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MeramJert posted:Your friend probably doesn't use the internet the same as you. Pro-PRC will back me up on this, just go with China Telecom. They have storefronts all over the place in every city. Just walk into one and ask about signing up for internet service (you'll need your passport). You'll have to fill out some info, then within a couple days some guy will come to your apartment and set it up. They'll provide a wireless router, but I've found that their routers don't tend to do PPPoE on their own so I prefer to get an additional router that actually logs in, so the devices that connect to it can just get on the internet right away. Here I am backing you up on this. Just go with China Telecom/Unicom If you can get fiber, get it obviously. You should be able to sign up online for it all if you're too lazy to go in person. The only point in going in person is either to get fapiao cus your company is paying for it, or you have no idea what you're doing. If you get fiber, just pay for the year in advance. You'll get a free landline and free calling time on their 2g sim card they give (sms is extra). There are also some packages where you sign up for their 3g phone plans and the internet is free. For fiber, the BEST speeds I have gotten are using the Asus RT-N16 router. It's also the only one that we can jam inside the box in the wall and still get good signal everywhere in the house. The modems they provide standard are kinda lovely unless you hack em, best to just use em as modems and not routers at all. Pro-PRC Laowai fucked around with this message at 09:36 on Jun 25, 2013 |
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Jun 25, 2013 09:17
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peanut posted:AirBnB- If you're staying for a week or more, traveling in a group, need more space, want a kitchen... try renting an apartment. There are also rooms for rent like a homestay or clean and organized couchsurfing. Most of the hosts in HK and China are expats and well-traveled locals. This is actually a very common thing to do. Tends to be about the same or less than a hotel (sometimes a bit more if they are really nice, but still cheaper than getting 2 rooms), but there are no limits on occupancy, you usually have a useful-sized fridge, and a kitchen of course. Search for 日租 or 短租 and that's where they'll usually pop up.
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Jun 25, 2013 13:38
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Update on the July 1st visa change stuff. Just got a frantic call from my accountant who apparently thinks that the non-criminal record thing is applicable for all applications, both new and renewals. Based on that (the first notification I have seen that is not from a visa agent), I'll just go ahead and say that it's a very real thing. As far as renewals needing it, it makes sense obviously, but who the hell knows. I'll have more info after the 10th. edit: also no idea about actual requirements, be it a full out FBI check, or if state checks are fine, or if fingerprinting is required.
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Jun 26, 2013 03:50
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GuestBob posted:Beijing, Shanghai and, alledgedly, parts of Guangdong. Hainan is asking you to submit a bit of paper which says you are a good boy but this can be hand written inside the police station if you like. Yes, I too thought it was only for new applications. All I know is that the policy is kinda vague at the moment and he heard it first hand. His advice is to wait and see. If too many people bitch and complain about it it will probably be loosened up somewhat. It's not July 1st yet, so, right now it's all kinda "who the gently caress knows". He has some renewals coming up on the 10th though, so he'll know by then and then I'll know. Should be doable using a travel agent without *too* much hassle.
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Jun 26, 2013 04:48
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ReindeerF posted:It's almost as if the SHANDONG BEEF ROLL isn't available in China. I'll have to go get the drat name for all you Chinaboos! 牛肉卷饼?
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Jul 10, 2013 20:03
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Bloodnose posted:How long has there been controlled admission? I kind of remember it being a place you could just wander into back in 2009. Not very controlled. If you're an obvious tourist, they'll want money for a ticket, but it's really basically just a donation.
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Jul 14, 2013 14:14
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LentThem posted:The holiday thing is more like this: Imagine that a holiday (1 day) falls on a Wednesday. The government will shift your weekend, giving you Monday and Tuesday off as well, but expecting you to work Saturday and Sunday prior to the holiday. If you're lucky, you might have some energy to do something fun on your 3-day weekend after a 7-day work week! If you work at a foreign company who doesn't put up with this stuff, then you'll have your standard weekend off, work Monday and Tuesday, and then have a 1-day holiday on Wednesday. Eh, it's weird, I agree, but you get used to it. The idea is to take holidays that break up the week and turn it into something long enough to do something with. If you want the weekend off too, you just go to your local hospital and buy a doctors note saying you're sick and need a few days rest. Works best when it's a MNC that relies on regular communication with the home office... because nothing real will get done on the weekend anyways, and all the managers have already left town, and half your team is "sick", and going into the office is just a complete waste of time.
