I went to live in China... ask me anything!

[xiongmao]

Hmm, this was a most interesting day.

So at lunchtime I'm heading into town on the metro and I get a call on my mobile from Miss Xiang. Now I've chatted to her for 2 years now, but I never managed to meet her IRL.

And now I have!

She told me she was coming to Gz at 6, so I was slowly making my way back to my apartment to get ready. Next thing she calls me at 2 to tell me she was an hour away!!!!

I bust my gut to get ready, then went to meet her off the Shenzhen train.

And what can I say?

WOW!

There was another thread about why Western men date ugly Asian women. Meh. Maybe these threads are started by guys who have never been to Asia.

While maybe not beautiful in Chinese mens' eyes, Miss Xiang is by far the hottest woman I have ever dated. Maybe she's a 10, all I know is that if I posted her photos here or on facebook then guys would be pretty impressed.

I went to meet her at the station. She called to say she was outside KFC. Hmm, not easy to see find her as there were at least 3 KFC's.

She turned up wearing a beautiful white fur coat and a really exquisite chinese style dress. It's freezing cold today, so I didn't see too much of the dress. But I liked what I saw. In terms of dressing to impress, yeah, she's a 10.

Some Chinese guys on the metro were talking about us. Maybe they wondered what I saw in such an ugly woman, lol.

Anyway, she really reminded me of Angelina Jolie. She had the same tight skin and pouting lips. She wore some beautiful accessories in her hair. The students at my Uni are just girls - Miss Xiang is a WOMAN. And a classy one at that.

We held hands which was tricky for me. The girl is so gorgeous and has so much sex appeal that I could barely walk hee hee hee.

I've been a late developer as far as women go. But holding hands on a first date - that's a first for me. Chinese women love confident men, and this is what I need to work on.

She's gone back home now. I hope I can see her again, but if not then there's plenty more like here here. I'm actually working on setting up a date with an even hotter woman.

Of course the downside is that this type of lady is high maintenance. Yeah, she went in a store and was looking at some pricey stuff. Although I will also add that she's not poor. In fact she bought us dinner - well I am a poor student now!

One good thing is that there aren't too many types of Chinese lady, and she's sort of a combination of a couple of girls I've met before. I have doubts, but now I'm here and in it for the long haul, I can play the longer term game.

But walking down Gz's trendiest shopping street with her on my arm - that felt great!

I heard a good saying. If she's easy she won't be special. If she's special, she won't be easy.

Miss Xiang, she's really something .

[xiongmao]

I need to post more photos. So here's a couple of fashion ladies I spotted today:



Next week the temperature here will soar, and those white legs will finally appear en mass!

[magnum]

my opinion, one on the left is a negative, one on the right is a positive.

I'm curious as to what registers as a "ugly" asian woman?

For me it would be the girl on the left in that photo, but even then I ask....if the guy dating her likes her, what's the big deal.

the girl i'm seeing now I'm almost sure isn't "hot" or a 10, but she's got the body, and honestly, if the girl passes the kiss test your golden, that means if you want to kiss her, she's cute/hot enough for you then isn't she?

That's my problem though, like you with miss xiang, great experience is to be desired, but good isn't to even say you can't find someone better or more compatible, on the flip side, why hunt if your not hungry.

catch 22, when you have options for once, you start to make slower and more thought out choices.

[xiongmao]

Small update: there's so much opportunity here! I went in the University admin office to file some paperwork, and they gave me a photocopy of a job ad. There's a local language school that wants English teachers. The downside is that it's for weekend working (quite common with language teaching).

Both the girls in my photo have great figures... in fact most women here do.

There are plenty of "plain" women here. But again they often have great figures.

The issue with beautiful women is that their selfish gene tells them not to trade down. So they can be a handful. But I must say that Miss Xiang has a nicer personality than I was expecting. Maybe she can be tamed.

Anyway the sun is out and I've gotta work on getting my apartment up to standard, in case a lady comes here!

[xiongmao]

Hmm, so much stuff is going on here.

I met a member of the communist party today. Here, who you know is VERY important.

Also I heard about another teaching job - that's two I've heard of now. The thing is there are probably less than 100 native English speakers at my University. Yes, lots of people speak English, but it's native speakers that are the most in demand here.

I don't even have a teaching qualification, but if you're a native speaker and you're a graduate of a good University then you don't really need one.

I also met another English teacher. This seems to be a great job for guys in their 50's and 60's who want to do something with their lives. In general, the University I'm studying at seems to like teachers who are at least 40. Schools probably prefer younger teachers.

I need to suss out the implications of working on a student visa. From what I've heard, getting caught working here is a case of two strikes and you're deported. But there might be ways round it.

