On the afternoon of May 22 police in Longna got calls reporting a hobo walking on the high way. Upon investigation they discovered that the ‘hobo’ was just a poor foreigner who had taken the wrong bus from Chengdu to Chongqing and couldn’t afford to buy another ticket.
The Canadian man had traveled to Chengdu to go and see the pandas for the first time and ran into some trouble on his way back to Chongqing. He wanted to take a bus from the one city to the other but, because of his bad Chinese language skills, he ended up in a city near Luzhou and was told that he had to get out because he had reached his destination.
After taking him into the police station for questioning the police found out that he did not have enough money to take the bus back to Chongqing and had decided to walk home. The escorted him to the station, bought him a ticket and sent him home on a bus.
Nice to hear a good story about police interactions with foreigners.
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Keywords: helped by police foreigner mistaken for hobo
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er...he has a residence in Chengdou ? why did he so wanna back ?
Jun 02, 2014 13:32 Report Abuse
I know that guy! I picked him up hitchhiking in Klamath Falls, Oregon. He certainly gets around, last I heard from him he had just finished hitchhiking down Japan and was heading to China. Looks like he made it. Sent him the article.
May 30, 2014 04:00 Report Abuse
this guy has no money and is a utter disgrace to all of us "lao wai" he should have had his butt kicked out the country. In my situations I have had iphone stolen, big sum of cash stolen once and all the police do is make my situation 10 times worse...accusing me of lying and then demanding I bribe them to stay in the country! This is in Shanghai by the way! My best advice to fellow "lao wai", if you run into trouble in China, run home! Take the hit and try to forget it, getting the police involved only guarantees you face many more problems than you could ever imagine. They see us as an opportunity to get a bribe, its happened to me twice, and never ever ever again will I call upon the police for help.
May 28, 2014 17:20 Report Abuse
My fella and I have come into contact with a lot of authorities during our several years here. Every single one has been a very positive experience. We were handled with care, consideration and with utmost fairness. I hope the same applies to the treatment of their own people.
May 28, 2014 16:52 Report Abuse
This story sounds similar to this one: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2014-01/29/content_17265196.htm
May 27, 2014 17:25 Report Abuse
great help... sometime we walk on the road and never know where we heading but helping hand always around ys
May 27, 2014 10:53 Report Abuse
Is that him in the picture? People with dreadlocks have been known to be "partially-aware". If you go to a foreign country you should take money.
May 26, 2014 21:13 Report Abuse
This guy is a damn embarrassment. "I don't have any money, let me go to China to see the pandas."
May 26, 2014 21:09 Report Abuse
People end up broke for various reason to underestimating how much a thing would cost to losing a bank card. It is a good thing the police were their to help him though.
May 27, 2014 10:37 Report Abuse
city-to-city by bus is never cheaper than by train. second - highway walk without gps?? ... third, police will generally escort foreigners for quite some distances when lost. it happened to me twice in the countryside and every other long-distance traveler i've met reported same... sometimes quite far 300km stretches
May 26, 2014 20:47 Report Abuse
"city-to-city by bus is never cheaper than by train.". The bus from my city to Shanghai: 90 rmb. Second class train ticket? 105 rmb.
May 27, 2014 08:35 Report Abuse
he reached his destination in the end, thats a happy ending
May 26, 2014 19:14 Report Abuse
Yikes! Usually i complain about the articles just calling everyone foreigner and not saying where they are from. Today i would have prefered they didnt!
May 26, 2014 18:44 Report Abuse