What would you take to live in China?

[lupacexi]

I may have an opportunity to work in China. If I have a 40 inch waist and 10.5 shoes, what kind of clothes or personal items do I need to take with me? Can you find dental floss there? What about dress socks that hug the whole shin and don't just have a rubber band at the top. (Finding decent socks in Indonesia was hard. I could find super cheap ones the way I wanted under a bridge right off of Jl. Sudirman in Jakarta sometimes.)

When I lived in South Korea, I had my mom mail me a pocket comb from the US. There were plenty in Korea, but always made out of a brittle plastic and combs broke when I sat down. I eventually found out I could get dental floss at the pharmacy, so I was okay. Indonesian shoes went up to 42 or 43 cm, and I wore 44 or 45. I eventually found special places for the larger shoes without having to go to the fancy expat-oriented shoes. Pasar Baru had big shoes for local prices.

I know China makes all kinds of stuff. Do they sell the larger sizes domestically?

What kind of stuff like this do I need to know for China?

[zboy1]

Here are some tips from someone living in China now:

1) Buy two or three pairs of sneakers and bring them over because Chinese men have small feet and finding size 44 sneakers is virtually impossible in China. I'm Asian and size 12 in the States. That would make me size 46 in China.

2) Dental Floss is hard to find in China.

3) Bring Western medicines like cold pills, Tylenol and Advil, Alka Seltzer and other drugs not readily found in China. Chinese drugs are weird and very dissimilar from Western drugs.

4) Bring at least one Credit card with you to China. It's hard to buy anything using Chinese cards outside of the country.

5) Buy a laptop but don't buy one in China: If you do, then you'll have to reinstall the correct software and it's a pain to use Chinese laptops with Chinese software in it.

[MrMan]

It looks to me like lupacexi quoted one of my old posts from when I was considering a job in China last year.

zboy's advice looks really good. I've only spent a week or so in China. But some of these shopping problems seem to be common to Asia. In Jakarta, there are places to get shoes over 43, which I think is about 9 and 1/2, the standard maximum size at most stores. There are expensive malls that sell them, but also Pasar Baru sells them, or used to, at one of the shoe companies main stores and some of the other shops there. They export shoes like that from Indonesia, but the companies that do that may only sell them at one location. Korean shoes are small, too. I couldn't find my size when I shopped in Korea. Fortunately, I had enough shoes to last me for the time I was there.

I've seen this style in the US, but it seems like narrow shoes, sometimes with an excessively long bit at the end that your foot doesn't actually touch, seems to be the style in Asia. Some of the styles shaped like that look good, but I couldn't squeeze my foot into them.

If one knew the place to go, China may have some places where they sell the larger sizes.

I was able to get some amoxillin over the counter in China, but I had someone with me to translate. In Indonesia, I haven't been able to find just plain Benadryl (or the local equivalent.) They usually put two or three other medicines in there. So if you had some kind of allergic reaction or a runny nose with no cough, you'd probably have to take a cough suppressant and a pain killer just to get the active ingredient in Benadryl in Indonesia. Does China have the equivalent of Benadryl.

China has a developed online ordering industry, but Taobao was in Chinese the last I looked. I could find some 38's in pant sizes on it when I searched in English, but the problem with ordering online is that you don't get to try them on first.

Btw, these kinds of threads are really useful to people searching the Internet who are actually moving abroad, IMO.

[xiongmao]

All good advice.

I couldn't find decent man sized tissues in Shanghai - they're essential if you get man flu.

Asian toothpaste is, er, weird so it's another thing to bring from home.

Bring decent shoes with you I'm not that big footed but I had a nightmare buying shoes in China and ended up damaging my feet from hard soled Chinese shoes. Took months to fix them and I was hobbling around Bangkok.

Again, bring tech stuff with you as it's not cheap in China (except for accessories). Stuff in China tends to be dirt cheap (household goods) or expensive (toasters, gold), with no middle ground.

China has just banned cheese imports apparently - it could be fake news but it seems legit.

[D_Athlete]

Huh? Family Mart carries dental floss usually

[Bao3niang]

The obvious:
1. Clothes
2. Computer
3. Basic necessities


-PS4
-Books

[xiongmao]

PS4s are sold here. Although I just took my PS4 controller as my PC is fast enough to play GTA V.

English language books are rare here although you can just download any reading material you want.

I would also take Brazil nuts - I've never seen them for sale in China.

[Winston]

Yeah the drugstores in china suck. The medicines dont work and dont even stop colds or headaches. And they arent in English so you dont know whats in them. I dont understand why china doesnt import better quality medicine from abroad. They dont even have simple things like atenolol, which i couldnt find in any drugstore there. Yet in the Philippines and Thailand most drugstores have it. Go figure.