What are Chinese good at and what are they bad at? My selection:

Good at:
(1) Dumplings
(2) Making foreigners feel welcome
(3) Copying
(4) Cover-ups
(5) Proverbs

Bad at:
(1) Spacial awareness
(2) Keeping quiet
(3) Fixing things
(4) Driving
(5) Fashion

..

Talking of driving (I still feel dizzy and headache from trying to work in my taxi this morning), have you noticed that when you talk to a Taxi driver he always turns is head & look at you to listen and answer ??? And this even if he is driving 100KM/H on Nanpu bridge trying to overpass a buss from the right ??????

Scary or what ?

yeah ditto!

I love everything about Shanghai....

I love my motherland!!! Shanghai Storm Trooper has spoken!!!

...............

I can't say there is anything bad about Shanghai. I just love it.

.....................

??????? with the ........... :mrgreen::mrgreen:

heretoday wrote:I can't say there is anything bad about Shanghai. I just love it.

please tell me the doctor that issues your prescription drugs.

Goods about Shanghai:
-Convinient and cheap public transport, and that guanxi thingy on the cell phone to always find the location is so convinient!
-Nice food and scenaries
-Cute girls
-Clubs and karaoke
-Some things are just cheap like massages and DVDs.

Bads:
-Expensive imports (most expensive in China!)
-Floor based toilets
-Manners, especially traffic manners and people walking on the streets suddenly flem out a spit!
-Expensive rent.
-Beggars that never give up and will also follow you into your taxi!


5 things are just too little the list of goods and bads can go on and on! Overall I like Shanghai!

@ shangstar :

(2) Making foreigners feel welcome

Yep. At the Hyatt.

Get real ! I feel as welcome (in the general to and fro) as 28 kg of 7 day old roadkill dumped on the loungeroom floor after I venture outside.

I love the scented air and super-sized population. Also winter is winter and summer is summer here. Putting extra milk in my cornflakes is a delight and eating eggs raw after a great workout in a state of the art gym is something that makes me feel that I am living. Mostly though it is the great variety of food on any street. The closeness I feel for my fellow subway riders is something that warms me greatly. My love of movies is something that is shared with most of the population here and is a great source of solace that thousands of others are watching the latest releases along with me. I love Shanghai.

Sardonic, but good!

Zak101 wrote:@ shangstar :

Get real ! I feel as welcome (in the general to and fro) as 28 kg of 7 day old roadkill dumped on the loungeroom floor after I venture outside.

true - but try being an expat in the UK and making conversation with a Daily Mail reader.

Moving to Shanghai soon, after 4 years in Shenzhen.

Thought i would contribute with a top/worst 5 of Shenzhen then...

Good at:
-- Saying "Hello.................... *giggle giggle giggle*"
-- Hot Pot (Love it)
-- Getting back in line........ After a "Oy!, ni deng yi xia hao bu hao??" from the scary laowai
-- Using the words: Should be, maybe, possibly, around, almost.... in the same sentence
-- Arranging and balancing 3-4-5 plates worth of food from the "1 trip only" salad bar at Pizza-Hut, on 1 plate.

Bad at:
-- Cooking steaks well-done
-- Stopping for red lights. Cars, pedestrians..... anyone...
-- Seeing anything further away than 1 meter
-- Keeping streets/city clean
-- Structured thinking


Could talk for days.......

It has certainly been a mix of pleasures & frustration... a mix of smiling with all your face and finally laughing with tears in your eye
&
covering your eyes/head with both your hands, while shaking your head and whispering "F**k...... why?.... Sigh..." then putting both hands on top of your head leaning slightly back looking with wide open eyes up in the grey sky above taking a deeeeeep breath and a final heavy *Sigh*, while once again telling yourself that you should stop being an idiot asking Why, seeing you already know there is absolutely no answer waiting for you....

It started out as a 3 month assignment. Now I have been here 4 years, getting married to a Chinese woman next month... So good things must outweigh the bad things by far

4 years here and you've just joined SHExpat ? I suppose all that time wasn't in Shanghai !

Victor - congrats on your up-coming wedding. Marrying a Chinese lady was one of my better life decisions. We lived de-facto for 4 years and tied the knot 18 months ago, so about 5.5 years together.

The best part ? A small argument about every 6 months and I don't have to deal with her tantrums and "issues" because she has none !

She doesn't complain about my habits and she often gives me surprise gifts, doesn't ask for money because I frequently offer it to her and she usually declines - she works and has her own coins.

Back to topic :

Best ?

