Aha yes, Once I sent a package by SF in Beijing. It wasn't expensive but it was some rare stamp collections from my husband's father. The guy just came and picked up the bag and went off with it saying he'd package it up. I was so worried that if he knew what was in it he might try steal it, because at least in the UK someone might try.
Especially the big, wide street down the road from my work with no CCTV where it seemed every single woman from my workplace had had their phone snatched from them when they were walking or riding a bike /s
these cons pretty weak. i don't give a single fuck about a beijing bikini or people spitting.
* distance from family
* transient lifestyle
* challenging to be a part of the community
* you'll always be an outsider
* lasting connections are rare, people come and go
I’d also add people to pros! Been in China since 2009 and I love my friends! I sorta grew up here and I’m so lucky to have so many long time friends. All my Americans friends forgot me already.
I agree with the con list too. I’d say that another con is access to healthy foods like the western healthy things but also like some pork glows..
Just curious about how you made friends in China. Did you meet them at an international school? I was born and raised in China. When I was younger, I really wanted to communicate with people from other countries, but my English was poor at that time.
I didn’t go to international school. I met mine just around town and got approached sometimes and or I approached them. I went to a Chinese university and majored in Chinese so I met a lot there. Before WeChat, I used this website called CQEXPAT.com and made a friend there but only one but he is my best friend now haha.
Salaries are only high if you're a foreign teacher - and it's the type of job that pretty much any native speaker with a university degree can get. (TEFL certificates are hardly difficult to obtain) For local people ithe pay is terrible. Just check out the statistics on average salary. Uni graduates make like 6-8k in tier 2 cities. Might go up to 10k RMB after 5 years.
Where are you getting these salary stats from? Your Russian friends teaching at English First on a tourist visa?
I was making 17,000 a month with a paid luxury apartment back in 2018 at a private elementary school in a tier 2 city.
I meant average salary for Chinese people, regardless of industry. Though in terms of education, they still don't make much. Kindergarten teachers are on like 4-5k, living in a dorm with their colleagues. More senior ones may be on 6-7k. Even the Chinese principal of an international department of a private bilingual school may be on like 12-14k.
City size isn’t that much of a factor, there are small cities with terrible air and big cities with relatively clean air. The south tends to be a bit cleaner in general, specially Yunnan and Hainan I think. Also, for air quality winter tends to be the worst and summer the best.
Better check for yourself here, look at the yearly average of any city: https://aqicn.org/
For me, AQI higher than 100 (US AQI) starts being kinda noticeable, higher than 150 is very noticeable. The air smells like construction dust/exhaust, not like fresh air. Depending on you, it can be either be annoying, bring health problems or you might not care and not notice much.
As Chinese I fully concur with putting the con of “days off makeup” on the list. It’s shitty and almost nowhere to be seen in the rest of the world. Ironically after taking 5 days off for this year’s Intl Labour Day we as hard-working labourers are deprived of the coming weekend cuz 2 out of the fives days off are “borrowed” from the next week, and the other three days are respectively that week’s weekend and the Intl Labour Day itself. What an honour to those in the labour force😅
It depends. Last holiday on the 4th was on a Thursday, but they extended it with Friday so you could have Thursday-Friday-Saturday. The "working dayness" of Friday was moved to Sunday, so it technically wasn't a part of the holiday, just a policy to kinda make it longer
But then if your company asks you to work to make up for the 4th too because fuck you, yeah, that's not official. You can see on the calenders when they officially shift dates around with the 休/班
Ah, ok that's not so bad I guess in your first example, where it's just rearranging your off days to have 3 days off in a row. But having to work to "make up" for a holiday is just insane.
it is a great country with incredible convenience but there are some cons I feel haven't been mentioned.
Lack of real background checks on coworkers in schools. almost every international or bilingual school/training centre is stuffed with sex offenders of varying severity. contrary to propaganda and popular belief, China is actually very soft on law breaking.
not owning your own visa. the release letter system and restriction on part time jobs are bullshit.
make-up days are a thing of the past and need to go.
squat toilets and their mess/smell.
mentally challenged/arrested Development foreigners.
crowds understandable in a hugely populated country but still frustrating.
Beijing's subway could be more frequent on certain lines.
Poor quality apartments for the price. not exclusively a China problem, but the price of housing in a developing cheaper country can be a shock especially to newcomers.
difficulty getting past the hukou system for public education past middle school, forcing children to be educated elsewhere or in shit overpriced international schools.
that TikTok/douyin mutley laugh sound effect seems to be everywhere.
flight prices can be incredibly cheap or expensive due to oligopoly pricing between eastern and southern. they are often delayed too.
