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Cruiser0077
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I was in China for three weeks. It's ALLLL culture shock! So beautiful though. Loved every minute. There's no A/C in most hotels. They use an enormous amount of garlic in everything. Usually there are no western style toilets so be prepared to pee in what is essentially a hole in public places. They're all about trying to sell you either jade, silk, or pearls. It ultimately depends on which province you see. People don't speak English so I hope you have a translator. China has a certain "smell" that you can instantly detect getting off the plane. It will be burned in your memory forever. Everyone was very nice. We were in Beijing, Chongqing, and Guangzhou adopting our daughter.

 

 

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I solved the hole in the floor toilets problem most of the time. If you are going to touristy areas just head for the handicapped toilets. They are in nice restaurants and tourist area public toilets and hotels. Not my favorite vacation destination but glad I went.

 

 

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The sales person in most stalls in buildings are too agressive and intimidating. If you ask for a price, they show you the price on a calculator. If you are not interested, they will shout at you in their language. Toilets in one hotel restaurant have urinals but the smell stick to your clothing. Most people are not sociable, some rude, except in Shanghai which is a business area. Others may feel differently but JMHO.

 

 

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Yes...in public restrooms look for the handicapped stalls as usually they will be western type, bring your own toilet paper and hand sanitizer. We've been to several cities in China and agree Shanghai is our favorite...love the shopping there, Nanjing Road and of course the Bund. Enjoy China, we can't wait to go back for a 3rd visit to Shanghai.

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We were just in China in April. Our hotel in Beijing was fabulous for $95 a night. Cities look like Western cities with lots of bicycles. They do have squat toilets in most public bathrooms and you need to bring tissues or toilet paper. Hotels all have Western toilets that I saw. People were very friendly. Most speak some English especially in major cities that we ran into. Most prices are meant to be negotiated. For instance a tshirt we bought started out at 280 yuan and we ended up paying 50 yuan. The same tshirt was offered at 480 yuan in the same store to our friends. Pollution was bad especially in Beijing. My eyes were burning. Sights were fascinating. Culture is very different and scenery is magnificent. Totally awesome. Prices were reasonable. We had a huge meal for $5 per person in Beijing. We had a problem because we didn't know what the food was. It wasn't Chinese like we see at home and we didn't understand the menu

 

 

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Interesting answers above. I hardly recognize this country that I have traveled to over 20 times. I will not address all the points above but let's correct a few things.

Nearly all hotels where I stayed had AC, even some where I paid $10 per night. A ton of people speak English but those, generally better educated, usually do not drive taxis or wait at tables. Regarding toilets, older building (such as a temple built a few hundred years ago) will not have great toilets but hotel, shopping malls, restaurants, will have clean "sit-down" toilets.

Understand that when visiting tourist attractions, you are not meeting locals. While they look Chinese they are mostly tourists like you from other parts of China or other Asian country.

The food will be different. Not even like Chinese food back home. But you also have tons of McDonalds, KFC, Pizza Huts and many nice western restaurants.

But, yes, it will be a shock. Everything is written in Chinese and people generally speak Chinese, you are in China after all. But signage if the subway, airports and tourist attractions is bilingual. Restaurants have menus in English or with photos.

Keep an open mind and you'll have fun. To get a feel for it, check on Youtube. There are tons of videos about various aspects of China.

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From the "culture shock" side of the question, here are the ones that come to mind:

 

 

- there's a lot of shouting there, particularly where there are crowds.

 

 

- Things are generally dirtier, and there's a lot of pollution - as mentioned above. Many wear masks and we just wound up staying inside (as the tv news also warned for its pollution alerts, stay inside unless you have to be out).

 

 

- Drivers aren't big on following rules, and pedestrians come last.

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I solved the hole in the floor toilets problem most of the time. If you are going to touristy areas just head for the handicapped toilets. They are in nice restaurants and tourist area public toilets and hotels. Not my favorite vacation destination but glad I went.

 

 

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Yes- handicapped toilets and bring your own TP.

I've made multiple business trips to China (often mixed with some R&R) from big cities to mountain hamlets.

IMG_1495809967.225201.jpg.e5aa2da6b8fe28073a5d0270a0263cb6.jpg

 

Can't remember any greater percentage of rude folks than anywhere else.

Food: I am convinced that the main tenet of China's culinary culture is to prove that every part of every animal is edible.

 

 

 

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OP, to prepare for your trip abroad to China - CC's partner site is a good start, suggest using TripAdvisor to preview cities, attractions and pictures.

