My expectation was that the Chinese curricula would be more rote, but that was not entirely true. There is more structured work in the Chinese curriculum, but a

My expectation was that the Chinese curricula would be more rote, but that was not entirely true. There is more structured work in the Chinese curriculum, but also a considerable amount of high-level problem solving. It's a lot like the JUMP Math approach, if you're familiar with that curriculum, but pushed ahead a couple of years. Creativity understood more broadly is a tough thing to shoehorn into a math curriculum, because average teachers have difficulty with mathematically creative material that is sufficiently in-depth. The Discovery math curriculum that's popular in North America is emblematic of that; there is a huge amount of time devoted to finding multiple creative ways to visualize/deconstruct basic operations, but actual, profound mathematical creativity like exploring various ways to prove interesting theorems is largely absent.