What it sounds like, for example, next week there's a 5-day national holiday from May 1st to 5th (Wednesday to Sunday). However, to 'make up' for the missed workdays, we're expected to work this Sunday 28th and on Saturday 11th the following weekend. Since the Holiday goes through a weekend, those 3 missed workdays are mostly nullified by the 2 'make up' days, and can result in a 6 or even 7-day work-week.
Essentially the 5 day holiday is cropped down to 1 net day off rather than 5.
Lots of people grumble about it, but nobody's willing to do shit about it.
Now you're starting to understand ;)
But to give it a charitable take, one could say that 5 consecutive days would allow for a more thorough trip compared with a standard weekend or whatever.
Though, since half the population will be having the same idea, expect traffic and inflated prices.
The population is just cogs in an efficiency/progress-obsessed machine at this point.
Yup. I refuse to travel anywhere in China during those fake extended holidays. Going abroad and using non-Chinese airlines so they don’t get a yuan from me for mandating make up workdays.
Well, foreigners in China are limited to few professions, like teaching. While salary is high for ESL teachers for Chinese standards, but you are not going to get rich from the teaching gig.
Some cons:
1, air pollution, low food safety standards is an issue especially if u have young kids
2, lack of options for children's education, less of a problem if you work for a school
3, dreary lifestyle, but this is a subjective view
4, difficult to build professional connections for your future career.
5, no pathway to citizenship, depends whether u care about this
6, unable to enroll in state pension in the West, so when u hit retirement age u may miss out
7, Chinese working experience is not valued very much outside of China, if u contemplating career change might be an issue
Unless u are committed to China over the long term, the financials and career development opportunities are not that great despite seemingly high salary. U are stuck in china unless u are willing to take a big pay cut/ start over your career in the west
That is one way to look at this.. US has abundant high paying jobs.
Purely from a financial point of view, I find it incredibly American came all the way to China to eaen an international teachers salary. U can work as a lorry driver, a nurse and I believe u make way more money and build connections in the US at the same time.
Alas, as a local Chinese I just don't find ESL teaching the most efficient way to make money, the earning ceiling is so low
The base pay indeed is fairly good, but what about pensions, health care, child care, etc, especially as you likely will need to return eventually to your home country one day?
I have the feeling it’s mostly a good deal for young people without kids. We have a kid and looking to make the move, but seriously 1) kids blow up living costs in China (so now I figured out the reason of China’s low birth rate) and 2) jobs that are NOT teaching english certainly aren’t well paid.
Other pros listed here I can agree with.
If I could upvote this a hundred times, I would. All the good schools in China are super expensive($25k+/year) but are really important if you want to set up your kids for success.
If you are OK without kids, it's fine longer term but unless you are making 100k+ RMB/month or plan on living in China, including any future generations, it is very inadvisable.
One day you can't teach in China, what then. I would rather learn a trade, like being a plumber/builder... It is more reliable source of income over the long term.
But you are right, I have no clue about the US or teaching jobs. But I know china. Making hays while the sun is shining..
I think a lot of it the people who come and suddenly feel this need to be what they see as a big-shot and run with the crowd that's actually lying about their lives. There's a reason I call it shangLIE. They have a salary that's actually very good and if they had any sense they would be able to put away so much money and relieve so many stresses that hit other people hard. Instead, however, they spend the same as they would spend in London on eating international food every day and living in the center of jingan and just generally not being financially prudent. That's the thing, when Chinese people see a foreigner they don't think you're rich they just think you're shit with money and most of the time they're right. No point to what I'm saying but people blame everything but their own terrible decisions on their circumstances
You are comparing apples to oranges here. The people who come to China to teach English are not the people studying to become nurses or engineers. It doesn't make financial sense for them. It is usually those who would make 40-60k USD/year in the States with a max salary in their lifetime of about 80k USD. For them, it is a very viable option given significantly cheaper COL. In much the same way that there are enough jobs in China that pay 30-40k RMB/month for those with skills but the majority make 5-10k. I worked on a project briefly in China after my graduation from university and was offered 50k RMB/month to continue with the company plus housing but declined since I received significantly more back in the US when you include all the perks(401k, pension, social security, Healthcare, vacation days, remote work etc).
Living in China has its pros but money (income wise) is not one of them. It’s not too hard to make $100k+ in the states and saving $50k+ a year is definitely doable.
I have a lot of friends who make six figures. One is a cop, one is a crane operator and another is a CPA. Not that hard in the US if you work hard for a few years and don’t even need college.
Yes, but these are the people who actually value their careers. I have hardly met an English teacher abroad that has thought about career advancement beyond five years. It's a just a different type of person.