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Jul 25, 2013 07:32
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Big Alf posted:That's fine, but again my point is this is not China-centric. Just because someone has only experienced this sort of behaviour in China does not mean it only occurs here, or is a cultural phenomenon. And Baijiu is pretty awesome anyways to be honest
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Aug 1, 2013 07:47
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Magna Kaser posted:Baijiu is terrible unless you're dropping some major Maos on it. You can get decent imported 15 year whiskeys for less. It takes time and a lot of really crappy baijiu to understand why the more expensive stuff tends to be worth every mao. The cheap stuff leaves a rather strong aftertaste the second it goes down, and it goes down harsh. Good stuff does not do this. It's smooth, it leaves no hangover, no real aftertaste. And it's just great stuff that hits your gullet all at once. It's not for sipping it's for shots.
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Aug 1, 2013 15:23
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Eat This Glob posted:Yeah, the hosts are covering all the food and hotel and stuff. To you and all the others, I was warned about baijiu. Is there an analog state-side? Everclear? I can more than hold my own when it comes to liquor consumption, and luckily, I'm a happy drunk. Unfortunately, I also loooove to talk politics when I tie a few on. Gonna have to hold my tongue there! Baijiu equivalency: Treat it like moonshine. Politics: You're safe talking politics on like 99% of topics (don't insult China) Smoking: Smoking's all good, if you want cheap stuff, you can get cheap stuff. For personal smokes, I'd recommend 利群 or 娇子. 红河's pretty decent too, just get something made in the south, as everything from the north is dry and like smoking newspaper. Local food... just hit the street and get stuff where you see other people getting stuff. If you have the option, stick to your BBQ coming from places that are at least in front of a restaurant that says "清真", as you're much more likely to get actual lamb instead of mystery meat. For finding the meat on a stick, it's pretty easy, there'll be smoke everywhere from the grills and 串 characters everywhere (which literally looks like meat on a stick). Pro-PRC Laowai fucked around with this message at 17:12 on Aug 1, 2013 |
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Aug 1, 2013 17:04
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MeramJert posted:By the way, when Pro-PRC says mystery meat it's a euphemism for literal rat meat. If it's just rat meat, you're probably pretty lucky. Might be whatever the stray catch of the day was, or some poisoned dead rats. I wouldn't trust anything under 2 RMB in Beijing for lamb (god I miss the days of sub-0.5). Lamb's just too expensive right now for anything cheap to be legit.
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Aug 1, 2013 18:59
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Eat This Glob posted:Well, if I could get a lamb meal for $0.33, No, that's for *each*, a meal would consist of anywhere from 20-70 of em. Definitely like 50-70 of em if the are the tiny delicious ones that still are legit at 0.5. And to the haters, seeing as the guy speaks no Chinese, pinyin ain't gonna help much. Characters are better, at least he can whip it out, point and grunt desiringly. Also... whereabouts in Iowa? If only there was a way to grab some curds from Kalona and keep them squeeking long enough... but alas, there is not. Or getting a meal from the Canteen and having it not congeal... or tenderloin sammiches. quote:I'll pick up some Djarum black's too. I haven't bought a clove cigarette since college like 10 years ago. If that will make me look to the Chinese businessmen, than I'll quietly hum some ska to myself and transport my brain back to 2001. Thanks for the smoking etiquette advice too! In general, do western brands carry more prestige? I don't want to look like a rich rear end in a top hat (I'm not even remotely wealthy - I'm a print journalist for a few tiny weeklies in BFE, Iowa), but if there's some novelty in a pack of Marlboros, I'd be happy to trade some smokes off for some of the local tobacco if they'll enjoy them. Djarum blacks are a winner, not for the taste, but for the crackle, and the fact that they don't exist here. Marlboro... meh, personally I don't see em as anything special as they are at every duty free shop ever. Oh, be sure to enjoy some cubans while your here... just because.
