Comments on: Cart before horse in Chinese-Canadian tourism

By: Almost Famous | A China Blog on Suzhou Expat Life | The Humanaught

Almost Famous | A China Blog on Suzhou Expat Life | The Humanaught — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 13:10:20 +0000

[...] here I was chuffed that my hometown paper posted the letter to the editor I sent [...]

By: Ryan

Ryan — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 01:56:45 +0000

Haha Chris, I KNEW that last name was familiar. Sorry man, didn’t mean to slight ya or yer kin.

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 23:19:20 +0000

I just want you to know I wasn’t amused by the “Maloney baloney” line. Also, you guys might get lucky and become the 加拿大自治区。
Chris Maloney

By: Ryan

Ryan — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 16:43:54 +0000

Of course by then Canada will be called 加拿大省 in the great Chinese empire.

By: Chip

Chip — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 02:10:00 +0000

Same thing here with my wife trying to get to the states (although we didn’t need to provide THAT much info, it seems Canada might be even sticter). Well written post, it’s a problem that will solve itself once the average salary of a Chinese citizen matches that of a Canadian. It’s all about incentives. Give it 80 years, and your wife should be able to fly over pretty easily. ;P

By: Guest

Guest — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 21:26:01 +0000

Yeah, and a potential visitor has to get a letter from his employer stating that employer “doesn’t mind” visitor’s trip to Canada. How insulting is this… And after that Canada speaks about “human rights”.

By: Steven

Steven — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 09:25:19 +0000

“six months of banking records and pay stubs for my wife, myself, and each family member we’ll be staying with while in Canada”

that really is invasive. on both sides of the water. i’m stunned!

By: Ryan

Ryan — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 08:23:38 +0000

Hey Dez, bit weird replying to this post – having talked to you about it – but well, in the interests of clarity…

I’m not at all saying that the Canadian gov’t need change the application process, in fact, what I’m saying is it’s not going to change.

The original Tribune article makes ADS seem to be the perfect solution to the lost American dollars.

However, the visa process for China (or any of the 150+ other countries that require a visa) isn’t going to change.

So, Niagara tourism, hungry to re-fill the American ass-print on the slot stools, can criticize the government and lobby them to compromise their representation of Canadian ethics (ya ya..) in order to stop China’s childish ADS punishment, but will it really make that big of a difference?

We’re talking the ability of China’s affluent to come to Canada and spend their money – is it really so hard for them to do that now?

Where inroads need to be made is for the middle-class traveller that isn’t stupidly loaded, but might have their own apartment, maybe even a QQ car.

These are tourism’s bread and butter. And these folks are still going to have a helluva time convincing the government of Canada that they’re not going to make a run for Spadina.

By: Dezza

Dezza — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 06:44:08 +0000

the reason why the lai chang xing case is stopping canada from getting the ADS is china’s economic punishment to canada for not shipping him back to face charges..the money made from these overseas junkets is huge. just ask rolex and fine perfume dealers in europe.

ADS status would allow mainland tour groups to visit canada but it doesn’t mean that single visitors (such as your wife) would have an easier time picking up visas. it’d probably be just as stringent.

i’ve met quite a few chinese ‘canadians’ who went to canada on study visas and upon landing just went straight to work to make money. they don’t pay taxes and some have even gone onto join the triads. of course, not all of them do but they’re not doing themselves any favours by not contributing to their new home either. that’s why Chinese young people especially are placed under very stringent application procedures. sorry man.