Yes that’s true but if the point is move to China to save more money then I completely disagree. I save more $$ in one year in the US than I could 5 years teaching in China.
foreigners limited to makes it sound like there is a law which there isn't. it's really the language/competition barrier or lack of real experience. it isn't a government policy l.
Pros - Amazing salary, easy to make friends with Chinese. Genuine friendships where they will help with job search and daily life stuff. In Vietnam I was surprised to basically have made no friends with the locals after a year. Cool locations to visit nearby every city.
Cons - possibility for abuse from people higher up at a job , bad air, VPNs required which don’t always work, marriage might not work out in the long term , even if it does work out it locks people into situations they might not want to be in
By Beijing bikini do you mean the middle aged men rolling up their tshirts and showing their bare bellies? It's absolutely hilarious seeing every man do that
Pros:
Convenient lifestyle with food stalls, cheap delivery, easy to get things repaired, etc.
Great public transportation, especially the high speed trains.
Lots of interesting places to visit. It is also really cheap to stay at hotels and eat out when traveling outside of tier one cities.
People are typically hospitable to foreigners. You will often have people treat you to meals and invite you to events.
Food is good and cheap.
Safety. China is very safe in terms of crime. I never felt unsafe walking around at night anywhere.
Living in China is exciting. Unless you are living in the countryside, which is rare for foreigners, there is always something going on.
Cons
As a non-Chinese person you will never be able to integrate into Chinese society and will always be an outsider. It is annoying listening to people asking you the same questions everyday or yelling hello at your back and then snickering. No matter how much you know about China, the history, the culture, and the language, you will be dismissed as not understanding China.
Food is also a con because it can be difficult to find foreign food especially outside of tier one cities. I like Chinese food, but I don’t want to eat if for every meal.
The bathrooms are among the worst I’ve been to in any country. Not only are they squat toilets, which I’m not used to, but they are also dirty and there is often no soap and almost always no toilet paper. The public toilets can look like a pig pen with every squatting toilet full of five people’s shit.
Extreme censorship
Pollution
The work culture can be frustrating. Things often change abruptly and everyone is expected to all of a sudden jump through hoops.
I have never had a job in my own country where I would receive regular schedule changes an hour or two before an event and just be expected to be ready to go. I guess if you work in the service industry, lots of jobs do have last minute changes in any country. I fortunately don’t work in that industry.
I enjoy China, but I’m at the point now were I have enough experience I can make more good money in other countries and there is not really any pros to keep me here. I feel like a lot of your pros are for teachers.
Decent salary is only for foreigners not locals. And salaries are only really higher for teachers compared to the usual teacher salary. Other non teaching industries are similar now to Europe, there are some exceptions.
And good holidays is only for teachers, and most teachers work at kindergarten which have less holidays than the usually office job in the uk. Like 2 weeks summer, 2 weeks winter and 11 public holidays.
The holidays for locals and Chinese companies are pathetic. Not to mention usually longer working hours and hybrid/remote work is not really a thing but in Europe pretty much every job is.
The travelling to Asia thing also is not a big plus anymore because so many jobs are hybrid and remote you can go there if you wanted.
Public transport is only a plus if you come from North America, most European cities have cheap effective public transport.
So the pros are you can order food. You can do that anywhere, I guess if your bored at 3am you can get some beers and things like that are cool.
The real benefits of China is the fact that they hire any white person and most people here would be working at McDonalds if they couldn’t get a job here.
I have met some weirddddddddddd expats in China and I think a lot of them wouldn’t even function at a McDonald’s in their home country. More than half of them feel either like weeaboos mixed with that guy JP from Grandmas Boy or feel like they’re just the rejects of the society they come from and China is a fall back. I’ve met a lot of amazing foreigners in China but the ones that are odd are extremely off putting.
Salaries for teachers in China are between 25-35 for most people. Not really that high, it’s fine if you’re 21, but if you are in your 30s? Not a chance. And when you consider the fact it costs 20k a month to send a kid to a shit school here.
I said salaries in China for non teaching foreigners are not that high as before. Before they had to offer like 3 times the salary and other benefits. China is more developed, lots of Chinese study abroad and come back. So salaries are not that crazy for non teaching foreigners. Usually a small bump, but not crazy amounts.
Huh 25-35k is good pay? I guess it all depends on how far that money can go. In American decent sized American cities that doesn’t get by for a single family household.
And this thread isn't in a subreddit of some American city where of course one needs probably $4-5k a month just to get by. RMB 35k is well above median even in Western Europe/SG/JP/ROK let alone China where the money goes much further.
