By Michael Hurwitz | Date: April 23rd, 2014 | Category: Chinese Culture
Coming to China to work is an amazing, character-building challenge.
In addition to simply doing your job, there are concerns like adapting to a new work culture, working in a market expanding at a still-pretty-ridiculous rate and sitting in on meetings held entirely in Chinese (I’ll tell you one thing: it certainly makes them more interesting).
That said, the job market for foreign nationals here in China is different and more competitive than it was even 8 or 10 years ago; China’s economy has further opened and matured, and hundreds of thousands of new foreigners have flooded in.
Let’s take a look at a few of the top jobs available to foreigners in China and what it takes to get them.
Engineering/Specialized Technical Skills Jobs
If you’ve read about the preposterous number of engineersChina pumps out of its universities every year, it may seem kind of strange that foreign engineers are in high demand here.
The fact is, however, that Chinese universities and companies are having a hard time training engineers in newer or highly-specialized fields like clean energy, automotive, oil and gas and general heavy industry.
Chinese-designed infrastructure projects have something of a mixed track record, so skilled foreign engineers are in high demand (in part) for the reason all foreigners are highly-valued here: they lend projects and companies an air of prestige.
More specifically, however, they generally have a higher level of hands-on experience with globe-spanning projects.
If you’re an engineer from a top US or European university, you can expect pretty excellent compensation and benefits here in China!
IT Jobs
Those of you who have been to China have experienced how the Chinese and the global Internet are like totally different worlds - Chinese websites and platforms operate on different standards and design principles, often via homegrown browsers, and foreign sites can be difficult to access from the Mainland.
A running joke among foreign IT professionals in China, in fact, is that the Chinese Internet is actually really just a gigantic intranet, since it has little in common with the global Internet.
This gulf, however, has led to strong demand for foreign-born and trained IT professionals, as more big Chinese websites and companies seek to create an international presence.
Alibaba (often called the Chinese Yahoo/Amazon/eBay), for instance, has hired a huge team of foreign IT, design and marketing specialists to improve its global presence.
One big factor here is that English is the global lingua franca of Computer Science, making skilled Western foreign IT masters a hot commodity in China, though Japanese and Korean IT specialists are also in demand.
Sales Jobs
Sales jobs in China suffer from high turnover and sometimes-shady management practices, but opportunities abound.
Some are expat-focused, meaning that sales reps tap into the lucrative market of expats in China’s larger cities, many of which have a good deal of disposable income.
For more experienced sales professionals, though, there is the enormous and still-growing Chinese domestic market to target, and with a limited financial system, many Chinese are on the hunt for solid investment opportunities.
So, if you’re in real estate or finance and have strong sales and management skills, China can present fantastic opportunities, but having a nuanced and strong understanding of Chinese culture and language is a must if you don’t want to end up pitching to the same 30,000 expats over and over again.
Teaching Jobs
Certainly the most stereotyped job category in China, English teachers are found far and wide, from humongo mega-cities to small villages.
The demand for native-level, in-person English instruction in China is enormous and still growing, and for a surprisingly large percentage of Western foreigners in China, teaching English is their first job here; a friend of mine refers to it as “paying your dues,” though I think that casts professional teachers in an unfair light.
While there are the commonly-derided training center teachers, China is also a fertile market for professional teachers, especially those with advanced degrees.
International schools here pay some of the best salaries you’ll find anywhere, and universities are always looking for qualified teachers to lead math, science or history courses in English-medium programs.
An increasing number of graduate schools, in fact, are running entire programs in English, so if you have a specialized degree and some teaching experience, there are loads of opportunities to be found for Westerners.
Marketing/Creative Field Jobs
Marketing and other creative fields in China, namely design and content-related e-commerce, are growing fast and there is strong demand for experienced foreign nationals with relevant skills.
A lot of this has to do with different concepts of marketing in China and the West, a difference that really boils down to the fact that the free market is still a very new concept in China - consider that Forbes Magazine only ran this headline in 1985, the year I was born (and I still have pretty much all of my original hair! Pretty much…).
Anyway, there are two types of companies hiring in this field: Chinese companies looking to improve their global image and presence, and foreign companies looking for experienced China hands to help them enter and adapt to the local market.
This is a great field if you have strong critical thinking skills and genuine curiosity and experience with China, because working in marketing or other creative fields in China essentially entails acting as a cultural and business bridge between two cultures. Well-developed language skills are extremely helpful, as well.
High-Level Management Jobs
As mentioned, the market economy is a relatively new concept in Mainland China, so there aren’t a whole lot of management personnel with the length of experience required for high-level positions.
As such, experienced foreign managers are much sought-after, not surprising in a country that idolizes people like Steve Jobsand Warren Buffet (as well as business-focused academics like Michael Sandel) even more than Americans do.
However, as the Chinese market matures and as more Chinese managers return to the country armed with advanced US or European degrees and overseas experience, jobs for high-level foreign management professionals are becoming more scarce, and “there’s no doubt the need for English-speaking generalists is quickly receding,” according to a BBC analysis.