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Aug 2, 2013 14:53
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Magna Kaser posted:Winters in Beijing are pretty much like a post apocalyptic wasteland. No, they are like Silent Hill 
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Aug 2, 2013 15:08
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VideoTapir posted:Uh, that's for 4 people, right? Sounds like someone doesn't know how to pack away the 串儿！
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Aug 2, 2013 16:02
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Tomato Soup posted:I don't even have shoes that cover my entire feet, am I going to freeze to death? This is the perfect opportunity to get a military coat here then... the only question of course, will you be a sucker who falls for the fakes, or will you manage to score a real one? And of course... can you rock it?
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Aug 2, 2013 17:53
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tacoman165 posted:The actually have Templeton in China and it's drat good Get some moonshine, moonshine wins friends.
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Aug 3, 2013 14:34
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BadAstronaut posted:Do ISPs in China generally have uncapped or limited bandwidth? Lol, no. Just get Unicom fiber. There, problem averted.
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Aug 7, 2013 09:57
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MeramJert posted:Actually I meant KBps That's...so sad.     
Pro-PRC Laowai fucked around with this message at 14:12 on Aug 7, 2013 |
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Aug 7, 2013 14:01
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BadAstronaut posted:Pro-PRC Laowai, searching is just bringing up a bunch of news sites. Can you please link to the page that has the pricing/speeds for your provider? http://mall.10010.com/goodsdetail/311307147862.html The 100M speeds are still in "trial mode" for the fiber. Only really available if you have been a customer for a few years 1560 a year in Shanghai for 20M, so 130 a month for delicious fiber ain't bad. Might wanna check up on the offers Telecom has though.
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Aug 7, 2013 14:27
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MeramJert posted:It's not that sad consider I was talking about downloading stuff from the US. 1500 KBps works out to almost 12 Mbps, and you only scored 9.54 on your bragging test there. Sure, but... torrents, 9.9MB/s
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Aug 7, 2013 18:36
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Magna Kaser posted:Jingan is one of the more expensive areas of Shanghai. Also one of the weirder parts... where convoys of GL8s shuttle white people to and fro, and everyone is somehow incapable of doing anything for themselves.
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Aug 8, 2013 16:07
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systran posted:Pirated movies are usually complete poo poo quality, like 320p screencaps. They are all literally just DVD burns of whatever's up on the torrents now. If the only thing out is a lovely cam, then that's what'll get burned. It made sense back in like the "256k dsl is super fast" days, when people still used the national 56k dialup system. But now, unless you feel like watching some obscure Chinese movies (which are all probably up on tudou/funshion/youku/pptv) then DVDs are just stupid and pointless. Hell, it's been like forever since the days when they were literally everywhere on the streets. Still some stragglers, but it's pointless. Ditto for games and pretty much all software, it's all just coming from torrents. If it's a bad copy, you just grab a different one, rather than trying to track down the seller and try to trade after the DVD magically works in their crappiest dvd player ever, but fails entirely in yours. Not to mention the clutter that builds up over time and the fact that just buying another hard drive to add to the stack is gonna end up cheaper than blank DVDRs. edit: just get an HTPC when you get here, they are stupidly cheap and you'll be a happy camper
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Aug 8, 2013 16:37
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MeramJert posted:Not all of it. One of my coworkers goes around actively installing all that crap on computers. Some of it's decently useful for certain things... think of a lot of it like RealPlayer. Back in the day it was a love-hate relationship. loving everything needed it, and it would infest your computer the second you looked at it. And of course, most people genuinely do not care all that much. Perfectly willing to install adware if it means free movies somewhere.
