We spent three weeks in China... our first ever visit. But I can tell you right off the top that it likely won't be our last.
We were there June 21st to July 11th, just to give future readers an indication of the season. And we visited four different areas... Chengdu, Xi'an, Zhangjiajie (Wulingyuan), and Yangshuo.
These are the four areas we visited.
We arrived in Chengdu and when we were finished there we took the train to Xi'an. Then we flew from Xi'an to Zhengjiajie. Then we took the train from there to Guilin (Yangshuo).
The good...
There's a lot to like about China. They've come such a long way in the last 30 years. It's not the backwards, Communist, totalitarian China we were told about. Most areas are very modern... high speed rail, electric cars, electric scooters, apps on your phone that run everything and pay for everything. Cellular internet literally everywhere. Quite amazing, actually.
So in the "good" category are a lot of those items. The high speed rail system is super efficient, and very reasonably priced. And easy to understand! Same thing with the metro (underground) system in both Chengdu and Xi'an.
Not only are the train and metro systems inexpensive, but so are the taxis. And the Didi (similar to Uber) app works great everywhere and it's available in English as well.
Speaking of English, most signs have English on them as well as Chinese. And every hotel we stayed at had staff who knew immediately how to communicate with us easily through electronic translation. There is really no need to learn any of the language, although they were impressed when we knew how to say please, thank, you, and hello.
Quite a few sites had discounts or free entrance for seniors which even included foreign tourists. Certainly for age 65 and over, but often for age 60-65.
Hotel staff were over the top friendly. At every place we stayed, they were extremely gracious and seemed almost overly thankful that we were there.
Toilets... almost everywhere, and free. And for the most part, clean. Yes, sometimes there are only squat toilets, but we found western style toilets more than we expected to.
Very low rates of crime. It is a very safe country.
The bad...
I know that politics comes into play here for many people, but we don't let politics dictate where we travel, provided it's safe to do so. In fact, we believe that it's not up to us, as travelers, to comment or get involved in the politics of another country whether or not we personally agree or disagree. We are there for the people, the scenery, the culture, and the food.. not the politics.
So having said that, I mentioned that this is not the "communist" China we were told about. And I wanted to explain that comment. Yes, politically, China still has a communist government. But in real life China today, the economy is not even close to communist. There is private business ownership everywhere, people have property rights, there is a ton of foreign investment. Etc. So economically, it is a capitalist society. Millionaires, fancy cars, and Starbucks. And profit is the main driver.
But the government is always watching. Facial recognition cameras are literally everywhere, although I think it's not much different than London, England, or New York City, So if you're worried about privacy in that regard, then this is a bad thing. The government is still a one party system and you can't criticize it. Religious freedoms are limited... but allowed, provided the government approves it.
The food. We had a difficult time with this, but mostly because of Ruth's gluten allergy. The Chinese don't seem to recognize or care about food allergies, so it's up to you. Fortunately, Ruth's allergy is not severe... if she eats gluten it's not going to be life or death, in fact if it's a once or twice thing, she may not even notice it. But if anyone has a severe food allergy, then China is not the place for you.
The people. There are 1.4 billion people in China. The country is about the same size as the United States, and most of the people are concentrated in an area half the size of the United States. It's almost overwhelming. I mean, what happens when all of these people want to go on holiday? Well, the tourist attractions can get really busy!
The ugly...
The Chinese, especially the older men, have a habit of spitting. Clearing their throat with that awful wet, guttural retch-like sound, and spitting. But it's not only the older men. We experienced some older women and younger men doing the same thing. Never younger women. Apparently this goes back to the very polluted days in the 70's and 80's and it became socially acceptable. Not so much now that the pollution levels have moderated, and they have even begun public education campaigns against it. Ruth didn't seem to be quite as bothered by it, but personally, I found it to be totally gross.
Smoking. This actually wasn't as bad as we had read about, but it's still an issue that a lot of people in China are smokers. For example, even if a hotel says that your room is non smoking, it's only because they removed the ashtray the day of your arrival! But again, it wasn't as bad as we expected.
So, there you have it... the good, the bad, and the ugly of visiting China. For us, we would return for sure because it's such a large country and there's so much to see. And really, the good far outweighs the bad and the ugly! But we don't think we could do more than three weeks at a time.
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Electric Scooters are coming way down in price.
And in Canada...
I think you meant 1.4 billion? And about the spitting. It totally grossed me out. Especially when we were going out to eat. Definitely a hunger suppressant when it happened just before we walked into a restaurant. Last year we had a young man in class who used to clear his throat and would cough the spit into a tissue. Eventually the prof asked him to leave the class when he "needed" to do it.
ReplyDeleteOf course, corrected, thank you.
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