The fact remains, however, that if you’re a foreign-born manager in China, life is pretty good: companies still offer very generous expat packages, including housing and expensive international schooling for the kids.
If you already live in China, I'd love to know what you do. Or, if you don't, let me know in the comments below what kind of job you'd want while living there.
By Michael Hurwitz | Date: March 28th, 2014 | Category: Chinese Culture
Mainland China is home to some 700,000 foreign nationals - that’s more than the people who live in Washington, DC (the U.S.’s most important city!) Anyway, that number continues to grow as more and more people move to China seeking job opportunities, adventure, new skills or more authentic versions of their favorite Chinese take-away dishes.
After living here for years, though, I’ve noticed that foreigners in China tend to fall into a small handful of categories. It’s a fun game to play at your local expat bar - try to spot one of each!
The Package Exec
The top of the expat food chain, these employees are generally brought over by their companies on generous expat packages, which can include housing, expensive international schooling for their kids and perks like a personal driver.
The Package Exec tends to live in a big house in far flung parts of the city, and is particularly vulnerable to the “expat bubble,” containing him or herself to a world composed mostly of fellow Package Execs and overpriced Western food.
The upside, though, includes getting paid a Western salary in a place where, if you want, you can live for 1/10th that price! The downside usually involves living in China without actually living in China, which is a huge waste of opportunity.
Habitat: Gubei, Jinqiao, and other places miles from anything that could be considered an interesting part of the city
Camouflage: Suit and tie
Watering Holes: Element Fresh and any club with a number in its name
The Language Enthusiast
The Language Enthusiast studied Mandarin or East Asian Studies in college/grad school and arrives in China to soak up more of the language.
The problem they tend to encounter, as many people who have studied Chinese before coming here can attest, is that learning Chinese and living in China are two entirely different animals.
Real Chinese comes at you hard, with non-standard Mandarin, weird accents, and that scary feeling you get when you realize that if you mess up something linguistically, there are consequences more substantive than just your grades.
However, I’ve found that Language Enthusiast types tend to eventually do really well in China, if only because obtaining good Chinese skills requires a genuine passion and curiosity for the language. That said, they’re also the type likely to get offended when Chinese people speak English to them rather than recognizing that language learning goes both ways.
Habitat: French Concession walkup or a Beijing hutong
Camouflage: Traditional Mao suit, but only for formal occasions
Watering Holes: 5rmb 家常菜 (jiācháng cài, basic “home cooking” dishes) restaurants with no English menus
The Conquering Entrepreneur
Brought here by the promises of an ever-expanding market, the Conquering Entrepreneur can be found with business card in-hand, perpetually excited about new opportunities in China.
Shanghai is home to a seemingly unlimited number of these types, who are always cornering you in bars/subway stations/late-night street food stands to pitch their latest “disruptive” idea to you.
I will admit that it is great to have that sort of entrepreneurial energy running through a country, but it can get annoying at times. The Conquering Entrepreneur tends to have poor Chinese skills, I’ve found, which doesn’t make a lot of sense since they’re trying to gain a foothold in the Chinese market.
Entrepreneurs range from the impressively magnanimous to unspeakable levels of doucheness, but one thing’s for sure: they’re here to stay as long as China’s economy keeps expanding.
Habitat: Sleeping secretly in his shared office space in JingAn because rent is just too damn high
Camouflage: Various iterations of business casual
Watering Holes: Foreigner-heavy sports bars and every conceivable happy hour
The Wandering Teacher
Probably the most commonly-found foreigner in China, the Wandering Teacher comes in two distinct varieties: the no-jobs-at-home-might-as-well-teach-in China type and the career teacher gaining experience.
Fact is, English teaching jobs are very easy to come by in China, and it lures some seriously interesting characters here. I’ve met teachers who literally have warrants out for their arrest back home, as well as trustafarians travelling the world, one year and one place at time.
The education market in China continues to boom, but in the last 5 years I’ve noticed a definite reduction in the deadbeat teacher numbers and a significant uptick among serious career teachers, which is great news for Chinese students!
Habitat: multiple roommates above an inexpensive bar with Filipina waitresses
Camouflage: Cargo shorts and carpenter jeans
Watering Holes: Any place with 10rmb Qingdaos on draft and 15rmb quesadillas on the menu
The ABC (American-Born Chinese)
One of the most interesting foreigner archetypes you’ll meet in China is the ABC (or CBC...or BBC...etc), who has often come to China seeking a reconnection with his or her culture, as well as for many of the same reasons as the types listed above.
The China experience for ABCs is wildly different than it is for foreigners of other ethnicities, and they are usually held to a different standard by locals. I’ve heard ABC friends complain, for instance, that Mainlanders will viciously criticize them for their less-than-perfect Mandarin skills, and bizarrely they can be turned down for jobs because some Mainland employers don’t believe they truly have native-level English skills.
Culturally, ABCs often have to make an extra effort to stand out from the locals, which leads to things like excessive partying and other abrasive behavior in an attempt to distance themselves from Chinese stereotypes - a huge portion of bar fights I’ve seen have involved ABCs in some capacity, for example.