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Aug 9, 2013 17:37
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VideoTapir posted:It wasn't so much that it was adware as that it was just generally poo poo and liked to grab any and all file associations it could at every opportunity. Let's be blunt, most antivirus stuff is pretty horrible. I used to be a fan of AVG, until I discovered that it pretty much sucked for China. The local stuff tends to be better at detecting and removing the common stuff here. Especially when it's relatively new.
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Aug 9, 2013 17:59
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BadAstronaut posted:Looking at places to stay in Shanghai now that this is all going ahead. I need to travel to Changping Rd, on Line 7 and keen to keep the commute to a minimum. Anyone able to recommend a good area? I've even been looking at some spots within walking distance to the office, to avoid a commute entirely, and while I am sure it's pricier than what I could be getting elsewhere, there are some decent options going. Find a place with a morning market within walking distance (like 5 minutes)
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Aug 12, 2013 12:35
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Big Alf posted:I'm making the big step of collecting my RP on my lonesome for the first time ever tomorrow from Yonghegong. Do you know where your local PSB is that can process it? You may perhaps, see a big long line of Chinese, you do not have to wait in this line. Foreigners have their own line and it takes like 10 minutes tops as long as you're poo poo's all in order. Alternatively, just do the wedding and worry about registering the next day. 有事 is the universal excuse to deal with deadlines if they even care.
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Aug 13, 2013 09:19
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Big Alf posted:All my paperwork has been done, it's quite literally a case of picking up my passport with RP sticker in from the Exit/Entry at Yonghegong. Oh, you're picking it up? Thought you were talking about the registration and whatnot. Show up early, like, an hour before open and you should be in and out.
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Aug 13, 2013 10:18
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VideoTapir posted:Dude, just get a VPN. It sounds like you're addicted to foreign content sites, at least one of the ones you want is blocked at any given time, guaranteed. It changes all the time, because a lot of the blocking isn't list-based, it's automated based on packet inspection, links to explicitly blocked sites, and who knows what else. You don't know from day to day what's going to be blocked or have its service degraded. Apart from noting which things are ALWAYS blocked or ALWAYS available, it's pointless to ask. Best VPN is no VPN. They are overpriced and it's a constant battle. Use what I've been using since forever instead. With the added bonus of zero hassle to swap back and forth. (roll this into a .bat file, dump it in the same directory as plink.exe, shortcut it to your quicklaunch) plink -ssh -l user -pw password -D 1080 host-you-have-a-shell-account-on.net Then, install either: Chrome: Proxy Anywhere - crx can be found here (and you're welcome by the way, this no longer exists anywhere else) or unpacked on github) Firefox: Elite Proxy Switcher Proxy settings are then 127.0.0.1:1080 SOCKS 4/5 Snap up at least 2 different shells, ideally in different countries and make a specific bat file for each of them, just in case one goes down for any reason. Be it server failure, temporary blocking, routing issues, etc. There are MANY places to pick up a shell either for free, or for a one time donation of a buck or two, or a monthly sub of a buck or two... or any server you have access to that allows session forwarding over ssh. Beats the ever living crap out of VPN. Pro-PRC Laowai fucked around with this message at 13:12 on Aug 13, 2013 |
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Aug 13, 2013 13:09
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BadAstronaut posted:Is that in any way doable on Android phones/tablets, and on a PS3? PS3, no idea... android, yes
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Aug 13, 2013 13:29
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BadAstronaut posted:And this would work just roaming around on my 3G/LTE data? Yep. All you're doing is creating an SSH tunnel to a remote server and funneling all your traffic through it. No proxy for the local sites, just use it when you actually need it.
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Aug 13, 2013 13:39
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BadAstronaut posted:Just FYI, I've been using this site and Numbeo to do some cost of living comparisons. Just go there, select the cities to compare, and you should get most of the info you need. I much prefer Numbeo's whole layout, though. Lookin' over it... take it with a grain of salt. As it's an expat site, and most expats are bubble-living fucktards, those are the insane prices they pay. Food is far cheaper in reality. Here's the prices as monitored today: http://www.shjjcd.gov.cn/jgjc/jgsj/userobject1ai1150.jsp code:Domestic milk should be around 7.7~8 per liter Imported around 10 Beef around 25~27 per 500g More prices for Shanghai here: http://www.zhujiage.com.cn/special/shanghai.html
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Aug 14, 2013 12:00
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MeramJert posted:wtf is "Winter Melon"? 冬瓜, surely you have eaten 冬瓜.
