What are the best Chinese cities?

[JohnDavey02]

Hi all,

I've gotten the opportunity to study on scholarship in China (funded by my home country to study anywhere in China for at least a year, essentially) next year and was wondering what cities you all would recommend for me to select for my place of study? From browsing this forum's archives, it seems to be oft-repeated that places like Shanghai are bad for geo-maxxing, and Chongqing or Chengdu are good? Is that accurate? I appreciate any advice or thoughts you'd have to share

I expect to post here with great regularity regarding my life when I'm over there a while from now, but for now, I'm happy to answer any questions otherwise!

Thanks

 

[AlexBrown84]

welcome

From browsing this forum's archives, it seems to be oft-repeated that places like Shanghai are bad for geo-maxxing, and Chongqing or Chengdu are good? Is that accurate?

yes this is true generally



tell me more about yourself such as personality type, interests, mbti, etc and i’ll try to give advice from my experience of visiting over 20 chinese provinces

 

[Exutoire]

Alex will probably give better city recommendations than me but my 2cent is just that you should also check the quality of the institutions you will study in.
Also do you speak Chinese ?

 

[JohnDavey02]

i’ll try to give advice from my experience of visiting over 20 chinese provinces

That would be amazing; thank you!

MBTI: ENTJ (Pretty stable over my life, although tends to be a close E/I split)
Personality Type: Young guy, sort of dualistic split between being out-going and adventourous (visiting new places, getting fucked up at the club) and being an autistic introvert playing EU4 for a six hour session every now and then when time permits.
Interests: Decent nightlife, cute girls, a more "authentic" China experience

To tell you the truth, after dating a really high-tier Chinese international student here for a few months and going from feeling like a 6/10 to an 8/10 from her, her friends, and other intl Chinese, I sorta became obsessed with China and engineered my trajectory to end up over there as my undergraduate degree nears its end. I'm giving up a decent job offer here to do this, so we'll see if this all ends in disaster, lol. I have a decent amount of savings, fortunately, to live off if things go awry, though.

Also do you speak Chinese ?

Not really; I'm doing my best, though. Starting from scratch since New Years, I could reliably pass HSK 2 mock tests online around March through an autistic combination of spamming Anki, consuming pirated Chinese grammar textbooks, and watching Children's TV shows w/ ZH-subtitles for a cumulative total of ~3 hours a day. I think I have a decent chance of getting to HSK 4 prior to touching down in China. I am also JLPT N3, so I have some basic familiarity with Hanzi.

As for the educational quality, that's a good shout to check. My thinking was to do a one-year (or two-year) english-taught Masters at a decent Chinese university: Fudan, Sichuan Uni, Chongqing Normal, etc.

 

[AlexBrown84]

That would be amazing; thank you!

MBTI: ENTJ (Pretty stable over my life, although tends to be a close E/I split)
Personality Type: Young guy, sort of dualistic split between being out-going and adventourous (visiting new places, getting fucked up at the club) and being an autistic introvert playing EU4 for a six hour session every now and then when time permits.
Interests: Decent nightlife, cute girls, a more "authentic" China experience

To tell you the truth, after dating a really high-tier Chinese international student here for a few months and going from feeling like a 6/10 to an 8/10 from her, her friends, and other intl Chinese, I sorta became obsessed with China and engineered my trajectory to end up over there as my undergraduate degree nears its end. I'm giving up a decent job offer here to do this, so we'll see if this all ends in disaster, lol. I have a decent amount of savings, fortunately, to live off if things go awry, though.



Not really; I'm doing my best, though. Starting from scratch since New Years, I could reliably pass HSK 2 mock tests online around March through an autistic combination of spamming Anki, consuming pirated Chinese grammar textbooks, and watching Children's TV shows w/ ZH-subtitles for a cumulative total of ~3 hours a day. I think I have a decent chance of getting to HSK 4 prior to touching down in China. I am also JLPT N3, so I have some basic familiarity with Hanzi.

i’d say hangzhou. slower than shanghai and less foreigners so can still be around mostly chinks while improving your language

would also be close to shanghai when you want to go clubbing

if you want the best chinese girl you can find then i’d say shanghai or beijing

 

[JohnDavey02]

i’d say hangzhou. slower than shanghai and less foreigners so can still be around mostly chinks while improving your language

would also be close to shanghai when you want to go clubbing

if you want the best chinese girl you can find then i’d say shanghai or beijing

Is there something about Chongqing or Chengdu that doesn't align with the bio I posted? Weak nightlife? Need better language skills?