Habitat: small but well-appointed apartment somewhere near the Bund
Camouflage: Designer gear and the occasional flatbrim hat
Watering Holes: M1NT, Bar Rouge and any club where people take black and white pictures and post them on Instagram
By Michael Hurwitz | Date: March 5th, 2014 | Category: Chinese Culture
China is a big and amazing place, and if you’re looking to move here (which I highly recommend), you should put a lot of thought into which city, if any, you’d like to live in. China’s big expat destinations all have a unique character as well as distinct advantages and disadvantages, so check out our list of my top four (in no particular order) cities for living in China:
Beijing
Beijing tends to attract a specific class of foreigners, in no small part because of the preponderance of NGOs and government / diplomacy-centered jobs available there.
It’s also much more laid-back than other big cities like Shanghai or Guangzhou - maybe it’s the immediately-evident millennia of history, but life just seems to move slower in Beijing, and it’s full of relaxed dive bars and quiet hole-in-the-wall restaurants.
The ever-present conversation topic of pollution is a bit of a drag (I’m told asthmatics should avoid the city for anything longer than a brief visit), but the city’s amazing history, vibrant arts scene (China’s best) and hutong culture more than make up for it.
Beijing is also one of the best cities in China for learning Mandarin. Because putonghua is essentially the native language of the locals, they’re generally much more willing to engage foreigners in Chinese conversation than residents of other cities, and Beijing is also home to some of the country’s best Mandarin programs.
Live here if….
You’re particularly into Chinese culture and history and want to live it firsthand, and if polishing your Mandarin is a top priority
Guangzhou
Guangzhou is a place unlike any other in China. It has a long history of foreign contact, having been settled by Portuguese traders as early as the 1500’s, when it was known as Canton (hence the Cantonese language native to the region). These days, however, it’s actually considered to be a bit less international or globalized than its large-city counterparts.
While there are still legions of foreign merchants and traders in town, the city is part of the enormous Pearl River Delta manufacturing region, which means it’s a bit dirtier and more rough-and-tumble than other cities.
In other words, it has yet to receive the sort of international scrub-down that Shanghai and Beijing have, making it a bit more of a “Chinese megacity” rather than a global one, if that makes any sense.
The warm year-round weather is a definite plus, but the humidity is a lot to handle.
The food situation is really interesting there, as you get some wild and crazy local dishes that you can’t find elsewhere along with classic Chinese 家常菜 (jiā cháng cài, “home cooking” or standard pan-Chinese dishes) fare. In essence, it’s kind of China’s version of the American deep south, except it’s an enormous city.
Language is also a bit of an adventure in Guangzhou, because while Mandarin is the language of education and business, Cantonese (as well as those bedeviling traditional characters) is still heavily used, especially by older folks. Many public announcements, like on buses and even at airports, will be in Cantonese before Mandarin, which is frustrating as hell if you’ve poured countless hours into standardizing your Mandarin. Finding a Mandarin speaker is rarely a problem, however.
Live here if….
You’re looking for a slightly wilder China adventure and aren’t afraid of seediness or getting your hands dirty, figuratively and literally.
Kunming
I’m a bit biased, as Kunming is probably my favorite big city in all of China, if for no other reason than it’s located right in the middle of southwest China’s Yunnan province, possibly the coolest place in Asia.
Kunming itself has a lot to offer, as well, from clean environs to great weather year-round to beautiful natural sites nearby. Most of all, the city’s laid-back, confident culture makes living or visiting there a really enjoyable overall experience.
In contrast with Beijing’s stuffy restaurants or Shanghai’s overwhelming clubs with shark tanks, recreation in Kunming often consists of outdoor beers and street food, accompanied by live music and the like. In short, it’s sort of China’s hippy city, which is something I would never have thought exists but it’s totally true (“hippy” in Chinese is 嬉皮士 (xīpíshì), if you were curious).
The flip side of this, though, is that Kunming isn’t as dynamic or exciting as its larger cousins to the east. There aren’t a tremendous number of job opportunities beyond teaching English, as larger corporations tend to center their south/west China operations in Chengdu or Chongqing.
The number of foreigners in town is increasing, but it’s still a good place to sharpen your Mandarin skills, as well as get an overall experience you can’t find elsewhere in China!
Side note: Kunming is home to, by far, China’s most baddass cab drivers.
Live here if….
You’re not as into clubbing or the fast pace of life eastern China offers, and are more interested in hiking and other outdoors stuff.
Shanghai
About as lao wai as it gets in China, Shanghai is the country’s business capital and portal to the rest of the world, for the most part. Expats that live elsewhere in China and move to or visit Shanghai often remark that it’s “not really China,” and that’s fairly accurate: it’s possible to live here for years without speaking any Chinese or even talking to Chinese people, though that’s a pretty lame way to live.
As a result, it’s not the best place to study Mandarin, as there are a million laowai and even the locals all want to practice their business English with you.
