China Visa when you are already abroad?

We are working in South Korea and finish up in September when our ARC cards run out. We were planning on going home via a tour of SE Asia and then Transiberian Railway, but are having problems with our China Visa. We have just found out that the SEoul Embassy will only issue visas if you have 6 months left on your ARC card, which we will not have. We have e-mailed a number of embassies in countries we will be visiting and they seem to be saying the same thing and we are reluctant to post our passports home to get one while we are out here. Any help would be appreciated!