 

[AlexBrown84]

Is there something about Chongqing or Chengdu that doesn't align with the bio I posted? Weak nightlife? Need better language skills?

nah nothing wrong, those places are still good, it’s just the line about wanting the best chink girl. sichuan girls are good but the top tiers taller girls still congregate to shanghai/beijing

 

[Cigarette]

BEIJING FOR PUSSY

 

[Exutoire]

i’d say hangzhou. slower than shanghai and less foreigners so can still be around mostly chinks while improving your language

would also be close to shanghai when you want to go clubbing

if you want the best chinese girl you can find then i’d say shanghai or beijing

Yeah Hangzhou is very solid and the city is super cool, universities are top notch (Zhejiang University). Girls are cute. It’s rich and clean. Very good.

 

[JohnDavey02]

Alright, awesome! Thank you very much for the recommendation of Hangzhou guys; I'll look into it

If anyone else has ideas, too, I'm more than receptive.

 

[Xavist]

Alright, awesome! Thank you very much for the recommendation of Hangzhou guys; I'll look into it

If anyone else has ideas, too, I'm more than receptive.

Urumqi or Lhasa lol

 

[JohnDavey02]

Urumqi or Lhasa lol

What's the reasoning behind these? They seem quite off the beaten path

 

[Exutoire]

Also what type of climate do you like ? And do you like white-skinned or darker girls, tall or short ? All this matters when choosing a city as well.
For example, the South is extremely hot in summer and spring, it’s basically unlivable for me.

 

[JohnDavey02]

Also what type of climate do you like ? And do you like white-skinned or darker girls, tall or short ? All this matters when choosing a city as well.
For example, the South is extremely hot in summer and spring, it’s basically unlivable for me.

I've had quite a varied childhood climatically, so I'm pretty laissez-faire in that regard. Otherwise, I much prefer light-skinned, and don't care about height so long as I'm not getting comparatively mogged by other guys around (I'm only 5'9" jfl but can fraud to 5'11.5" in stylish boots and such). I read that the Northerners are rather tall?

 

[Exutoire]

Light skinned girls you can find in Sichuan / Chongqing and Northern parts of China (anything above of Shandong I’d say).
As for the men, very short in Sichuan/Chongqing, but very tall in Shandong, and relatively tall in Beijing.

 

[JohnDavey02]

Light skinned girls you can find in Sichuan / Chongqing and Northern parts of China (anything above of Shandong I’d say).
As for the men, very short in Sichuan/Chongqing, but very tall in Shandong, and relatively tall in Beijing.

This is very good to know haha

 

[Orientalist]

Hi all,

I've gotten the opportunity to study on scholarship in China (funded by my home country to study anywhere in China for at least a year, essentially) next year and was wondering what cities you all would recommend for me to select for my place of study? From browsing this forum's archives, it seems to be oft-repeated that places like Shanghai are bad for geo-maxxing, and Chongqing or Chengdu are good? Is that accurate? I appreciate any advice or thoughts you'd have to share

I expect to post here with great regularity regarding my life when I'm over there a while from now, but for now, I'm happy to answer any questions otherwise!

Thanks

Shanghai is probably perfectly fine. I'd probably pick that if I was getting betabuxxed by a scholarship and didn't have to worry about COL.

 

[Orientalist]

Personally I plan on going to Guangzhou for the grungey, sex-positive and "authentic" canto alt youth culture
Cities like Chengdu are known for something similar, but it's more hip-hop/tech/cosplay oriented

 

[Xavist]

Personally I plan on going to Guangzhou for the grungey, sex-positive and "authentic" canto alt youth culture
Cities like Chengdu are known for something similar, but it's more hip-hop/tech/cosplay oriented

What are you planning on doing for income in Guangzhou?

 

[Orientalist]

What are you planning on doing for income in Guangzhou?

I'm the greatest educator of the English language that the world has ever known

 

[Xavist]

I'm the greatest educator of the English language that the world has ever known

Thought you wanted to do something in IT there since that’s what you studied; is it that difficult to get a normal job in mainland China still with both domestic companies and also multinationals?

 

[Orientalist]

Thought you wanted to do something in IT there since that’s what you studied; is it that difficult to get a normal job in mainland China still with both domestic companies and also multinationals?

Who knows, but no chance in hell I'm working 9-9-6

 

[Xavist]

Who knows, but no chance in hell I'm working 9-9-6

Don’t think that’s ever applied to foreign workers there though?

 

[JohnDavey02]

Are most non-student Western foreigners in China just teachers? Would there be jobs that involve a more defined career path and the development of transferrable skills, like management consulting, available?