That said, Shanghai is one of the most dynamic and interesting cities in the world. It is constantly changing, and there are huge and regular influxes of new people, from all over China and the world.
New restaurants, clubs and even neighborhoods pop up with astonishing frequency, but rather than taking on the appearance of a bizarre pre-fab city (looking at you Dubai), all this development gets integrated pretty well into the larger city, making Shanghai an overall fascinating place to live.
Nightlife, food choices and job opportunities are all off-the-charts-level good, and the city’s cost of living hasn’t yet caught up to its international brethren. It’s an amazing experiment in the globalization of a 4,000-year old culture, happening all around you in real time - there’s really nothing else like it, and I find myself bored by comparison even when visiting amazing cities like Sydney or Chicago.
Live here if….
You love feeling connected to “the next big thing,” and you want a city that you can derive your energy from much as Superman does from the sun (but not if you like the sun itself...it’s cloudy here a lot). You want Western conveniences with Chinese characteristics.
It has been about a week since I arrived in Shanghai. It is not my first time, so I know my way around. The only difference this time: I had to find a place to live on my own.
All the last times I have been a student in Shanghai. That meant I could just move into the university dormitory. Such convenience; so easy; no worries… This time, I had the big task of getting a room not too far away of my work place, and not too expensive.
I have been looking on the internet for rooms months before I came to Shanghai, but it is actually impossible to get a good room without being in China. Some of my friends did ‘reserve’ a room prior to their arrival in Shanghai, but it is always a risk as it can happen that you arrive in Shanghai turn on your phone and get a message saying “Sorry to inform you, just rented the room to someone else”, or you get to that room and it turns out it’s more a dump than a room…
I arrived on a Saturday, and started looking for rooms on Sunday. It is possible to find a place in just one day. That’s what I did. But I recommend everyone, if you want the perfect place calculate at least one to two weeks time for the room search.
How do I find a room?
There are hundreds of websites just for Shanghai housing in English and Chinese. I found most of the rooms on SmartShanghai. You can search in a specific area, or limit the rent per month depending on your budget.
RoomInShanghai has some really nice apartments. The only problem they might not have any available room during the period you would need one. Plus the rooms are a bit pricy if you are on a low budget.
ShanghaiExpat has a variety of higher standard rooms. I have not found any room in my price range (about 2000RMB to 3000RMB), but if you, for example, are moving to Shanghai with your family, or you plan to rent a whole apartment with your friends ShanghaiExpat is a good place to start (so is SmartShanghai by the way).
There are also Chinese websites. If you speak good Chinese you could try those. The advantage is the rents are much lower than those advertised on the English websites. You just have to keep in mind, foreigner are not allowed to live in every house (or sometimes hotels). So make sure to ask the landlord about the regulations before you go and see the room.
One of the best Chinese website I have used so far is Ganji 赶集. It has hundreds of rooms, and many of them are really affordable. You can find a room bigger and in a better location, but way cheaper on here, than on English sites like SmartShanghai or ShanghaiExpat. But if you don’t speak Chinese very well it could be quite difficult. There is no English speaking agency who will help you if anything is broken, or you want a new cleaning lady.
Another good website recommended by a friend is 58同城. Like Ganji you have a lot of choice, but you might get a few rejections because you are a foreigner. However, if you are looking for something cheap, and are confident of your Chinese this should be your choice.
What else should I pay attention to?
About the Chinese website and their rooms; one more important thing is that for those Chinese rentals you usually pay three month rent in advance. And sometimes you have to sign a one year contract. But I have also seen the contrary, pay month by month, and just one month deposit. It’s called 一付一押.
On the English websites you might notice that there are adverts by private people and by agencies. Agencies usually have the better rooms, but you have to pay a fee once (which is usually 30% of your monthly rent). For people who are in Shanghai for the first time and don’t speak Chinese very well (and are looking to rent an apartment on their own, not just a room) an agency is actually not a bad choice. The people there speak English and will help you with everything.
I have found out that even room which get advertised on SmartShanghai has having no agency fee, are in fact rooms in apartments rented by agencies. The only difference is that you are not the person renting the apartment but you are more a replacement for someone moving out. For example in my case, our apartment was rented by a Chinese guy, who now rents all the rooms through an agency to foreigners. When I moved in I had to go to the agency together with the guy who stayed in my new room until now. I am his replacement, so I don’t need to pay an agency fee, but just a service fee (usually about 400RMB). The monthly rent is paid to the agency at the end of every month. The deposit (which can be between on to three months of the rent), is paid to the agency as well. Make sure you can move out whenever you want, and don’t bind yourself to a year or two year contract. Usually, you just have to find a replacement and can move out immediately. Plus, finding a replacement in Shanghai is really not that hard (at least that’s what everyone is telling me, I did not have to do it…yet).
How much money for a room in Shanghai?
How much you spent per month on rent in Shanghai really depends on your living standard. You can get everything from 500RMB a month to 300.000RMB a month.
