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Hearing all the negative stuff about China recently, like the online censorship, dictatorship, stories about people not caring about human life, like hearing it

Hearing all the negative stuff about China recently, like the online censorship, dictatorship, stories about people not caring about human life, like hearing it's common that if you accidentally drive over people, many will backup to finish the job so they wont' have to pay the insurance for rest of the life and seeings stories like babies on the streets and nobody caring, why would anyone want to work in China? Are these stories true, or just negative propaganda to threaten the great republic of China ? Anybody care to share experiences living there ?

TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
We probably hear mostly about the sensationally negative things the most because they drive clicks. The same could be said about all the negative news coming out of the US. Why would anyone want to move there? And yet they do, and many thrive. I'm sure China is thriving, despite its problems.
- westiseast 9y ago
  The problem is best illustrated with things like road deaths. If you look at road deaths for China, it’s something like 20 per 100k people per year vs maybe 2-3 in the UK. What that means is, statistically China is 8-10 times “worse” than the UK. Does it mean you’re going to be seeing car crashes everywhere all the time? No. Does it mean China’s road safety is much worse? Yes. Things are much worse in China in a variety of meaningful respects. Does that mean it’s impossible to live there? Not at all.
  - sh4z 9y ago
    If we instead go onto crime; If you look at violent crime we have 6 times more robberies, 4 times more murders and 18 times more gun crime in the USA compare to China (per capita) Does it mean you're going to be seeing people getting shot everywhere all the time? No. Does it mean general safety in the US is much worse? Yes. Things are much worse in USA in a variety of meaningful respects. Does that mean it's impossible to live there? Not at all. Well, if you can stand having Trump as the president of the country you live in.
    - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
      General safety is worse in china if you include traffic accidents. Crime safety is better in china. You are unlikely to be affected in any case. Though I did know of stupid foreigners who became crippled after stupidity on motor scooters.
- saiya-jin 9y ago
  > Why would anyone want to move there? Apart from chasing money and career, there are ridiculously few reasons to move there. Extreme hostility from official places (visa issues all the time, no citizenship), utter disregard for human rights on many levels of society, very bad air on most big cities where you end up living in 100% of the cases. I could go on and on and on. If you want a south asia experience, places like Singapore or Kuala Lumpur are much much better.
hkmurakami 9y ago
Money talks.
ghostcluster 9y ago
I can recommend a YouTube channel from a couple Westerners who have lived in China for years and share their experiences about it, https://www.youtube.com/advchina https://www.youtube.com/advchina -- the slightly older of whom is http://youtube.com/serpentza http://youtube.com/serpentza who lives in Shenzhen. They tackle a lot of the issues you bring up. China is very protective of their immigration, and unlike the US, it's impossible to get the equivalent of a Green Card or become a citizen at all, even if you marry a Chinese person, which they both have done. You constantly have to jump through hoops to keep a current Visa, and as a foreigner you must report in person to the nearest police station each month to be monitored, or face deportation. The police will also sometimes randomly come to your apartment unannounced, and come in to check on you. There exists a huge range of living situations that span from the more western first tier cities like Shanghai and Shenzhen, that are very organized, with a police presence that cuts down on lawless driving, unlicensed food vendors, etc, to the more rural areas where the bulk of the population still lives. Anyway, they both cover a lot of the issues you raise, and have a ton of good videos that give you a sense of what contemporary life is like there.
- jamra 9y ago
  I love these guys. Came here to link them. I suggest anyone watch these videos. They cover those topics as well as Visa issues and censorship.
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  The apartment thing...it’s very rare. Most likely to remind you to register at the PSB, I was always late and warned a few times, they never tried to fine me or anything. They aren’t really “checking” on you, honestly I’ve had worse experiences in Switzerland than China where they really do check on you (like the television tax guy entering my apartment to check that I really didn’t have a TV!). Beijing was actually more lawless than the other first tier cities. The police are kind of paralyzed when they could easily pull over someone with enough guanxi to end there careers.
  - probablybroken 9y ago
    Television licencing property checks are normal in the UK as well - I've had a few inspectors demand access to my home to verify that I wasn't watching TV illegally. For a long time there used to be "TV detector vans" that would drive around areas supposedly detecting TVs in use in unlicensed properties - I believe it was ( still is? ) illegal to publish any information surrounding the efficacy of these vehicles ( Obviously because they don't work ).