However, I'm not just here to work/study. I've also found a wing man, and I'm looking forward to hitting the bars with him in search of perfect 10's who our moms wouldn't like us to bring home. Lol.

[drealm]

2 questions:

1) Do chinese women cook anymore? I met quite a few on chinese love links who were office girls that just ate microwave food all the time?

2) What was the communist party member like? I've heared stories that they get away with rape and their children break laws because they know they won't be thrown in jail.

[Rock]

Hmm, so much stuff is going on here.

I met a member of the communist party today. Here, who you know is VERY important.

Also I heard about another teaching job - that's two I've heard of now. The thing is there are probably less than 100 native English speakers at my University. Yes, lots of people speak English, but it's native speakers that are the most in demand here.

I don't even have a teaching qualification, but if you're a native speaker and you're a graduate of a good University then you don't really need one.

I also met another English teacher. This seems to be a great job for guys in their 50's and 60's who want to do something with their lives. In general, the University I'm studying at seems to like teachers who are at least 40. Schools probably prefer younger teachers.

I need to suss out the implications of working on a student visa. From what I've heard, getting caught working here is a case of two strikes and you're deported. But there might be ways round it.

However, I'm not just here to work/study. I've also found a wing man, and I'm looking forward to hitting the bars with him in search of perfect 10's who our moms wouldn't like us to bring home. Lol.

I might have to go to Shenzhen by around April if I can swing a decent China visa here in Manila. Will u still be around Guangzhou? If so, perhaps we can meet up to kick-about yr. new adopted city and enjoy a bit of what China has to offer.

The thing I hate most about Southern China is the cold dreary weather u often get in the winter. The only place I know in China which is pretty much spared from the cold I think is Hainan Island. Depressing winter weather is one reason I tend to vacate Taiwan from late December thru April. We pretty much have the same weather as u. Thai and Phils is much better weather wise than about anywhere in China IMO.

[xiongmao]

Drealm - most Chinese girls I've met have said their moms are better cooks than they are. I don't know about young girls, but when my Uni has an international day maybe I'll get to sample some of their cooking.

Quite honestly I don't know why anyone would cook here, I don't know how you could make anything more cheaply here than a restaurant can.

As far as the communist party member, well I hope to learn more about the system here. Corruption, well it's just not really talked about here. He believes communism will outlast capitalism - I guess 2008 almost proved him right.

I want to question him about communism because this place seems so ruthlessly capitalist, at least for ordinary working class people. We don't even have rent controlled apartments here (I think!) - I believe the market sets the price.

He dropped a big clue - China is playing a long term game.

But understanding this country, well that's gonna take me a while. I don't even know why they paint the bases of the trees white, or why the woman outside my apartment was smoking her foot.

Also note that in China Beijing is the place to go for politics, Shanghai for finance, and in Guangzhou it is international trade.

Rock - Yeah, I should be here for a year - I should get my visa soon. I've got my medical tomorrow. Come to Guangzhou although I'll warn you it's packed to capacity here. Even my visitor from Shenzhen thought this place was too busy!

Have you been here before? Guangzhou is fabulous as there are a lot of tourist sites and also some wonderful markets. Very few people come here as tourists. I can even show you a market where you can buy an alligator! Actually I want to buy a gecko now, as I heard they eat roaches and mosquitoes.

It's colder here than I expected, although coming from a snowy UK it's been OK here. Sunday was really cold though, and Miss Xiang was smart wearing a fur coat.

It must be said though that nowhere in China has particularly good weather! Still, I'd rather be too hot than too cold.

And another update - I've just spent a couple of hours helping out in an informal English class. This was just to help students practice their speaking and listening.

One thing is certain - I should have come here when I was 18! There are 80% girls here, so boys are very popular!

As to the students who came to the class, well I was surprised that their English was so good. And I was even more surprised to find that they were just first year students!

I got some great teaching experience from the class, and I have some ideas for what I'd need to do if I taught on my own.

Also it's useful to talk to Chinese girls (and only girls came to the class). It was interesting to find out that they don't like talking to foreigners not because they're shy, but because they're scared of losing face. Actually some are a little shy, but a couple are very confident.

On the downside, well 6 days into my Chinese class and they couldn't really understand anything I was saying to them in Chinese. Yeah, it's a tough language to learn and for most people it's probably a total waste of time. I know a guy who has a Chinese wife and he's studied Mandarin for 5 years, but he still couldn't make himself heard! Besides, for all of my students, Mandarin is their second language after Cantonese and a whole bunch of languages I never heard of before. If you wanna learn Chinese, then learning to read is probably more valuable (especially if you want to take the bus!).

So that was an action packed day. And tomorrow will bring a trip to a Chinese hospital. The life experience I am racking up here is just incredible.

Now I need a quick trip to Chinese Love Links to try and set up some more dates.