For a single apartment in central Shanghai (one bedroom, one bathroom, one kitchen), you pay between 5000RMB to 10.000RMB. For that price you can get a quite good place. If you want the high-end apartment you have to pay more.
The cheapest way to live in Shanghai is apartment sharing. Most foreigners live in a shared apartment. You can get a good room in central Shanghai (like People Square 人民广场or Jingan 静安区) for 3000RMB to 5000RMB, the higher rent usually being for a Master room (where you have your own bathroom).
You can rent a whole apartment or house for about 15.000RMB onwards. All my friends with families usually live in Shanghai’s outskirts because most expat compounds are outside the centre. I think to be able to rent one of those houses you really need an expat income. Maybe one day I will be able to afford one.
How’s your new room?
For all those who are interested: I like my new room a lot. It is very central. Directly at People Square. I chose this location for a reason. First of all it’s next to metro line 2 which takes me directly to my work, and secondly, as Jin will be leaving tomorrow I am gonna be alone here, so I need some people around me. I could have moved to Pudong, very close to my work, but up there is not much to do, very few shops and people. I am not sure it would be worth feeling so lonely.
I am sharing with five other people which is not ideal. Actually, it is something I have to get used to. So far they are ok, but tend to be very dirty. We do have a cleaning lady coming twice a week, but it seems the second she leaves the house gets dirty again. Well, I can’t be bothered. My room is clean, that’s important.
One corner of my room. Everything was already in there (except the bedding and the handsome Chinese men haha).
By Michael Hurwitz | Date: October 9th, 2013 | Category: Chinese Language
While there’s certainly no express lane on the Chinese language learning journey, it’s important not to be intimidated by the challenges ahead! For instance, my brother-in-law came to visit me here in Shanghai once, and he remarked upon the language by saying, “it’s just like….what? Huh? I have no concept of how that could possibly work.” The first step in breaking through that language barrier is to get over the “what? Huh?” hump, and it’s actually pretty easy. Here are five quick and simple ways to get your feet wet in your daily life and sound like a pro doing it!
1.) Use your dictionary to find street names. If you’re in a cab having trouble with pronouncing the street names properly, punch the pinyin into your dictionary – most streets in big cities are named after places elsewhere in China that are listed in most electronic dictionaries. Your dictionary can tell you the tones of the street name so that the driver will understand you. It’s also a good way to practice your tones, but failing that, you can simply show him the characters in your dictionary and he’ll know just where to go!
2.) Talk really fast! It sounds a bit counterintuitive, but Chinese speakers are actually pretty accustomed to dealing with people who speak Mandarin as a second language, as many Chinese, especially in rural areas, grow up speaking their local dialect as a native language and only learn Mandarin in school. If you’re unsure of the proper tones, try to smooth it over by talking quickly. Think of the English equivalent: if you can’t hear someone clearly, your brain naturally substitutes the most likely possibility based on what it can hear and understand (in your experience), right? Chinese speakers do the same thing, so you’ve got a good shot at being understood if you speak quickly and confidently.
3.) Use exclamations (!). Mandarin is rich with fun (and funny) exclamations and filler-words you can shout out or add to the beginnings and ends of sentences. Some great examples are the classic “āiyā” (哎呀!), used to demonstrate surprise or frustration, and “wā!” (哇!), roughly equivalent to the English “wow!” but also used to express sadness or dismay (“哇哇哇,” for instance, is a common way to show crying or complaining in written form). These are rarely taught in formal Chinese programs, so using them in everyday speech suggests that a natural, casual tone that will make it easier for native speakers to understand you, even if you have other tone and pronunciation issues. Others to note are “yā” (呀) for sounding surprised (though this is used primarily by females) and “a!” (啊, with the tone varying based on location/speaker) for starting a sentence, expressing casual surprise or adding on to a name when addressing someone (e.g. “lǎowánga 老王啊, qǐngbāngwǒyíxià 请帮我一下…”).
4.) “Share” the thanks (谢, xiè)! This one is for the absolute beginners. Your first word in Chinese is likely to be “xièxie” (谢谢, “thanks”), but it’s actually a fairly hard one to pronounce, especially for beginners! Here’s a quick easy way to nail that pronunciation: try pronouncing it like the English word “share” but with a serious Boston accent. I’m talking Ben Affleck in Good Will Hunting serious. It’s a tip I’ve given to visitors (including my brother-in-law, a Boston native) and it has worked well. Here’s an example of proper Bostonian pronunciation of “share.”
5.) When typing pinyin into your electronic dictionary, always include the tone numbers. So instead of just typing “dianying” (for “电影”), type “dian4 ying3.” It sounds really simple but is tremendously helpful in memorizing tones associated with words because it teaches your brain not to think of Chinese words as a string of English letters, but rather as a unique sound that is simply represented by those English words. It’s a trick I used to take my pronunciation from painfully bad to entirely acceptable, something I couldn’t have foreseen a year or so ago, and it pays off quickly. Getting your tones down pat is a huge part of tackling Chinese, way more so than things like stroke order or advanced vocabulary in my opinion, so try entering your pinyin with numbers and see if it works for you.