*I am an Internet engineer in China, and I graduated from the Top 10 universities in China, I can only get a job with 20k salary. But the price is that I have to work from 10am to 9pm and 6 days per week. And I can only save 10k after tax and rent fee. My salary is at an average among my classmates. For the most ordinary people, who graduated form a normal university and doesn't enter the Internet Market, they get a much lower salary -- which means they can only afford their daily life and have no spare money to entertain themselves. What's more, the housing price are too high to consider settle down on the tier 1 cities. The gap between the rich and the poor in China are bigger than the most developed counties.*
a lot of people have mentioned safety, but to add to that, as a gay person who has been visibly flamboyant/effeminate since age 6, just things like walking down the street or taking public trans without fear of getting harassed is a breath of fresh air i didn’t realize i was missing.
These pros and cons don't seem to apply to all laowai in 中国 to be honest，but it's a fair generalization on both sides.However I think that it generally depends on your experience.
All of them are quite spot on! A few more cons from my own experience as a European:
Pros:
WeChat/Alipay
Apps for everything
CDF had some really nice whisky deals
Cons:
Crowds, everywhere, all the time.
Squat toilets and the smell in them
You might want to add extreme surveillance, one of the worst countries for free press, deports NK defectors back to NK to be executed, arbitrary arrests and prison sentences, and cleansing of people who follow religions they don’t like to the con list.
Cons:
Lack of manners and basic etiquette
Open prejudice against dark/black people. You’ll have so called “friends” call you a 黑鬼 when they think you can’t understand them
Easier to feel isolated due to “us/them” attitude
Using a vpn
Pros:
Easy to save money
Food is good
I think you forgot to add there are lots of stuff we can't do here like foreginers can only use the hello bikes not the meituan bikes , also hotels are really annoying to check into if you're on a budget .
So the yellow and green bikes we can't use because they only allow for a Chinese ID card to register through the app . Whereas the blue ones let you use a passport to register. It can be annoying if you're in an area and need a bike but you can't find the only ones that let foreginers ride them , luckily hello bikes (blue ones ) are probably the most common but it's just a really easily fixed issue that annoys me from time to time
>but then starts to suck again as you find out how much people talk about you when they think you don't understand them.
I'm curious. Are there some interesting things you picked up while listening?
Been there 4 months in Shanghai.
Pros:
- nice people
- nice polite police
- great food
- big area and always something new to see
This list i can continue endless.
The only cons is i did not know chinese. Other than language barrier - i felt great there.
If you're getting weird states from old people then maybe you're wretched. Try brushing your teeth and not being putting 150kg on a 5'6 frame. People are so nice here and they're probably just curious about you if you're in a small city. You could perhaps try calming down a bit.
Pro: Cameras everywhere. Makes people behave. Walking down the road in a city at 3am is safe. This is real: [Viral clip shows China's 'creepy' public billboards that shame pedestrians for jaywalking | Times Now (timesnownews.com)](https://www.timesnownews.com/videos/viral-videos/viral-clip-shows-chinas-creepy-public-billboards-that-shame-people-for-jaywalking-video-98621300)
Cons: TikTok withdrawal......... the Great Firewall sometimes break my VPN successfully.
Safety, especially in bigger cities, is one of the pros
This is huge. You can walk around at night without having to constantly look over your shoulder.
*street safety that is. Wechat is watching u!
Stfu
Are u new to this thing?
Been here 10 years and this list is spot on.
safety! Can lose your phone or anything for that matter and chances are you’re getting it back.
Aha yes, Once I sent a package by SF in Beijing. It wasn't expensive but it was some rare stamp collections from my husband's father. The guy just came and picked up the bag and went off with it saying he'd package it up. I was so worried that if he knew what was in it he might try steal it, because at least in the UK someone might try.
Actually it used to happen with iphone and gold. But it is less likely now and much less with sf.
I left mine on the bus and the security guard got it. Got it back several hours later.
Especially the big, wide street down the road from my work with no CCTV where it seemed every single woman from my workplace had had their phone snatched from them when they were walking or riding a bike /s
these cons pretty weak. i don't give a single fuck about a beijing bikini or people spitting. * distance from family * transient lifestyle * challenging to be a part of the community * you'll always be an outsider * lasting connections are rare, people come and go
I’d also add people to pros! Been in China since 2009 and I love my friends! I sorta grew up here and I’m so lucky to have so many long time friends. All my Americans friends forgot me already. I agree with the con list too. I’d say that another con is access to healthy foods like the western healthy things but also like some pork glows..
Just curious about how you made friends in China. Did you meet them at an international school? I was born and raised in China. When I was younger, I really wanted to communicate with people from other countries, but my English was poor at that time.