strebler 9y ago
I've lived and done a fair amount of business there. The car thing is true. I would say people there care a lot more about their immediate network of friends / family and a lot less about anyone else. It's very safe to live there, but at the same time everyone's trying to take advantage of everyone else - literal and metaphorical pickpockets are everywhere. The inherent lack of trust makes workplace environments really difficult. Everyone's looking out for number one (themselves), to the point of damaging their own company for personal gain. You have no clue how hard it is to build a software dev team when ANY of the developers will happily copy the source code they have access to onto a thumbdrive and sell it to your top competitor for a modest payday. I highly respect anyone who builds a software team successfully in China, such a headache. Frankly, the internet censorship was the deal breaker for me. No Google, gmail, facebook, twitter, news, etc, is just too much to bear. But the food was really good, good weather and foreigners are treated like minor celebrities (everyone is really really friendly), so we don't experience real China like everyone else.
- sharkdesk 9y ago
  to be clear, white foreigners are treated like minor celebrities.
  - nojvek 9y ago
    White foreigners are treated like celebrities in almost every non-western country. That’s what we sort of mean by white previlege. Thanks to Hollywood movies and music + beauty ads with predominantly white people.
- anthonyleecook 9y ago
  yup, I've heard many stories of expats turning around and leave the second they found the internet frustrating, which is strange that they didn't do their homework before coming. Also, the food I found ok; lack of variety (hot pot, shaokao, dumpling, repeat), and no good international cuisines. You can also get safer Chinese food in Taiwan or Los Angeles. As for weather, it's usually made worse by pollution. And recently, foreigners have been treated with disdain by locals because of nationalism.
anthonyleecook 9y ago
It's pretty true, speaking from experience. China is a pretty harsh place to live. But since this is hacker news, here are some links: - Viral footage shows bystanders doing nothing as Chinese woman is attacked in hotel https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/04/06/viral-footage-shows-bystanders-doing-nothing-as-chinese-woman-is-attacked-in-hotel/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/04/06... - Preschools across China to be inspected after ‘series of child abuse cases’ http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2121495/preschools-across-china-be-inspected-after-series-child-abuse http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2121495/presc... - Air pollution suspected for sharp rise in China lung cancer rate http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2106410/air-pollution-suspected-sharp-rise-china-lung-cancer-rate http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2106410/air-p... - In China, the water you drink is as dangerous as the air you breathe https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2017/jun/02/china-water-dangerous-pollution-greenpeace https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals... - Man in China sentenced to five years' jail for running VPN https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/22/man-in-china-sentenced-to-five-years-jail-for-running-vpn https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/22/man-in-china-s... - Steam Community allegedly banned in China https://dotesports.com/general/news/steam-banned-china-19631 https://dotesports.com/general/news/steam-banned-china-19631 - The disappeared: Accounts from inside China's secret prisons http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/23/asia/china-lawyers-disappeared/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/23/asia/china-lawyers-disappeared... I would say from who I meet at expat bars/events in China, 80% of them are English teachers. They're there because there's no other skillsets for them to utilize in their home country, or they're just seeking new experiences before going back home. the rest 20% are there because their companies sent them there (but they'll go back sooner or later)
regularhackerer 9y ago
Adding to the other comments if you thought the whole rhino horn medicine idea was bad wait till you hear about inflicting pain to animals to make the meat more delicious.
seanmcdirmid 9y ago
The car thing is true, but it is more prevelant among the blue trucks. One of my friends lost a father this way. However, it isn’t that common. Sometimes you’ll encounter some guy in the middle of the street lying down waiting for someone to help them, who they will then accuse of causing them to be hurt in the first place...chinese law and police just aren’t developed enough to avoid these kinds of scams. However, it isn’t super common anymore, and you have to find a grizzled expat to bear these stories. For the most part they are just stories you talk about in a bar. It won’t effect you personally, not like the air pollution which finally convinced me to leave.
client4 9y ago
Having just been in Beijing and Shanghai for a significant period of time, I can say both of those cities are fairly modern with a flair of western living standards (aside from the fact that most people don't speak English). I can't speak to anywhere else, though I'm excited to visit a number of more rural cities this year.

TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago

We probably hear mostly about the sensationally negative things the most because they drive clicks. The same could be said about all the negative news coming out of the US. Why would anyone want to move there? And yet they do, and many thrive. I'm sure China is thriving, despite its problems.

westiseast 9y ago
The problem is best illustrated with things like road deaths. If you look at road deaths for China, it’s something like 20 per 100k people per year vs maybe 2-3 in the UK. What that means is, statistically China is 8-10 times “worse” than the UK. Does it mean you’re going to be seeing car crashes everywhere all the time? No. Does it mean China’s road safety is much worse? Yes. Things are much worse in China in a variety of meaningful respects. Does that mean it’s impossible to live there? Not at all.
- sh4z 9y ago
  If we instead go onto crime; If you look at violent crime we have 6 times more robberies, 4 times more murders and 18 times more gun crime in the USA compare to China (per capita) Does it mean you're going to be seeing people getting shot everywhere all the time? No. Does it mean general safety in the US is much worse? Yes. Things are much worse in USA in a variety of meaningful respects. Does that mean it's impossible to live there? Not at all. Well, if you can stand having Trump as the president of the country you live in.
  - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
    General safety is worse in china if you include traffic accidents. Crime safety is better in china. You are unlikely to be affected in any case. Though I did know of stupid foreigners who became crippled after stupidity on motor scooters.
saiya-jin 9y ago
> Why would anyone want to move there? Apart from chasing money and career, there are ridiculously few reasons to move there. Extreme hostility from official places (visa issues all the time, no citizenship), utter disregard for human rights on many levels of society, very bad air on most big cities where you end up living in 100% of the cases. I could go on and on and on. If you want a south asia experience, places like Singapore or Kuala Lumpur are much much better.

hkmurakami 9y ago

Money talks.

ghostcluster 9y ago

I can recommend a YouTube channel from a couple Westerners who have lived in China for years and share their experiences about it, https://www.youtube.com/advchina https://www.youtube.com/advchina -- the slightly older of whom is http://youtube.com/serpentza http://youtube.com/serpentza who lives in Shenzhen. They tackle a lot of the issues you bring up. China is very protective of their immigration, and unlike the US, it's impossible to get the equivalent of a Green Card or become a citizen at all, even if you marry a Chinese person, which they both have done. You constantly have to jump through hoops to keep a current Visa, and as a foreigner you must report in person to the nearest police station each month to be monitored, or face deportation. The police will also sometimes randomly come to your apartment unannounced, and come in to check on you. There exists a huge range of living situations that span from the more western first tier cities like Shanghai and Shenzhen, that are very organized, with a police presence that cuts down on lawless driving, unlicensed food vendors, etc, to the more rural areas where the bulk of the population still lives. Anyway, they both cover a lot of the issues you raise, and have a ton of good videos that give you a sense of what contemporary life is like there.

jamra 9y ago
I love these guys. Came here to link them. I suggest anyone watch these videos. They cover those topics as well as Visa issues and censorship.
seanmcdirmid 9y ago
The apartment thing...it’s very rare. Most likely to remind you to register at the PSB, I was always late and warned a few times, they never tried to fine me or anything. They aren’t really “checking” on you, honestly I’ve had worse experiences in Switzerland than China where they really do check on you (like the television tax guy entering my apartment to check that I really didn’t have a TV!). Beijing was actually more lawless than the other first tier cities. The police are kind of paralyzed when they could easily pull over someone with enough guanxi to end there careers.
- probablybroken 9y ago
  Television licencing property checks are normal in the UK as well - I've had a few inspectors demand access to my home to verify that I wasn't watching TV illegally. For a long time there used to be "TV detector vans" that would drive around areas supposedly detecting TVs in use in unlicensed properties - I believe it was ( still is? ) illegal to publish any information surrounding the efficacy of these vehicles ( Obviously because they don't work ).