NOVEMBER 4TH, 2014
Every country has its own favorite websites, but it seems like certain global titans are big everywhere – you’ve got your Googles, YouTubes, Spotify’s, Reddits, Wikipedias, etc. Except, that is, in China.
For a variety of reasons, the Chinese web functions almost like an intranet. You’ve probably read about some of the foreign sites that are blocked here, but you may not know about the hugely popular Chinese sites and services that are essentially unheard of elsewhere.
Today we’ll take a look at the most popular sites, whose user bases often dwarf their more famous Western counterparts, and even the efforts of certain services (namely Weixin) to expand internationally.
1. Baidu (百度, bǎi dù) - The Chinese Google
Baidu is China’s most popular search engine and has made a serious effort to basically become the Chinese-language version of Google. They’ve got their own map system, image search, news service and even "bǎi dù bǎi kē (百度百科)", an online encyclopedia that’s China’s closest equivalent to Wikipedia.
Though they generally tend to copy Google and aren’t always the most innovative company around (see the “Baidu Eye” headset that came out soon after Google Glass was released), lately they’ve developed a nice string of hardware products, including a cool, affordable WiFi controlled camera that stores video in the cloud.
2. Dianping (点评, diàn píng) - A Way Better Yelp
Dianping is sort of like the Yelp of China, but a lot more useful and multi-functional.
It’s an app/website that lists local businesses, primarily restaurants, but it’s more than just crowdsourced reviews – it has a well-developed rewards and membership system as well as an analytics platform for business owners and even a popular group-buying (known in Chinese as 团购 (tuan2 gou4)) page that allows users to get hefty discunts at restaurants if they all use the service. It’s similar to group buying services in the US like GroupOn or LivingSocial, but with Dianping it’s built into the ratings and discovery app itself, which makes things just massively convenient.
Basically it’s a much more evolved Yelp, and one of the most innovative Chinese web services out there. Everyone uses Dianping; group chat discussions of where to eat are a never-ending stream of Dianping links or screenshots.
Their app is very well-designed, as well, and it’s something I hope makes its way to the States soon!
3. Sina (新浪, xīn làng) - News and More
Sina, known in Chinese as 新浪 (lit. “new wave”) is kind of an all-purpose Chinese internet platform and company, perhaps best known for its once-ubiquitous Weibo microblogging platform.
Sina is sort of like a Chinese Yahoo!, if I had to make a comparison, because of the wide variety of functions it serves: news, blogging, email, etc.
It’s about as mainstream as it gets on the Chinese web, and they’ve done a great job catering to overseas Chinese with relevant Chinese-language content, developing dedicated sites for North America and Europe.
Sina is also a great resource for reading practice if you’re at that level. TheirNBA section, for instance, has some strong writers and has provided me hours upon hours of not-so-boring character study time.
4. YouKu (优酷, yōu kù) - Chinese YouTube
Sometimes you’ve just gotta love when China goes ahead and copies something so directly that it’s just hilarious.
That’s basically the idea behind YouKu, whose name was chosen because of its pinyin resemblance to YouTube (it literally means “excellent and cool”, but sounds a bit awkward by my reckoning).
It serves a similar purpose as a full-service video platform, but also has cool stuff like authorized streaming versions of US shows with Chinese subtitles, which is actually a really interesting way to learn Chinese because you see direct Chinese translations of natural English phrases (instead of the other way around).
5. Jingdong (京东, jīng dōng) - Amazon of China
Jingdong is a bit like the Amazon of China, with a focus on electronics but a gradually growing selection of other products as well.
Like a lot of Chinese e-commerce sites, their hallmark has always been a superbly streamlined purchasing process: usually, you can order a product in 3-4 clicks, and while you can use the ubiquitous AliPay payment system, you can just as easily pay cash to the delivery guy upon receipt of the product.
It’s so easy that it’s hard not to buy the occasional extra USB flash drive or space heater – which is exactly what they want!
When I was working in an office full-time and found that I needed something small (extra phone charger, new mouse, or even some new socks), it was preposterously easy to hop on jd.com and order it. Most of the time I would literally forget about it until it arrived a day or two later, but I’d just pay the guy in cash.
6. Taobao (淘宝, táo bǎo) - eBay of China
Often described at the eBay of China, Taobao is actually something much more: a cultural phenomenon. The sheer variety of stuff available is absolutely unbelievable, and it has made life in urban China much more convenient.
Let’s look at it this way first: Taobao and its sister site Tmall (which is basically the same thing but limited to more established sellers and brands) oversaw US$272 billion in transactions in fiscal 2014 – that’s larger than the GDP of the Philippines, Finland or even Hong Kong.
More to the point, Taobao has enabled China to leapfrog the West in many ways and become a global e-commerce leader.
The low cost of labor and delivery in Chinese cities (you see delivery dudes, known as "kuài dì rén (快递人)" on little scooters or e-bikes on every single block at all hours of the day) has led to a situation where nearly every imaginable product is available to you for next or same-day delivery – something I certainly didn’t have back home.