One funny thing I've learnt about Chinese girls is that they're not very clued up about their local area. Like yesterday I found a fabulous night market near my apartment. It was nearly 1 Km long, and you could buy all manner of stuff. Yet the girl I know who lives here had never heard of it. I found that incredible, as it must only be a Km from her apartment. This isn't the first example of this. Maybe Chinese people just aren't good explorers, or maybe it's a gender thing.

[xiongmao]

Wow, the weather is great this week. Blue skies, temperatures of 25C and the air is pretty clean. It's perfect weather for sitting outside a cafe and watching pretty girls walking by.

As usual today was action packed. Today was my allocated day for getting my medical examination required for the residency visa.

Yeah, that was an experience. The Chinese aren't big on privacy, so we got our blood samples taken from us in the waiting room. I'm surprised nobody passed out.

The trip to the clinic was an experience as well - I've never seen so many elevated freeways. In some places there were 3 levels of freeway. It would be fun to drive here, but also really scary.

Myself and a couple of foreigner friends of mine got lost in a rough looking neighborhood, but a lovely English speaking girl not only gave us directions, but escorted us to the metro station.

I've made contact with a very hot woman from Chinese Love Links. Ah, as usual the hot ones are hard work

My wing man is primed and ready, and it looks like we'll be hitting some bars on Friday. He's young, I'm Western, yeah we should be able to have some fun.

Things aren't all good though. I got 1 mosquito in my apartment and managed to get bitten. It's really painful. I've equipped myself with a load of defences. My favourite is a tennis racket that delivers 2000V to flying critters. I hit a mosquito with it and there was a huge blue spark. Lol. I wonder how dangerous it is? There's no concept of health and safety here!

Other downsides? Well it's remorselessly noisy here. You also need to keep your wits about you - a friend fell over a rough paving stone and ended up with his arm in a sling.

Girls wise, well I've seen two girls today who were right off the scale. There was a girl in a bright blue miniskirt - I saw her from the bus and she was practically floating down the sidewalk. And another girl had a pair of killer heels and pants that couldn't disguise the shapeliest legs imaginable.

Also there's a club down the road that's packed full of probable perfect 10's. I saw them all lined up greeting customers, but I was too far away to get a better look. I need to get friendly with some company bosses, then maybe they'll take me there!

By the way, as far as teaching jobs go, yes there are loads here. But it's hard to find out about them when you're not here. So if you've got some cash then why not come on a student visa, and study Chinese for 6 months. Then find a job and change to a work visa?

Also if you want to come here on a work visa then a teaching certificate is a must, unless you have an academic/teaching background.

[xiongmao]

More great weather, and an endless supply of pretty girls to admire in the street

You can look at photos of China all day long, but unless you actually come here, it's hard to imagine just how many stunning girls you'd see.

I wonder if Winston will come here soon? I saw a lot of sun parasols today, so that means the white legs will be sure to follow.

Next week is a key week for me because all being well I should get my long stay visa. If not then I'll head off somewhere else.

I like the studying in Asia route because I am nicely chilled out while English teachers and business people are losing their minds. There's an English teacher studying Chinese in my class, and it annoys him that our teacher isn't doing things the way he would. Me, I'm just gonna sit back and observe.

I guess I should do some money earning activity. But I'm happy that being here is putting such good stuff on my resume that I'll make up for lost time later.

I reckon I can pass a couple of the Chinese language tests (the HSK's). Really that's enough objective for me as far as language learning goes.

Learning Chinese is very tough. Actually the best guy in our class is the guy from the 'stan. He came here without being able to speak a word of English. Now he has no choice but to learn Chinese, and to learn it fast. I reckon he'll top the class.

My other classmates all seem to be at or around the same level as me, although the Koreans are pretty good at learning Mandarin. While Chinese students can be good, educational standards in Korea and Japan are way ahead, and so are their students who come here.

Now I'm going to have a bit of a clean of my apartment, and try to bring it up to Western standards of cleanliness.

[xiongmao]

More great weather, and an endless supply of pretty girls to admire in the street

You can look at photos of China all day long, but unless you actually come here, it's hard to imagine just how many stunning girls you'd see.

I wonder if Winston will come here soon? I saw a lot of sun parasols today, so that means the white legs will be sure to follow.

Next week is a key week for me because all being well I should get my long stay visa. If not then I'll head off somewhere else.

I like the studying in Asia route because I am nicely chilled out while English teachers and business people are losing their minds. There's an English teacher studying Chinese in my class, and it annoys him that our teacher isn't doing things the way he would. Me, I'm just gonna sit back and observe.

I guess I should do some money earning activity. But I'm happy that being here is putting such good stuff on my resume that I'll make up for lost time later.