strebler 9y ago

I've lived and done a fair amount of business there. The car thing is true. I would say people there care a lot more about their immediate network of friends / family and a lot less about anyone else. It's very safe to live there, but at the same time everyone's trying to take advantage of everyone else - literal and metaphorical pickpockets are everywhere. The inherent lack of trust makes workplace environments really difficult. Everyone's looking out for number one (themselves), to the point of damaging their own company for personal gain. You have no clue how hard it is to build a software dev team when ANY of the developers will happily copy the source code they have access to onto a thumbdrive and sell it to your top competitor for a modest payday. I highly respect anyone who builds a software team successfully in China, such a headache. Frankly, the internet censorship was the deal breaker for me. No Google, gmail, facebook, twitter, news, etc, is just too much to bear. But the food was really good, good weather and foreigners are treated like minor celebrities (everyone is really really friendly), so we don't experience real China like everyone else.

sharkdesk 9y ago
to be clear, white foreigners are treated like minor celebrities.
- nojvek 9y ago
  White foreigners are treated like celebrities in almost every non-western country. That’s what we sort of mean by white previlege. Thanks to Hollywood movies and music + beauty ads with predominantly white people.
anthonyleecook 9y ago
yup, I've heard many stories of expats turning around and leave the second they found the internet frustrating, which is strange that they didn't do their homework before coming. Also, the food I found ok; lack of variety (hot pot, shaokao, dumpling, repeat), and no good international cuisines. You can also get safer Chinese food in Taiwan or Los Angeles. As for weather, it's usually made worse by pollution. And recently, foreigners have been treated with disdain by locals because of nationalism.

anthonyleecook 9y ago

It's pretty true, speaking from experience. China is a pretty harsh place to live. But since this is hacker news, here are some links: - Viral footage shows bystanders doing nothing as Chinese woman is attacked in hotel https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/04/06/viral-footage-shows-bystanders-doing-nothing-as-chinese-woman-is-attacked-in-hotel/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/04/06... - Preschools across China to be inspected after ‘series of child abuse cases’ http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2121495/preschools-across-china-be-inspected-after-series-child-abuse http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2121495/presc... - Air pollution suspected for sharp rise in China lung cancer rate http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2106410/air-pollution-suspected-sharp-rise-china-lung-cancer-rate http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2106410/air-p... - In China, the water you drink is as dangerous as the air you breathe https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2017/jun/02/china-water-dangerous-pollution-greenpeace https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals... - Man in China sentenced to five years' jail for running VPN https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/22/man-in-china-sentenced-to-five-years-jail-for-running-vpn https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/22/man-in-china-s... - Steam Community allegedly banned in China https://dotesports.com/general/news/steam-banned-china-19631 https://dotesports.com/general/news/steam-banned-china-19631 - The disappeared: Accounts from inside China's secret prisons http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/23/asia/china-lawyers-disappeared/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/23/asia/china-lawyers-disappeared... I would say from who I meet at expat bars/events in China, 80% of them are English teachers. They're there because there's no other skillsets for them to utilize in their home country, or they're just seeking new experiences before going back home. the rest 20% are there because their companies sent them there (but they'll go back sooner or later)

regularhackerer 9y ago

Adding to the other comments if you thought the whole rhino horn medicine idea was bad wait till you hear about inflicting pain to animals to make the meat more delicious.

seanmcdirmid 9y ago

The car thing is true, but it is more prevelant among the blue trucks. One of my friends lost a father this way. However, it isn’t that common. Sometimes you’ll encounter some guy in the middle of the street lying down waiting for someone to help them, who they will then accuse of causing them to be hurt in the first place...chinese law and police just aren’t developed enough to avoid these kinds of scams. However, it isn’t super common anymore, and you have to find a grizzled expat to bear these stories. For the most part they are just stories you talk about in a bar. It won’t effect you personally, not like the air pollution which finally convinced me to leave.

client4 9y ago

Having just been in Beijing and Shanghai for a significant period of time, I can say both of those cities are fairly modern with a flair of western living standards (aside from the fact that most people don't speak English). I can't speak to anywhere else, though I'm excited to visit a number of more rural cities this year.