Phew–I'm Legal Again

The last 5 days I’ve harbored a little secret. I was in China illegally.
You see, my current permit expired on June 30th, so on June 28th, a friday, me, my boss and 3 other foreigners trundled off to the police station to register for next year. Only, we got there too late and they told us to come back after lunch, which we did 2 hours later. Only apparently between the time we left and came back they “got a call” and were told they couldn’t process anymore foreign permits until after July 1st.
On July 1st, the government implemented some new, pretty strict visa requirements for foreigners (aiming to squash illegal workers). Penalties for overstaying your permit are now much worse (for example the maximum fine went from a 5,000 rmb to 50,000 rmb.) These new rules won’t affect my job, or my permit, but they had to update their computers, and we could “come back on monday to register” they told us.
But on monday we were told “Sorry, updating still.”
Tuesday, “no can do.”
Wednesday, “Not yet.”
Meanwhile I was getting a little nervous. I mean sure, the police gave us assurances that “it was fine” but the fact was I was sitting on an expired permit. If I got got caught up in something, and the local cop saw my expired visa, I would get hauled to jail. I feel like it would eventually get worked out in my favor, but not without a lot of hassle. I also couldn’t buy a plane or train ticket and couldn’t stay at a hotel with a expired permit.

Luckily no one asked me for my passport, and I didn’t get caught up in any trouble, but still, I was a tad nervous. I just wanted to get my new permit and be done with it. I woke up early thursday certain today would be the day. It wasn’t.
In fact it wasn’t until today, friday afternoon, that we were finally able to go and register. They took my passport, which they won’t give back for about 10 days, but I have a fancy stamped receipt to prove the police have it and that I’m allowed to be in the country. So it’s all good.
And while it was a worry and slight inconvenience for me, I was way better off than another teacher who is new next year. He had to live in a Lin’an hotel waiting to register. He was told “just one more day” for an entire week! What a pain.