I know tons of people, for instance, that don’t even go grocery shopping anymore. They order all their food on Taobao every day and it’s waiting outside their apartments before they get home from work.
In recent years the amount of imported food on Taobao has exploded, as well, and you can get goodies like cheese, South American coffee and even hard-to-find spices there.
In short it’s kind of the best thing ever, and they do a great job making the purchasing experience easy if you have AliPay.
7. CTrip (携程, xié chéng) - China’s Best Travel Site
It may not be wildly innovative, but CTrip (literally “to go the distance,” with a bit of poetic license on my part) is a well-made, useful and reliable travel website, quite an accomplishment for a homegrown Chinese site.
Best of all, it has a top-shelf English version (as well as German, French, Vietnamese and Russian localizations, among others) that usually has the same prices as its Chinese counterpart, another rarity here in China.
Their mailing list is a great way to find out about random last minute ridiculously cheap deals to domestic destinations, and with air travel becoming increasingly popular and affordable within China, CTrip is a must-have travel resource if you’ve had enough of the super-authentic-but-I’m-kinda-over-it long haul train thing.
8. iFeng/FengHuang (凤凰, fèng huáng) - An Emerging News Platform
"fèng huáng (凤凰)", known by its web address iFeng or in English as Phoenix Television, is a Hong Kong-based group of television stations that maintains an increasingly popular website targeted primarily at the Mainland.
A general news site for the most part, iFeng has made inroads in China by sharing occasionally controversial news and insights that its Mainland counterparts are often unwilling to, all without drawing too much attention or scorn from the authorities.
iFeng has also developed a nice mobile app and is becoming something of a new media empire, definitely one to look out for in the future
9. 58TongCheng (58同城, 58tóngchéng)
A Chinese, and way less sketchy version of Craigslist, TongCheng (meaning “same city” in Chinese) is a well-designed tool for connecting people living in the same city.
Its relatively simple, clean design is a rarity among Chinese sites, and it's remarkably easy to use – I bought my bike and my current go-to electric guitar on there, and for people with limited Chinese reading skills, it doesn’t take much time or effort to find what you need and get the contact details of the person who has it.
It’s also an important resource for small businesses in rural China who may not have the resources or funds to set up their own site.
Seems simple enough, but Wall Street sees a lot of potential: Last October TongCheng’s IPO on the NYSE went for over US$150 million, surprising a lot of investors and giving the company some resources to grow with.
It remains to be seen what the site can do to continue turning a profit, but I can attest to its usefulness. It’s really the best place if you need something cheap and don’t mind second-hand stuff, though I maintain that, in Shanghai at least, the best way to get something for really cheap is from bitter expats having moving-away sales on Craigslist!
10. WeChat (微信, wēi xìn)
WeChat aka WeiXin is basically the mac-daddy of all Chinese-built web services.
It’s an app that often gets called the Chinese WhatsApp, but over the last 2-3 years it has completely changed the everyday experience of life in China – I’m not exaggerating.
At its core, WeChat is a messaging platform, but it also offers voice messages, voice/video calls, and a Facebook-like social networking service. It has basically made phone calls, text messages and other social networks obsolete.
Everyone and everything is on WeChat, and it’s now the center of every Chinese company’s social media marketing strategy as well. You can do your online shopping, your banking, your cloud storage and even finding new friends via their crazy radar feature, which lets you find users in your vicinity.
WeChat is attempting to eat the functionality of every other app or web service, and they’re succeeding.
It’s fed in part by the preponderance of super-cheap smartphones (we’re talking ~US$40 for a phone running a bootleg version of Android OS) and the increasing availability of cheap data plans. Even migrant worker can afford to buy a cheap handset, download WeChat and chat away to their hearts content. It’s so ubiquitous that when I go back to the States it takes me some time to adjust to the fact that people actually send text messages there.
Well, there you have it, the major sites that Chinese people use all the time. I’d love to hear about some of your favorite Chinese sites or apps, especially ones you’ve used to help practice your Chinese! Let me know in the comments below.
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JULIE THA GYAW
FEBRUARY 2ND, 2015
So, we all know that there’s no particular word in Chinese that can be translated as just “no.” (Watch this lesson if you don’t know what I’m talking about.)
But did you know that there are all sorts of phrases that COULD mean “no” even if they mean something else when taken literally? Those phrases can be misleading if you come from a culture that values direct communication.
If you ask 10 Chinese people what, generally speaking, one of the biggest differences is between them and Americans, I bet at least half of them would mention something about Americans being much more “direct.”
To hear some Chinese people talk, you’d think every American basically has no filter, never beats around the bush, and always means exactly what he says and says exactly what he means. And that makes Chinese people feel uncomfortable.
On the other side of the coin, the “indirect” nature of Chinese interactions can drive an American crazy. They feel like they always have to guess what a Chinese person really means, and have to force people to give a clear “yes” or “no” answer to any questions.
I always felt like I was one American who could help to bridge that gap. I felt like I didn’t fit the “direct American” profile. Saying a direct “no” to someone made me feel uneasy.