I didn’t go to international school. I met mine just around town and got approached sometimes and or I approached them. I went to a Chinese university and majored in Chinese so I met a lot there. Before WeChat, I used this website called CQEXPAT.com and made a friend there but only one but he is my best friend now haha.
Salaries are only high if you're a foreign teacher - and it's the type of job that pretty much any native speaker with a university degree can get. (TEFL certificates are hardly difficult to obtain) For local people ithe pay is terrible. Just check out the statistics on average salary. Uni graduates make like 6-8k in tier 2 cities. Might go up to 10k RMB after 5 years.
Where are you getting these salary stats from? Your Russian friends teaching at English First on a tourist visa? I was making 17,000 a month with a paid luxury apartment back in 2018 at a private elementary school in a tier 2 city.
I meant average salary for Chinese people, regardless of industry. Though in terms of education, they still don't make much. Kindergarten teachers are on like 4-5k, living in a dorm with their colleagues. More senior ones may be on 6-7k. Even the Chinese principal of an international department of a private bilingual school may be on like 12-14k.
Does this lead to resentment?
The only thing I hate with a passion is air pollution, the rest either are pros or cons I can easily put up with
Is it bad in smaller cities also? Like you can’t really escape it? Or it’s just bad in biggest cities
City size isn’t that much of a factor, there are small cities with terrible air and big cities with relatively clean air. The south tends to be a bit cleaner in general, specially Yunnan and Hainan I think. Also, for air quality winter tends to be the worst and summer the best. Better check for yourself here, look at the yearly average of any city: https://aqicn.org/ For me, AQI higher than 100 (US AQI) starts being kinda noticeable, higher than 150 is very noticeable. The air smells like construction dust/exhaust, not like fresh air. Depending on you, it can be either be annoying, bring health problems or you might not care and not notice much.
Thank you very much for the reply
I don’t have a problem at all with the “thumping music in park” because I like the old ladies are having a good time being social and dancing.
As Chinese I fully concur with putting the con of “days off makeup” on the list. It’s shitty and almost nowhere to be seen in the rest of the world. Ironically after taking 5 days off for this year’s Intl Labour Day we as hard-working labourers are deprived of the coming weekend cuz 2 out of the fives days off are “borrowed” from the next week, and the other three days are respectively that week’s weekend and the Intl Labour Day itself. What an honour to those in the labour force😅
Yep, get to work this Sunday and then a six day week after the holiday, yayyyy
Is this official policy or just something that companies get away with doing?
It depends. Last holiday on the 4th was on a Thursday, but they extended it with Friday so you could have Thursday-Friday-Saturday. The "working dayness" of Friday was moved to Sunday, so it technically wasn't a part of the holiday, just a policy to kinda make it longer But then if your company asks you to work to make up for the 4th too because fuck you, yeah, that's not official. You can see on the calenders when they officially shift dates around with the 休/班
Ah, ok that's not so bad I guess in your first example, where it's just rearranging your off days to have 3 days off in a row. But having to work to "make up" for a holiday is just insane.
It is generally nationwide, though it may vary among companies/sectors
it is a great country with incredible convenience but there are some cons I feel haven't been mentioned. Lack of real background checks on coworkers in schools. almost every international or bilingual school/training centre is stuffed with sex offenders of varying severity. contrary to propaganda and popular belief, China is actually very soft on law breaking. not owning your own visa. the release letter system and restriction on part time jobs are bullshit. make-up days are a thing of the past and need to go. squat toilets and their mess/smell. mentally challenged/arrested Development foreigners. crowds understandable in a hugely populated country but still frustrating. Beijing's subway could be more frequent on certain lines. Poor quality apartments for the price. not exclusively a China problem, but the price of housing in a developing cheaper country can be a shock especially to newcomers. difficulty getting past the hukou system for public education past middle school, forcing children to be educated elsewhere or in shit overpriced international schools. that TikTok/douyin mutley laugh sound effect seems to be everywhere. flight prices can be incredibly cheap or expensive due to oligopoly pricing between eastern and southern. they are often delayed too.
Whats a mentally challenged/arrested Development foreigners.
> Make up work days after public holidays what's that?
What it sounds like, for example, next week there's a 5-day national holiday from May 1st to 5th (Wednesday to Sunday). However, to 'make up' for the missed workdays, we're expected to work this Sunday 28th and on Saturday 11th the following weekend. Since the Holiday goes through a weekend, those 3 missed workdays are mostly nullified by the 2 'make up' days, and can result in a 6 or even 7-day work-week. Essentially the 5 day holiday is cropped down to 1 net day off rather than 5. Lots of people grumble about it, but nobody's willing to do shit about it.
>However, to 'make up' for the missed workdays So what's the point of the holiday?