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Aug 14, 2013 13:45
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MeramJert posted:Yeah of course, I knew what you meant I was just trying to say that the list of food you just posted is a list of food Chinese people eat. The list on those expat websites is a list of food White people eat; they're not really that comparable. It's almost as if.. when moving to another country or even distinct region, dietary habits should change to some degree? It would be fairly trivial to compile a list of basics here and then compare prices in whitemanland and gasp at the cost. If it's tbones and cheese and bread you're after... options: steaks - talk to your butcher and explain what you want, failing that, taobao. Shouldn't cost more than any other cut from the same chunk does. Get a cow's worth of porterhouse, should be doable for under 500, and freeze it. cheese - taobao or supermarket if it's cheaper (rarely) bread - find a bakery or make it yourself (srsly, people have been making bread for how many thousand years? it's not THAT hard)
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Aug 14, 2013 15:56
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BadAstronaut posted:
Only 2 pounds? You're going to learn something nice about China. China, generally doesn't care. As long as you're not bringing in drugs or guns, China doesn't care. Basically, bring in what you want, go right through that green channel. If, for whatever 1 in a million chance they want to check your stuff, and they find things you should have declared... in your most non-intelligible english, explain that you didn't know. Declaring anything just means possibly paying some tax... or losing it if you manage to bring in poo poo you shouldn't have.
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Aug 14, 2013 19:19
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It's "biltong" 
"Hey you good looking, intelligent and articulate white man, what is that in your carry-on?"
"Oh, just two pounds of dried, uncooked meat!"
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MeramJert posted:I can easily buy limes in Shenzhen Ya, srsly, can get that here with no issue either.
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Aug 16, 2013 08:52
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Magna Kaser posted:Uhh Cathay had like 2 seasons of Veep, a season of curb your enthusiasm and the entirety of the IT Crowd and Black Books on my flight from HK to Frankfurt. They also had a ton of movies and a ton of other shows, it was pretty drat good. lol, they're actually charging money for their lovely shows now? I wonder when they'll figure out they can just depressurize the cabin, drop the masks and charge you for your air.
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Aug 21, 2013 10:33
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Brennanite posted:I cannot endorse Singapore Airlines enough. The service was amazing and even coach felt luxurious (well, compared to Delta anyway). The in-flight entertainment selection was great: lots to choose from and a good mix of new and old. This really does matter when you are stuck on a plane for fourteen hours. I too experienced the horror of no in-flight entertainment due to a broken headphone jack (thanks Delta!) and the boredom is indescribable. I have no idea how people stay sane in solitary confinement. I survive those long flights by not sleeping the night before, showing up half dead and then falling asleep on the plane. Then waking up, getting hammered on free booze and passing out until the drat thing lands. Oh, and obviously, never flying any american airline ever.
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Aug 21, 2013 17:31
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Eat This Glob posted:Yes indeed. That owned. I've ordered Peking duck a few times in the U.S. and there was no pile of carcass to knaw on. Now I know what's up. The carcass is for soup btw.
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Aug 25, 2013 09:10
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Eat This Glob posted:They didn't serve soup v Well... normally they'll give you the soup if you ask for it. The shittier places (全聚德) will swap you the carcass for soup. The better places will give you the soup AND the carcass. Said carcass is for soup-making back home. Just add some goodies like ginger, salt, celery, wintermelon, topped off with gouqi and boil the gently caress outta it. Best results if you use a dutch oven
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Aug 26, 2013 02:05
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v but noted!
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Rabelais D posted:Also black chickens are the best; totally superior to white chickens. Once you go black...
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Aug 26, 2013 15:47
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