1. Abundant and varied Western food supplies 200 metres from my door.
2. Ridiculously low rent on my apartment compared to the same quality and location in a major city in Australia.
3. Meals delivered in 30 minutes if I'm too lazy to cook.
4. Electricity bills that are a reason to smile, even in winter.
5. Opportunities !

Worst :
1. Some prick always in my way (Wei ?) when I go out.
2. Shoddy products, especially "expensive" fluorescent bulbs and halogen lights that die within 3 months after I replaced them.
3. Not being anonymous when I walk on the street.
4. Dipsticks riding 3 abreast in the bike lane, going the wrong way in front of me.
5. Having to pay for health care.

There you go !

Z.

good
1. daoshaomian
2. mapodofu
3. guoqiaomixian
4. cheap ****
5. that funny old guy in that tv show

bad
noise
noise
noise
noise
crowd

OT:

Zak101 wrote:4 years here and you've just joined SHExpat ? I suppose all that time wasn't in Shanghai !

Victor - congrats on your up-coming wedding. Marrying a Chinese lady was one of my better life decisions. We lived de-facto for 4 years and tied the knot 18 months ago, so about 5.5 years together.

Stayed in Shenzhen area all 4 years.
Quiting my job and moving to Shanghai after CNY. "Wife" already works in Shanghai, and we got our own place there too.

Both moving to Shanghai, and marrying her will without any doubt also be on the top 5 best decisions I have made in my life. Even moving means being job-less for the time being.

Congrats to you and your wife too.

victorinchina wrote:covering your eyes/head with both your hands, while shaking your head and whispering "F**k...... why?"

An every day occurrence living in China.

Could be worse though - could be back home commuting to work each morning with head in hands saying exactly the same thing!

5 Best
The Woman
The Woman
The Woman
The Woman
The Woman

5 Worst
Public Bathrooms
Public Bathrooms
Public Bathrooms
Public Bathrooms
Public Bathrooms

Best
1. Comprehensive Metro system
2. Good shopping
3. Cheap street food
4. Cheap DVDs
5. Range of bars and clubs

Worst
1. Pushing and shoving in public places.
2. Cutting in line / not respecting the queue system.
3. ICS / CCTV 9
4. Allowing dangerous silent electric scooters and speeding motorbikes on pedestrian paths.
5. Expensive decent Western food.

Good - Cheap 'Consumerism'

Bad - Bad public etiquettes.

Good - Cheap 'Consumerism' Bad - Bad public etiquettes.

your words just hit my nerves for that~~~~

Good
- Cheap movies
- Low rent
- 24hr McD's (that delivers)
- street food
- 1 liter beers

Bad
- No queuing, ever
- Traffic lights are there for decoration only
- Toxic air
- "Rip me off" etched into my whitey forehead
- 24hr McD's (that delivers)

I have been here 7 years this March. I think the list would be different 5 years ago.

There are some things you just get use to after a while that were annoying as hell in the beginning but sooner or later fall off the radar.

The Good:
1. Lack of crime (surprised I am first at saying this, but there are not too many places in the western world as big as Shanghai that you can walk around at 2AM and feel safe)
2. Cheap living expenses (rent, utilities, food, etc; although I spend a fortune on my ‘western’ delights)
3. Friendly people (once you get to know them and live in the neighborhood for a few years)
4. Family (married to a Shanghai Lady)
5. The city in general and the opportunities, variety of venues, food, attractions, shopping….

The Bad: actually more a list of the things, I just can’t get use to, not necessarily bad:
1. Disregard by locals for just about everything except themselves, thank you Confucius
Peeing in public
Line cutting
Bratty kids (really bratty, not just the normal type)
2. Crossing the street (green man is barley a suggestion, 110,000 people killed last year in road accidents, WHEN will they learn how to drive?)
3. Environment in general including questionable hygiene everywhere
4. Quality of just about every locally made product, especially household items
Light Bulbs that don’t last
Bathroom fixtures that constantly break or rust
Locally made tools are useless
5. Sorry, and I will take crap for this but.... Expats, and I am one…. More so recently, the quality has gone down in recent years and I notice there are more from 2nd and 3rd world countries that think they are entitled to God knows what?.

don't understand your number 5 on list of bad things! Does it matter where expats come from? I'd call the UK a 2nd or 3rd world country, and there appear to be plenty of immigrants from that island coming over here for a better life.......

OUaH Lurker!! you are hard with them!

Shangstar,
Come on Mate. UK may have it's problems, but it still a significant developed country. I think a lot of people come to Shanghai for opportunities, but the vast majority are looking forward to getting back.
Just look at the list of worst things and honestly say whether any of these apply to England........OK, I will give you the bad dentists.