I'm an Indian citizen and planning to travel to China to visit my Chinese friend. My friend is currently in the US doing MS and will be going home to China in December for vacation. So I'm going at that time to visit him. The plan is to stay at his parent's house for my short stay (one week there).
So should I apply for a normal L tourist visa?
Also will it be problematic that I'm staying at his house rather than at a hotel?
It is perfectly fine to visit a Chinese friend on an L (tourist) visa. To obtain the visa, your friend should write a letter of invitation and send it to you. You should submit it with your visa application.
According to the visa application instructions, the invitation letter should include:
The invitation letter should contain:
a. Information on the applicant (full name, gender, date of birth, etc.)
b. Information on the planned visit (arrival and departure dates, place(s) to be visited, etc.)
c. Information on the inviting entity or individual (name, contact telephone number, address, official stamp, signature of the legal representative or the inviting individual)
See the instructions for additional documents that you must provide.
