useful) It was on the other side of town and took over an hour on the bus to get there. There, I find a large parking lot filled with cars, trucks, transports (Lorries), a dude in suspenders waiting next to a crane, and about a hundred cops. The road seemed to line up with one building that has more pillars and decorations than the others, so I go in there and start annoying some people. The dude at the "inquiry" desk was sitting pretty contently so I ask him, "zai zher, wo huan jianada zhizhao ...uhh...dai ti...uhh... zhongguo zhizhao." This dude was great. He doesn't miss a beat. He smiles and points to a map that has been taped to the desk written on looseleaf in pencil. It makes no sense to me. Dude at the desk already has a pen and paper out. He writes the name of the place and the phone number for it and hands me the paper. I ask for pinyin. He complies and I type it into my phones baidu maps app. It pops up and I verify that this is the correct place. He says "dui". I verify again my goal. "wo gei tamen wo de jianada zhizhao, tamen gei wo yi ge zhongguo zhizhao ma?" He says "yeah". And I'm off to my next destination. It's on the other other side of town and is another hour by bus. A small success in China feels more rewarding than a similar success anywhere else. This place ended up being the correct place. The name that dude wrote down was, "caojiazhuang, 曹家庄“ When I put those three words into baidu maps, it sent me directly to the correct building. This may be specific to Yantai and I have no idea what those characters mean.

At the License Testing Center I found the correct counter after annoying a few bored security guards. I was told the address of the translation office. I also learned where to get the medical done. It was done in the same building as the exam. Very handy. So off to the translation office.

For Number 3 Yantai Foreign Affairs and Overseas Chinese Affairs Office. Address: 烟台莱山，9新苑路。 9 Xinyuan Lu, Laishan, Yantai. Baidu Maps will again send you to the right place using that address, if you're in Yantai. When I got there I entered the wrong door and talked to a security guard who sent me into the office of the actual translator. NOT the person at the counter who takes your money. I found the guy who speaks English, accidentally. He took my license and translated it. Then I showed him my Drive in China app. His manager came in while this was going on and asked what was up. The drive in China app was passed to the manager who then asked my name and position in the office (I wasn't suppose to be there). I was revealed to be an English teacher teaching at a nearby university. As it turns out, the Vice-Dean in my faculty is a good personal friend of this manager. Because she liked the Drive in China app, She asked me to come back next week and start teaching the workers there some English.

This mornings events. Arrive at License Testing Center. A clerk takes all my documents, fills in all the blanks. The Chinese people are looking at me thinking, "Why doesn't she fill in all the blanks for me," Then she hands my papers to a police man who is asked to escort me to the medical exam. He thinks this is the most annoying thing anyone could do, so he makes it go faster. He butts to the front of EVERY line and I am allowed to go next. The Chinese people are looking at me thinking, "Who the hell is that fat foreign bastard who just butted in line?" Then he returns me to the counter. My paperwork is again done for me. I am told where the test will take place. Passed (96/100) and came back. They handed me my license. And that's it.

LASTLY, the questions in the Drive in China app differ wildly from the questions I received. I would say there were more errors and deviations than similar questions. I passed because some of the content was similar and the laws being tested haven't changed. However, I have seen better and more accurate versions of the test questions. Were I to do it again, I would not buy the Drive in China app. I do not recommend it.

ALSO, my Chinese skills are still bad...sorry. I try to make light of it but it's still really embarrassing.

AND, As promised, a link to soberpete's post.

For the past three years I ...

[galenernest]

Interesting that you had to go to the foreign affairs translation center for the license translation. I just had my friend translate my license into Chinese here in Beijing and that was fine... no need for any professional translation (even asked at the Traffic Management office to be sure).

Also, for the written exam, I tried the iPhone app, but ended up studying from this site: http://www.chinese-driving-test.com/
That site comes pretty close to replicating the exam (at least the exam that I took...)

Glad to hear that you got your license! What kind of bike are you going to ride?

[NZBrakelathes]

Can someone point me to the law that allows foreigners to apply for chinese license? QingYuan near Guangzhou the police are thick as shut and are telling us we can't do it
I need references to the Chinese law

[galenernest]

Can someone point me to the law that allows foreigners to apply for chinese license? QingYuan near Guangzhou the police are thick as shut and are telling us we can't do it
I need references to the Chinese law

This is from Beijing, so I'm not sure how much it will help you in QingYuan, but you can give it a shot :)

Here's the starting point with links to various sections of the Traffic Management Bureau:

http://www.bjjtgl.gov.cn/english/Ins...ons/index.html

Here's a page specific to holders of foreign driver licenses obtaining a Chinese driver's license:

http://www.bjjtgl.gov.cn/english/ure...970/index.html

Required documents for the application:

http://www.bjjtgl.gov.cn/english/ure...983/index.html

Again, this is for Beijing... hope it helps convince the folks in QingYuan to help you out...

[humanbeing]

I need references to the Chinese law

http://www.mps.gov.cn/n16/n1282/n349...7/3386943.html
search "境外" in that page
Identity Document =
外国人的身份证明，是其入境时所持有的护照或者其他旅行证件、居（停）留期为三个月以上的有效签证或者居留 许可，以及公安机关出具的住宿登记证明；

[Joshmakesnoise]

I thought I'd update on my current situation in Shanghai. I never got the license in England so was going to do the full process in shanghai. To cut things short foreigners can take the test, but only in chinese. I've been to every possible test centre I can take the exam and they say you can only take the test in chinese because shanghai scrapped the english version of the test last year, so now there is no test in english. However if you transfer a license from your home country they have a test.... In my opinion this is extremely annoying and frustrating not to mention if your chinese you actually can just buy the license. So such a strict law but you can actual buy te license if you're chinese but if you're a foreigner you can't. I will keep trying my best to take the test but as of now they're telling all foreigners to wait for another english exam accordingly...

[ZMC888]

I thought I'd update on my current situation in Shanghai. I never got the license in England so was going to do the full process in shanghai. To cut things short foreigners can take the test, but only in chinese. I've been to every possible test centre I can take the exam and they say you can only take the test in chinese because shanghai scrapped the english version of the test last year, so now there is no test in english. However if you transfer a license from your home country they have a test.... In my opinion this is extremely annoying and frustrating not to mention if your chinese you actually can just buy the license. So such a strict law but you can actual buy te license if you're chinese but if you're a foreigner you can't. I will keep trying my best to take the test but as of now they're telling all foreigners to wait for another english exam accordingly...

Well yep, it's China. Porn blocked from the internet, but there is a brothel on every street corner! So long as you call it binguan, lifadien, ktv etc etc

Must be a loop-hole to do it somewhere else in Asia and transfer it...or maybe it needs to be from your home country only.

[Joshmakesnoise]

Well yep, it's China. Porn blocked from the internet, but there is a brothel on every street corner! So long as you call it binguan, lifadien, ktv etc etc

Must be a loop-hole to do it somewhere else in Asia and transfer it...or maybe it needs to be from your home country only.

Yeah, the law is just something else. I'm so confused to why you can transfer you original license and take the test but not just sit the practical and take the theory test as well. It's just making Ch!na lose money, but obviously not too much or else they wouldn't have scrapped the test.

I'm going to get in contact with some friends in Japan and Korea. Although maybe I can get the license I'm Thailand or Vietnam.

Either way I will get the license without going all the way back to the UK to sit the test.



Or, I might just try my best with my CBT license and play dumb with the officers and explain I ride in the UK with this license and therefore I am entitled to ride I'm Ch!na. But maybe this will not work

[NZBrakelathes]

I've got an nz license but here they saying they can't do it for foreigners ???