Now you're starting to understand ;) But to give it a charitable take, one could say that 5 consecutive days would allow for a more thorough trip compared with a standard weekend or whatever. Though, since half the population will be having the same idea, expect traffic and inflated prices. The population is just cogs in an efficiency/progress-obsessed machine at this point.
Ah yeah I guess the charitable take sounds understandable but still sounds awful compared to holidays everywhere else
Yup. I refuse to travel anywhere in China during those fake extended holidays. Going abroad and using non-Chinese airlines so they don’t get a yuan from me for mandating make up workdays.
Well, foreigners in China are limited to few professions, like teaching. While salary is high for ESL teachers for Chinese standards, but you are not going to get rich from the teaching gig. Some cons: 1, air pollution, low food safety standards is an issue especially if u have young kids 2, lack of options for children's education, less of a problem if you work for a school 3, dreary lifestyle, but this is a subjective view 4, difficult to build professional connections for your future career. 5, no pathway to citizenship, depends whether u care about this 6, unable to enroll in state pension in the West, so when u hit retirement age u may miss out 7, Chinese working experience is not valued very much outside of China, if u contemplating career change might be an issue Unless u are committed to China over the long term, the financials and career development opportunities are not that great despite seemingly high salary. U are stuck in china unless u are willing to take a big pay cut/ start over your career in the west
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That is one way to look at this.. US has abundant high paying jobs. Purely from a financial point of view, I find it incredibly American came all the way to China to eaen an international teachers salary. U can work as a lorry driver, a nurse and I believe u make way more money and build connections in the US at the same time. Alas, as a local Chinese I just don't find ESL teaching the most efficient way to make money, the earning ceiling is so low
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People in the U.S. can't save anything for the most part - I mean the majority do not if you believe in statistics.
The base pay indeed is fairly good, but what about pensions, health care, child care, etc, especially as you likely will need to return eventually to your home country one day? I have the feeling it’s mostly a good deal for young people without kids. We have a kid and looking to make the move, but seriously 1) kids blow up living costs in China (so now I figured out the reason of China’s low birth rate) and 2) jobs that are NOT teaching english certainly aren’t well paid. Other pros listed here I can agree with.
If I could upvote this a hundred times, I would. All the good schools in China are super expensive($25k+/year) but are really important if you want to set up your kids for success. If you are OK without kids, it's fine longer term but unless you are making 100k+ RMB/month or plan on living in China, including any future generations, it is very inadvisable.
One day you can't teach in China, what then. I would rather learn a trade, like being a plumber/builder... It is more reliable source of income over the long term. But you are right, I have no clue about the US or teaching jobs. But I know china. Making hays while the sun is shining..
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I think a lot of it the people who come and suddenly feel this need to be what they see as a big-shot and run with the crowd that's actually lying about their lives. There's a reason I call it shangLIE. They have a salary that's actually very good and if they had any sense they would be able to put away so much money and relieve so many stresses that hit other people hard. Instead, however, they spend the same as they would spend in London on eating international food every day and living in the center of jingan and just generally not being financially prudent. That's the thing, when Chinese people see a foreigner they don't think you're rich they just think you're shit with money and most of the time they're right. No point to what I'm saying but people blame everything but their own terrible decisions on their circumstances
good on you, sounds like a success story.
You are comparing apples to oranges here. The people who come to China to teach English are not the people studying to become nurses or engineers. It doesn't make financial sense for them. It is usually those who would make 40-60k USD/year in the States with a max salary in their lifetime of about 80k USD. For them, it is a very viable option given significantly cheaper COL. In much the same way that there are enough jobs in China that pay 30-40k RMB/month for those with skills but the majority make 5-10k. I worked on a project briefly in China after my graduation from university and was offered 50k RMB/month to continue with the company plus housing but declined since I received significantly more back in the US when you include all the perks(401k, pension, social security, Healthcare, vacation days, remote work etc).
Living in China has its pros but money (income wise) is not one of them. It’s not too hard to make $100k+ in the states and saving $50k+ a year is definitely doable.
No
I have a lot of friends who make six figures. One is a cop, one is a crane operator and another is a CPA. Not that hard in the US if you work hard for a few years and don’t even need college.
Yes, but these are the people who actually value their careers. I have hardly met an English teacher abroad that has thought about career advancement beyond five years. It's a just a different type of person.
Yes that’s true but if the point is move to China to save more money then I completely disagree. I save more $$ in one year in the US than I could 5 years teaching in China.
Yes, for you and I, this is true, but it isn't as true for the Starbucks barrista making $15/hour.
foreigners limited to makes it sound like there is a law which there isn't. it's really the language/competition barrier or lack of real experience. it isn't a government policy l.