 

Depending on your mode of arrival / landing or port of calls - the "cultural" shock could vary. Their 4 lanes highways are wider, smoother & better maintained than those in America (shocked) and yes, some of them are tolled. HST or inter-city High Speed Train really run at 300+ and very comfortable, not something you will likely experience ... maybe pre- and/or post-cruise or with an overnight stop like Tianjin, close to Beijing. Major cities like PEK, PVG and CAN has vast underground subway systems and train lines, all relatively new & built in the last 10 to 30 years - connecting to other modes of transportation. Taxis are generally available at key transit hubs and transfer points, they can also be "ordered" using Apps and, yes, they alway have Uber & its competitive equivalent.

 

RMB is the Chinese currency and a lot of daily transactions in stores & restaurants are conducted digitally via credit & debit cards, and local equivalent of PayPal. The "younger" generations are just as proficient in using smartphone, tablet & iOS technologies as we are, in their native language. The urbanized young ones tend to get at least high school education - and you can easily tell by their manners & dress etc. in places like the Bund.

 

Tour guides are licensed and go thru formal training, are bilingual in more than one language with demonstrated proficiency - they usually majored in and graduated from universities with related degrees. The older generations, those in their 50's and up and generally retired - unless they are self-employed or owned their business (per government planning, to free up jobs for the younger ones) are typically (biased view) less educated but with disposable income to travel, spend & shop ... don' underestimate their wealth, despite the language barrier.

 

Airports and 3 stars+ hotels all have central air and western toilets, sometimes side-by-side marked with pictorial signs (older ones have high illiteracy rate) but - beware - some of them aren't used to closing & locking the bathroom door for privacy while doing #1 or #2 ... check slowly before walking into someone else in the down posture while dropping your trousers or skirts. 7-11's and newstands are everywhere, outside the restaurants & even at the cashier's counter - they sell pocket-sized packets of white paper napkins, for eating and as TP, thick & absorbent ... forget Kleenex from home. McD, KFC, Starbucks and Pizza Huts, etc. generally have clean toilets suitable for travelers plus running water (also, free WiFi access ... if needed, a small purchase is sometimes required for getting the access "p/w")

 

Hand sanitizer and wipes are a must as all except upscale places provide them. Urban smog from industrial pollutants and heavy automobile traffic along the eastern coastal cities have resulted in air polution indexes and measured data to be published on TV channels, check them daily & if prone to respiratory issues, speak to your own PCP and carry facial filter-masks along with clean bottled drinking water.

 

China's water sources are polluted in many places and find its way into the consumption chains - buy known (import/licensed) branded bottle water for safer drinking. Likewise, avoid good smelling & colorful street food sold in open market as sanitation standards are lower to none - to avoid norovirus and food poisoning.

 

Download names, addresses & phone numbers of the places you plan to see or visit - making it easier to ask the driver, doorman or police officer on duty for help or at least point you in the right direction.

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And when we say avoid the water, we mean don't open your mouth in the shower either. Don't brush your teeth with sink water. (Unless you're sure your cruiseline has made it safe for you. But don't do it in the hotels if you stay in one.

 

 

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No that is not true about three stars and up having a/c. We stayed in a 4 star that didn't have any in chongqing. We stayed in the winter so maybe that had something to do with it. So at best they have it, but you may not be able to control the settings.

 

 

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We stayed at the Marriott City Wall in Beijing and as I recall we had no control over the Heat/ac. Nobody except the people at the front desk spoke English. Which was interesting when we went to have breakfast in their breakfast restaurant and later on in their very nice noodle restaurant. The noodle place did have a picture menu. And they were very nice. We just couldn't communicate very deeply. Also there was a hotpot restaurant called Xiabu-Xiabu (Shabu-Shabu) at a nearby Henderson Center Mall where they also didn't speak any English but they were very helpful, including the other customers coming to our rescue when they thought we needed something.

 

 

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We ate at a local restaurant in Shanghai opposite our hotel. No English, but very busy family place. When server realised we had no Chinese she brought us a menu with pictures. Lovely meal, lovely people.

It IS China, they speak Chinese, they have different customs. Take your smile and sign language. I have been there twice and found people very nice. I'm not good at bargaining so walk away, generally they come back with a reasonable price. Amazing places to see, enjoy.

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We ate at a local restaurant in Shanghai opposite our hotel. No English, but very busy family place. When server realised we had no Chinese she brought us a menu with pictures. Lovely meal, lovely people.

It IS China, they speak Chinese, they have different customs. Take your smile and sign language. I have been there twice and found people very nice. I'm not good at bargaining so walk away, generally they come back with a reasonable price. Amazing places to see, enjoy.

 

My son and I went to a local restaurant in Shanghai, wanting to get takeaway food to eat with DH who was in hospital. We asked for English Menu as we had in other restaurants when dining in. We selected dishes and said we wanted them to go. The waiter indicated that we should sit down. We mimed 'to go' and he mimed 'sit down'. A customer who spoke a little English came over to help. He spoke to the waiter, then the manager, then told us to sit down. We sat!

 

Eventually our food was brought out in dishes, then a large number of very small styrofoam containers were produced with a spoon. We spooned the food into the containers, paid and took it away.

