– 99% of the tourists that came in 2023 are not able to use WeChat pay, there is Alipay as an alternative, but it doesn’t work in so many restaurants and cafes where you need to scan the QR code to read the menu and order from it
– Alipay lets you pay most time by using your credit cards, but… there are many occasions where you can pay using only your Balance (some taxis or the Chinese version of Amazon or some tickets), but you can’t top up your balance without a Chinese bank account, so you’re so limited in what you can do unless you have a local friend you can give cash to, and then they can top up your Alipay account
– Foreigners will always need to bring cash around, and people will look weird at you for using cash. And there are very few ATMs
– Google didn’t accept the Chinese terms, but Apple did. Apple Maps is present in China, but it is very weak. The Chinese maps are much much much better, but they have no English version of the app
– The majority of the apps in the app store are not set for a global market, but for a Chinese-only market. The problem is if you set your phone to the Chinese region, you will lose all the paid apps you are currently using. So you can’t even download lots of useful local apps.
– Many hotels and airbnbs don’t have the license to accept foreigners, you always have to double to check with them if they can or you’ll find out an ugly surprise when you’ll get there
– trip.com is a life savior for hotels (always double-check if they allow you in), and for train tickets. BUT being able to pay internationally with cards or PayPal comes at a price: a short $9 train ride from Huizhou to Shenzen did cost me $12 because of the $3 booking fee
– When you want to rent an apartment for a month at fair prices, the majority of the time you will need a Chinese friend to sign the contract for you
– Apart from Shanghai, 98% of the country doesn’t speak English
– You need VPNs to do anything on our side of the internet (here in China I’ve been using https://vpn.ac/ )
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Check my unfiltered video on how life truly is in China