It's still seven months off, but China travelers will want to take note of October 1 as a date that could bring an Olympic-style tightening of visa rules & regulations. 

Though it may prove mere rumor in the end, we've been informed by an in-the-know and well-placed source in China's travel and tourism industry that China's 60th birthday celebration will likely give rise to another round of visa difficulties for travelers. 

This is a year full of sensitive dates, of course, from the 50th anniversary of China's big move on Tibet--Beijing is calling it "Serf Liberation Day"; Tibetans the world over have a whole lot of other words for it--to the 20th anniversary of what the government refers to as an "incident" that took place here.  

And yes, it's true that those two anniversaries, the first of which just passed while the other is just about two months off, have yet to lead to tighter restrictions like we saw last summer. However, those two T-dates are ones Beijing wants to downplay. 

October 1st, on the other hand, figures to be a major media extravaganza rivaling the Olympic Opening Ceremonies for bombast and pageantry. You can bet that those in charge don't want any pesky foreign protesters scampering up buildings to drop banners--or do anything else that could disrupt things--while they orchestrate and execute a massive celebration of the October 1, 1949 founding of the People's Republic. 

So... we're thinking there could be something to the rumor. We hope not, but we'll keep on it and let you know whatever we can find out.

Regardless, it's good to keep the date in mind. As our favorite visa expert Magic tells us, "normally, at every big ceremony, they'll tighten up the visa policy." 

You can always find the latest China visa updates in our popular China Passport & Visa Forum, where we tracked the complex and shifting ins & outs of the 2008 Beijing Olympics visa situation. 

You can also check out our recent aggregation of China visa news to get a handle on the current  situation.

And if you're really into it, may we recommend you subscribe to our Passport & Visa RSS feed?
 
And as always, our best tips and info comes from you, our members, so keep the comments coming!