I reckon I can pass a couple of the Chinese language tests (the HSK's). Really that's enough objective for me as far as language learning goes.

Learning Chinese is very tough. Actually the best guy in our class is the guy from the 'stan. He came here without being able to speak a word of English. Now he has no choice but to learn Chinese, and to learn it fast. I reckon he'll top the class.

My other classmates all seem to be at or around the same level as me, although the Koreans are pretty good at learning Mandarin. While Chinese students can be good, educational standards in Korea and Japan are way ahead, and so are their students who come here.

Now I'm going to have a bit of a clean of my apartment, and try to bring it up to Western standards of cleanliness.

[Cornfed]

I need to post more photos. So here's a couple of fashion ladies I spotted today:

The first one looks plain and glandular and the second one looks snooty and evil. Are these examples of the alleged Chinese 10s you have been raving about? I agree that Chinese women are OK, but you seem to have some kind on unusual fetish.

[xiongmao]

The 10's have been for my eyes only so far - I haven't really used my SLR here much yet. And if you've never been here then it's hard to appreciate how hard it is to take photos. There's vast amounts of people, there are vehicles everywhere and the roads are littered with all kinds of hazards (one of my new friends here is sporting a broken arm as proof of the danger!). Photography is also a little risky here.

Anyway, I took a bus ride to a new part of town tonight. Number of foreigners seen all evening - zero. Number of perfect 10's seen - 100's, maybe 1000's. I need a wingman, then we're in action.

Chinese women aren't for everyone. But they are for me. I'm lucky enough to have grown up near London, and that vibrant multicultural city was a great place to find out which nation's women were my favourite.

But if you do like Asian women, then you'll be in heaven here.

The other day here I saw a size 20 Western woman with tattoos all over her chest. Yeah, I don't wanna go back to that in a hurry!

[CerealKiller]

2 questions:

1) Do chinese women cook anymore? I met quite a few on chinese love links who were office girls that just ate microwave food all the time?

2) What was the communist party member like? I've heared stories that they get away with rape and their children break laws because they know they won't be thrown in jail.

Responses:

1) Yes, they definitely do. I've dated girls who not only knew how to cook, but cooked absolutely amazing food. And when it comes to Chinese food, I'm a discerning consumer.

2) Welcome to the third world, drealm. Take your pick of just about any third world country and you could say the same. Here in Thailand, a senator murdered his secretary and ex-wife in a crowded restaurant, then turned around and claimed that it was an accident. This despite the fact that his weapon of choice was an uzi, and nobody else was hurt. Oh and by the way, according to Thai law he can't be charged with a crime while senate is in session. Just... peachy.

Also, O.J. Simpson: USA. Oscar Pistorius: South Africa. So it looks like third world countries don't have a lock on this kind of thing. Hehe.

[xiongmao]

Yeah, the same happens in Italy etc. etc.. The world isn't fair - get used to it.

Mosquitoes are a big problem here. I'm in agony from stings and it's quite hard to find the right medicines here to stop the itching. If you're coming here then bring stuff like that from home. Anyway, I'll pop downtown later and look around some of the bigger pharmacies.

In the meantime I've duct taped some mosquito netting around the sliding doors to the bedroom.

I've heard you get used to the stings after a while. It's hard to stop the critters though - I thought my bedroom was clean, only to wake up in the middle of the night and see two more.

Maybe if I ate more of the local food then the mozzies would stay away from me. That's quite hard to do here because the food is just so alien. My Chinese ex and I didn't like any of the same foods, we would have had to have bought a house with 2 kitchens.

When I do find food I like here, then it's invariably very good indeed. But in some places (like the University canteen) they tend to slice up an entire animal and what bits you get in your bowl are entirely random. Usually it's the crap bits that we Westerners would turn into dog food or sausages.

Western food is weird here as well, and I've found a new fusion restaurant with the strangest pizza toppings ever.

Shopping for food is also a bit strange. I found a massive Carrefour, only to find that it was generally more expensive than my local convenience stores. Figure that one out.

Some stuff is also incredibly expensive here, like a bag of USA pistachio nuts will set you back 100RMB. The locally sourced ones are cheaper, but quality is often variable.

Whole isles of the supermarkets are also off limits to me. I'm never gonna be a fan of the dried meats or bits of cuttlefish that you can buy. Also the chicken feet, I'll give those a miss as well.

I'm feeling a bit off women today. One thing's for sure - the women on Chinese Love Links don't reflect the women here on the streets. I need to find a better way of meeting the hotter girls here. Fortunately I have one or two leads.

I need to start a list of stuff that's hard to buy here. Mansize tissues, big bath towels, decent pillows, this could be a long list.

Some stuff is better here, including house plants, tropical fish and it's very easy to buy computer stuff. Chewing gum is also cheap and there are loads of flavours to try.