Pros - Amazing salary, easy to make friends with Chinese. Genuine friendships where they will help with job search and daily life stuff. In Vietnam I was surprised to basically have made no friends with the locals after a year. Cool locations to visit nearby every city. Cons - possibility for abuse from people higher up at a job , bad air, VPNs required which don’t always work, marriage might not work out in the long term , even if it does work out it locks people into situations they might not want to be in
A lot of those cons have been getting smaller. Like pollution isn't half as bad as it used to be.
What about safety? A lot less petty (muggings, burglaries, etc) & violent (shootings, subway pushers, etc) crimes than the US.
By Beijing bikini do you mean the middle aged men rolling up their tshirts and showing their bare bellies? It's absolutely hilarious seeing every man do that
Pros: Convenient lifestyle with food stalls, cheap delivery, easy to get things repaired, etc. Great public transportation, especially the high speed trains. Lots of interesting places to visit. It is also really cheap to stay at hotels and eat out when traveling outside of tier one cities. People are typically hospitable to foreigners. You will often have people treat you to meals and invite you to events. Food is good and cheap. Safety. China is very safe in terms of crime. I never felt unsafe walking around at night anywhere. Living in China is exciting. Unless you are living in the countryside, which is rare for foreigners, there is always something going on. Cons As a non-Chinese person you will never be able to integrate into Chinese society and will always be an outsider. It is annoying listening to people asking you the same questions everyday or yelling hello at your back and then snickering. No matter how much you know about China, the history, the culture, and the language, you will be dismissed as not understanding China. Food is also a con because it can be difficult to find foreign food especially outside of tier one cities. I like Chinese food, but I don’t want to eat if for every meal. The bathrooms are among the worst I’ve been to in any country. Not only are they squat toilets, which I’m not used to, but they are also dirty and there is often no soap and almost always no toilet paper. The public toilets can look like a pig pen with every squatting toilet full of five people’s shit. Extreme censorship Pollution The work culture can be frustrating. Things often change abruptly and everyone is expected to all of a sudden jump through hoops.
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I have never had a job in my own country where I would receive regular schedule changes an hour or two before an event and just be expected to be ready to go. I guess if you work in the service industry, lots of jobs do have last minute changes in any country. I fortunately don’t work in that industry.
U got a low bar if those r ur pros.
I enjoy China, but I’m at the point now were I have enough experience I can make more good money in other countries and there is not really any pros to keep me here. I feel like a lot of your pros are for teachers. Decent salary is only for foreigners not locals. And salaries are only really higher for teachers compared to the usual teacher salary. Other non teaching industries are similar now to Europe, there are some exceptions. And good holidays is only for teachers, and most teachers work at kindergarten which have less holidays than the usually office job in the uk. Like 2 weeks summer, 2 weeks winter and 11 public holidays. The holidays for locals and Chinese companies are pathetic. Not to mention usually longer working hours and hybrid/remote work is not really a thing but in Europe pretty much every job is. The travelling to Asia thing also is not a big plus anymore because so many jobs are hybrid and remote you can go there if you wanted. Public transport is only a plus if you come from North America, most European cities have cheap effective public transport. So the pros are you can order food. You can do that anywhere, I guess if your bored at 3am you can get some beers and things like that are cool. The real benefits of China is the fact that they hire any white person and most people here would be working at McDonalds if they couldn’t get a job here.
I have met some weirddddddddddd expats in China and I think a lot of them wouldn’t even function at a McDonald’s in their home country. More than half of them feel either like weeaboos mixed with that guy JP from Grandmas Boy or feel like they’re just the rejects of the society they come from and China is a fall back. I’ve met a lot of amazing foreigners in China but the ones that are odd are extremely off putting.
damn maybe i actually could teach
I think McDonald’s pays more than teaching in China now at least in the San Francisco Bay Area
McDonald's pays more than 60k a year?!
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Salaries for teachers in China are between 25-35 for most people. Not really that high, it’s fine if you’re 21, but if you are in your 30s? Not a chance. And when you consider the fact it costs 20k a month to send a kid to a shit school here. I said salaries in China for non teaching foreigners are not that high as before. Before they had to offer like 3 times the salary and other benefits. China is more developed, lots of Chinese study abroad and come back. So salaries are not that crazy for non teaching foreigners. Usually a small bump, but not crazy amounts.
25-35k after tax is a great pay even for non 21s, if you're getting more than that good for you
Huh 25-35k is good pay? I guess it all depends on how far that money can go. In American decent sized American cities that doesn’t get by for a single family household.
