Pandemic-era Trip Report: Shanghai PVG Arrivals

The arrivals process in Shanghai-Pudong Airport merits an entry all by itself, during this pandemic, since it’s comprised of many steps. Pictures aren’t allowed in the customs and immigration area, so the first part of this won’t be illustrated.

1. First, you need to have prepared the Chinese Customs Health Declaration QR code. There wasn’t any signage about this in SFO, but I think they should have something advising passengers to fill out the online form prior to arrival. The code is valid for 24 hours, so it’s best to do it in advance.

2. Then you sit down at a desk and someone scans your QR code, and then you sign an informed consent form to take the COVID test.

3. Then you go to another desk, where someone prints out a barcode to stick on your informed consent form, and a barcode to stick on your test vial.

4. You take the test vial down a flight of stairs and then kind of into an outdoor area, where there’s booth after booth of people administering COVID tests.

5. This cartoon has been passed around WeChat for a while, and I think it’s totally true. I think the original cartoon has “Boogers” where someone pasted over the USA COVID test label, and “COVID test” where the China COVID test label now sits. In San Diego, I thought the swab went really deep, and it felt ticklish. But here, they go that deep, but then they keep going and going. So far that I think they’re going to puncture something on the other side! Then they twist the swab around in circles. Then stop. Then they continue to twist in circles! I teared up when they did this. And then they do it to the other nostril!

6. Then after this test, you go back into the terminal building, and get your paper stamped.

7. Then someone collects your paper.

8. Then it’s like the normal immigration process. You have your yellow Arrivals card and present it to an immigration officer. By the way, every single staff member is in a full hazmat suit, with eye protection and face mask.

9. After immigration, you pick up bags in baggage claim. They have luggage carts here for free. Here there is also a desk that sells SIM cards. The guy was really helpful in teaching me how to top off my mobile phone account through Alipay on my own!

10. With your checked bags, you proceed through customs. I had nothing to declare, but had to put one of my bags through the scanning machine.

11. After exiting customs, there is literally a fork in the road. You go to the right if your final destination is outside of Shanghai. You go to the left if you have residency in Shanghai.

12. At the end of this walkway, you scan QR code to fill out another health declaration form, one for the city of Shanghai. This generates another QR code.

13. After this point, you find the district where your residence is, and check in with them. They scan your QR code, and it’s here where you apply for home quarantine, and they also assign you to a quarantine hotel. They were nice and offered some snacks - you can see the “Free Food” table to the left. They said there would probably be a wait, for them to gather enough other passengers for the bus over to the hotel. Darn! The previous steps had gone by so quickly because I was prepared and the process was very efficient. But then I was the first and only person here now waiting for others to join.

The guy standing up was one of the agents for my district, spraying down the area I was just sitting and standing in!

14. I took a bun, water, and 白兔糖 White Rabbit candy, bringing back childhood memories! The other snack on offer were cartons of milk. The wait was indeed very long. I waited about 2 hours here, before moving on to the next step. The other passengers who joined seemed to have come from an Air China flight from Tokyo-Narita. And by the way, this area has no heating, so please be prepared with warm clothes (in wintertime)!

15. Then with a group gathered together, the district agents lead you to another line, where your Shanghai QR code is scanned, and they print out a giant QR code to stick to the back of your passport. Then they keep your passport until you get to the hotel.

16. After that’s done, you go about three at a time into two elevators to the 1st floor. Once everyone is there, you then walk to the bus.

The bus itself was rather dingy, and there was hardly enough space for everyone’s suitcases. Also, you can’t sit too close to the driver, which may explain why some of the seat bottoms of the seats closer to the front were ripped out.