 

We realized that Chinese takeaway is not usual in China. The food was excellent however and very reasonably priced

 

Sheila

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When we were in Beijing, we had a tour guide who helped us pick out what to eat from a picture book. I am allergic to seafood and have other food allergies which made choosing foods more difficult for us. Everyone was kind to us. And yes we did find when we walked away, prices came down

 

 

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We visited China while on a Vantage tour of 21 days with a four day river cruise. We visited several cities and had five internal flights within China.

 

Our hotels were five star and all had AC and western toilets. Yes, occasionally we would be faced with the eastern (hole in the floor) toilets, but it was never a problem.

 

The food was excellent. We ate in top restaurants and hotels. The food was more diverse than Chinese food in the USA. Most Chinese food in the USA is similar to Cantonese (Southern China) and somewhat Americanized. Dessert is watermelon and you knew when the meal was over when they brought out the watermelon.

 

Don't drink the tap water.

 

Everywhere we went the cities were filled with air pollution. Chongqing was the worst. Shanghai was very bad, but Beijing was not as bad. We lived the river cruise and the half day cruise on the Li river.

 

 

Hong Kong was very polluted. It had grown a lot since I was there in 1981. It was more modern and looked like the people were better off.

 

 

Here is my review of our trip.

 

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1718320

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No Facebook or social media. Lots of internet sites blocked. Your eyes will feel very dry and irritated from the pollution. Bring tissues for toilets (I call the square potties, which are holes in ground, except for handicapped stalls which are regular) and lots of hand sanitizer - but the packets of hand sanitizer, not the bottles, even the travel size, because they are not allowed in carry-on on plane. Very crowded every where you go. Eat dumplings wherever you go.

 

 

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I thought the level of sophistication and safety was higher than a good deal of the Caribbean. I did not feel afraid in China. Their cities seemed very Westernized although their way of life in certain ways is different like parents work while grandparents raise the children in many cases. I saw many people dressed up and people seemed industrious. Just pollution was bad and don't drink water

 

 

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We visited China while on a Vantage tour of 21 days with a four day river cruise.

.....

Here is my review of our trip.

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1718320

 

I enjoyed reading your review. Your tour sounds very similar to one we took in 2014 which was our intentional visit to China as opposed to our unexpected three weeks in Shanghai a couple of years earlier. We toured with a Canadian company Sinorama and stayed in many of the hotels you mentioned, as well as cruising on the Century Diamond. We were also impressed with the standard of the various Chinese airlines and surprised to be served food on a 90 minute trip.

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You will see in restaurants they pour hot water from tea pot over chopsticks and in their bowls this makes them feel they have sanitized them.

Rule if not cooked do not eat if you touch something even peanut shell with your hands sanitize ( I had no problem bringing sanitizer on in plastic bag). We travel for business and pleasure all over Cina for many years.

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No Facebook or social media. Lots of internet sites blocked. Your eyes will feel very dry and irritated from the pollution. Bring tissues for toilets (I call the square potties, which are holes in ground, except for handicapped stalls which are regular) and lots of hand sanitizer - but the packets of hand sanitizer, not the bottles, even the travel size, because they are not allowed in carry-on on plane. Very crowded every where you go. Eat dumplings wherever you go.

 

 

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There is no Facebook but they use their own social media sites. Constantly. One culture shock for us was that the usage of mobile phones was greater than anywhere else we have travelled.

We spent nearly a month in China in April this year and I had not been there, except for Hong Kong, since 2003.

Some surprises and observations; we found China to be extremely clean, except for the air quality in some but not all places. We did not get sore eyes but the pollution level may not have been especially high.

Some parts are crowded but we were impressed with the amount of open space when you get out of the cities. It was quite uncrowded in Yunnan province and very very scenically beautiful.

We certainly did not eat dumplings wherever we went. Most food was Chinese as we were in China! But we were all impressed with the variety of the food.

What was a shock to us was the quantity and quality of all the new infastructure. Beautiful modern airports, extensive highways, the very latest ship elevator on the Yangtze, wonderful high speed trains that carried us at 300 kilometres per hour.

Compared to 2003, travel is much easier. People now queue in airports and some other places. There is less smoking than there was, and we were able to get smoke free hotel rooms the whole way. English is still not widely spoken but the people were very patient in trying to communicate. People no longer were aggressive in the markets that we went to but you still need to haggle, as you do in most of the world.

We saw no-one begging, no-one living on the street, no-one wandering around drunk. We felt safer than we have almost anywhere we have travelled (all continents except Antarctica) and very much safer than when we have been in North and South America.

We were told that the use of aircon is restricted as a measure to reduce air pollution. As we were travelling in spring it was not needed. We had great weather.

China, to be honest, was one of the easiest and most interesting places we have visited.

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