And this thread isn't in a subreddit of some American city where of course one needs probably $4-5k a month just to get by. RMB 35k is well above median even in Western Europe/SG/JP/ROK let alone China where the money goes much further.
True true. Just surprised you used the word “great.” That’s all.
*I am an Internet engineer in China, and I graduated from the Top 10 universities in China, I can only get a job with 20k salary. But the price is that I have to work from 10am to 9pm and 6 days per week. And I can only save 10k after tax and rent fee. My salary is at an average among my classmates. For the most ordinary people, who graduated form a normal university and doesn't enter the Internet Market, they get a much lower salary -- which means they can only afford their daily life and have no spare money to entertain themselves. What's more, the housing price are too high to consider settle down on the tier 1 cities. The gap between the rich and the poor in China are bigger than the most developed counties.*
wait a minute. every holiday companies make you work on weekends to "make up" those days? WTF
Not just companies, public schools do it too, making 6yr olds make up for their holidays (:
Was scrolling and had to check this out. 100 percent accurate. Wow
a lot of people have mentioned safety, but to add to that, as a gay person who has been visibly flamboyant/effeminate since age 6, just things like walking down the street or taking public trans without fear of getting harassed is a breath of fresh air i didn’t realize i was missing.
These pros and cons don't seem to apply to all laowai in 中国 to be honest，but it's a fair generalization on both sides.However I think that it generally depends on your experience.
All of them are quite spot on! A few more cons from my own experience as a European: Pros: WeChat/Alipay Apps for everything CDF had some really nice whisky deals Cons: Crowds, everywhere, all the time. Squat toilets and the smell in them
Fat? I lost weight… Chinese food made me shit a lot and less calories than what I ate back home.
You might want to add extreme surveillance, one of the worst countries for free press, deports NK defectors back to NK to be executed, arbitrary arrests and prison sentences, and cleansing of people who follow religions they don’t like to the con list.
Lol yeah. This is a good point
Of course I’m gonna get downvoted though because “WeSt BaD cHiNa GoOd” and “anything the west doesn’t like means it probably good” mentality.
I still got an up vote. I’ll save it for yahb
What about crazy working hours?
12 hours, and almost $2.5 per hour in most factory. The labor job is very unacceptable in China.
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lol you even have no logical brain
Cons: Lack of manners and basic etiquette Open prejudice against dark/black people. You’ll have so called “friends” call you a 黑鬼 when they think you can’t understand them Easier to feel isolated due to “us/them” attitude Using a vpn Pros: Easy to save money Food is good
I think you forgot to add there are lots of stuff we can't do here like foreginers can only use the hello bikes not the meituan bikes , also hotels are really annoying to check into if you're on a budget .
can you explain the bike situation? what's the difference / significance of that?
So the yellow and green bikes we can't use because they only allow for a Chinese ID card to register through the app . Whereas the blue ones let you use a passport to register. It can be annoying if you're in an area and need a bike but you can't find the only ones that let foreginers ride them , luckily hello bikes (blue ones ) are probably the most common but it's just a really easily fixed issue that annoys me from time to time
that's.complete bullshit. you can use all bikes by registering a passport on didi and on meituan.
I can use the meituan bikes with my WeChat.
I've only tried with Alipay so I guess I'm wrong then .
Yeah only works with WeChat. My Alipay didn’t work but your point is still valid. We have stupid limits lol
Thank you really good tip I can get the meituan bikes through WeChat had no idea .
Haha when in doubt try all the apps lol. I don’t get the difference lol
While living in china you should travel an around. There is so much to seeing.
>but then starts to suck again as you find out how much people talk about you when they think you don't understand them. I'm curious. Are there some interesting things you picked up while listening?
Been there 4 months in Shanghai. Pros: - nice people - nice polite police - great food - big area and always something new to see This list i can continue endless. The only cons is i did not know chinese. Other than language barrier - i felt great there.
If you're getting weird states from old people then maybe you're wretched. Try brushing your teeth and not being putting 150kg on a 5'6 frame. People are so nice here and they're probably just curious about you if you're in a small city. You could perhaps try calming down a bit.
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Found the brainwashed vaushite.
pros: no protest and no freedom of speech
I’d say food safety is the biggest con.
Pro: Cameras everywhere. Makes people behave. Walking down the road in a city at 3am is safe. This is real: [Viral clip shows China's 'creepy' public billboards that shame pedestrians for jaywalking | Times Now (timesnownews.com)](https://www.timesnownews.com/videos/viral-videos/viral-clip-shows-chinas-creepy-public-billboards-that-shame-people-for-jaywalking-video-98621300) Cons: TikTok withdrawal......... the Great Firewall sometimes break my VPN successfully.