Taiwan ID Card and China travel

[Falcon]

By the way, we seriously need to have way more posts here than in "Rants and raves." I'm surprised that this board is nearly empty.

All that time and energy spent complaining about American women can be better spent figuring out practical stuff, such as visas.

[eurobrat]

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[Falcon]

Interesting, I'm in a similar situation too. But yes, I'm already in their system, so I already have a good head start.

As I've mentioned easlier, Taiwan follows Jus Sanguinis as well, and also has a rule that I need to be a resident and have an address there. I can easily use one of my relatives' addresses, but I might also need to show evidence of long-term residency. I don't think I'll ever live in Taiwan continuously for an entire year, which is one of their prerequisites.

[eurobrat]

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[Winston]

@Falcon
Things have gotten easier now. All you have to do is go to any travel agency in Taiwan, and apply for a China compatriot permit. It's an ID card with a microchip in it, that lets you enter and exit China as many times as you want, and stay as long as you want. And it lasts 10 years. It only took a few minutes for me to apply for it at a travel agency in Taiwan. And the fee was only 1000 NT, or 30 USD. Then they tell you to come back next week to pick it up. That's all there is to it now. Easy as pie.

It seems that China wants to make it super easy for Taiwan nationals to go to China. Probably because if enough Taiwanese live or work in China or do business there, then the process of unification between China and Taiwan will be much easier and smoother, I would guess, as both will be more and more integrated. So that works to your advantage.

I don't know if you need a Taiwan national ID though. Or if a Taiwan passport is enough. You should google that question or ask a travel agency about it.

You won't be conscripted for military duty in Taiwan if you're over 35 or you have a work, school, life abroad that you have to go back to. Even if you're under 35, you can still get permission not to serve as long as you say you live abroad. But you gotta get stamped permission first and it should be easy to get.