So I, of all people, ought to be able to really understand where a Chinese person is coming from when they talk in a roundabout way.
Or so I thought.
After living in China for my first few years, I finally came to terms with the fact that compared to the average Chinese person, even I can in fact be downright blunt at times.
I am just as bad as the next insensitive American at being able to read between the lines that were put in place to save face. It may be that my way of being indirect is different from the Chinese way of being indirect.
I eventually figured out my main problem was that I simply expected people to mean exactly what they said. I took words at face value, and finally realized that it was causing me problems.
If I was ever going to be able to understand a “no” when it heard one, I needed to learn to decode a few key phrases.
Here’s what I’ve learned.
If you’re asking for help / a favor, you might hear…
"Don’t have"
méi yǒu
没有
Scenario: You walk into a store, and ask for something in particular. The shop clerk tells you, “méi yǒu.”
Even though you’ve bought it there before. Even though someone you know bought it there earlier that day. Even though you haven’t had a chance to really explain what it is that you’re looking for.
What it actually means: In some cases, “méi yǒu” might truly mean, “We don’t have it.” But in many cases it actually means, “I don’t want to / can’t help you.”
This response was really common back in the “iron rice bowl” days when nobody’s job depended on sales targets or customer service.
These days it’s less common, but you still hear “méi yǒu” from time to time in government service offices such as at the post office or the visa bureau, or if you happen to catch somebody in a bad mood.
"Let me think about it"
xiǎng yī xiǎng ba
想一想吧
Scenario: You ask a coworker if she will go to the boss with you to ask if everybody in your department can leave early on Friday. You tell her that the boss is more likely to agree if she asks too.
She tells you, “Xiǎng yī xiǎng ba.” You’re happy with that, and give her a few minutes to think it over.
What it actually means: “I don’t want to, but I don’t want to tell you that.”
She wants to make sure your relationship with her remains in good terms, so rather than just telling you “no” and risk you being upset with her, she tells you that she will “think about it.”
But be clear here: she has already made up her mind about it.
If you’re extending an invitation, you might hear…
"Another day"
gǎi tiān ba
改天吧
Scenario: You’re going to a live music bar with some friends, and asked a Chinese friend to join you.
He seemed really happy to receive your invitation, but when it’s time to meet, he says his uncle came to town, so he can’t join you. “Maybe another day.”
You ask him when his uncle is leaving so you can reschedule and he gives you a vague response.
What it actually means: “I don’t want to, but I needed to find a way to let you down easily.”
In this case, there’s probably no uncle, but a white lie is a good way to help you save face and to keep your friendship. The friend probably just doesn't think he’d enjoy going to a loud bar with a bunch of foreigners.
This doesn’t feel so foreign, does it? Americans are often pretty good at making up fake excuses followed by an insincere “another time” too.
"Next time"
xià cì ba
下次吧
Scenario: You’re heading out after work for dinner with some friends. You ask a coworker to join you, but she says she’s busy, so maybe next time. But the next time you ask her, she says the same thing.
What it actually means: “No thanks.” This one is pretty straightforward.
When someone says, “next time,” save yourself some embarrassment and don’t take it literally. Chances are, the answer next time will be the same.
If you’re asking for information, you might hear…
“It’s unclear to me"
bú tài qīng chu
不太清楚
Scenario: You ask for directions from someone on the street. Before you even get a chance to finish asking your question, the guy shakes his head and says, “I’m not sure.”
What it actually means: “I don’t want to tell you or I truly have no idea. Please don’t ask me again.”
If someone is quick to say, “I'm not sure,” it’s best to just leave it at that. Don’t try to offer more information that might help shed some light on what you’re asking.
“Bú tài qīng chu” is usually a clear sign that you’d better ask someone else.
In two days
gùo liǎng tiān ba
过两天吧
Scenario: You ask the shop assistant who said “méi yǒu” when the store might have more of the item you’re looking for in stock.
She replies “guò liǎng tiān ba,” so you make a note to try again in two days’ time.
What it actually means: “Maybe at time point in the future. I don’t know when.”
I made the mistake of taking this phrase literally. I showed back up at the shop two days later, and the woman told me again, “gùo liǎng tiān.” Then it became clear to me that “two days” doesn't really mean “two days” in this phrase.
Once I learned to identify a thinly veiled “no” in Chinese, I was able to save myself a lot of misunderstanding. But the biggest advantage to learning these phrases was being able to put them to use myself.
That granny who wants me to commit to coming over to her house every Saturday afternoon to teach her grandchild English? “Xiǎng yī xiǎng ba.”
The front desk staff who ask me to buy a membership at the hair salon? “Xià cì ba.”
That landlord who wants to know when it will be convenient for him to stop by and pick up some things (i.e. snoop around)? “Guò liǎng tiān ba.”
I know what to say. They pick up on my gist. We all save face and everybody feels good.
I hope these are helpful for you, too. Have you had any issues with misinterpreting an indirect “no” in China. If so, I’d love to hear about it in the comments section!