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Q: How does your city residents generally treat foreigners?
I am curious as I hear different cities have different attitude towards foreigners.
For example, I heard that Zhengzhou generally isn't too kind to foreigners. I also used to live in a city near Shanghai called Changzhou and they weren't very nice to foreigners overall. Tianjin is pretty good for a larger city.
I am in a smaller city (Yuncheng, Shanxi) and people here are actually quite nice to foreigners. Yuncheng is a lower tier city but has things like Wal-Mart, Pizza Hut, the speed train goes through here from Beijing and luxuries that a larger city offers.
However, there are not many foreigners so you still kind of get the star treatment but it is more curiosity and admiration than anything. Locals are generally quite nice and go a bit further to be helpful to foreigners. There are jerks but generally I would say this is a foreigner friendly city, however... the level of people that speak English here is quite low.
In this city, there are foreigners from all places but because a group of South African guys came here early on they sort of tainted the reputation of black people. Drugs and sleeping with students that circulated through the city... nice guys but had a little too much fun.
How about the city where you live? What is the general attitude towards foreigners and does it change based on nationality or skin color?
10 years 16 weeks ago in Relationships - China
Suzhou... Overall people will leave you alone, with a medium level of stares. I always have the occasional 'HAAALLLLLLLOOOOO teeheehee', on a monthly basis. I remember, 2 or 3 times, I did not have the 2 rmb for the bus, only a 5 rmb or 10 rmb bank note, and a good Samaritan put me out of my trouble. When asking my way, people tend to go away from me with an embarrassed face, despite me asking in Mandarin (I'm 170cm and look really tame). In the places I go often for eating, even after 3 years, the people will look at me eating like a zoo animal and comment "ho, he took a spoon", "ho, he took some spicy sauce", "ho, he did not come with his wife", and make generic comments about Westerners. Despite me talking gently in Mandarin with them a couple of time.
coineineagh:
Yeah, that can get really annoying. Reminds me a little of a Daily Show bit by Jon Stewart: "It's like walking on the streets with a six-year-old: Powice Car! Fire hydwant! Foweigner!"
Beijing residents are pretty sucky to foreigners which is a laugh because they want to host the Olympics again. Personally I think they shouldn't. With the terrible air, racist residents and terrible manners why would anyone give them the Olympics again? Plus I've never seen people walk so slowly. i can't help but laugh.
I must agree with the texascowboy posting, I have lived here in Wuhan for 2.4 years, traveling between Hankou and Wuhang regularly. I find the students in Wuchang friendly enough, however between the 2 locations, often or not the elders natives are far less sociable or welcoming.
well ,am a black women staying in a very small township near chengde city...i found that most chinese here are so bad...esp women,they gossip wen i pass,they call me dirty words ,they actually think i dont understand their language.well,they are so racists here...they dont like foreigners
well ,am a black women staying in a very small township near chengde city...i found that most chinese here are so bad...esp women,they gossip wen i pass,they call me dirty words ,they actually think i dont understand their language.well,they are so racists here...they dont like foreigners
Chengdu ren are wonderful, by and large. Most people smile and are quite willing to chat you up on the street. You get the occasional jackass who tries to work you over because you are laowai, but a lot of people will also go out of their way to help you. I was just moving apartments and was touched by people offering to help me lug my stuff.
I used to live in Beijing. That city was miserable. . People there are unbelievably xenophobic. Every apartment I lived in there had someone who had to accuse laowai of anything and everything. .
I completely agree about Chengdu. The people there are great and have been since I started going there in the 90s. They also have a great sense of humor. Maybe because foreigners have been going there so one the people are better. Even during the 90's Beijing den had a bad reputation for being rude. The city also had the worst service. Going into a store and not being helped as opposed to places like Chengdu or Kunming which had great service.
It depends on whether u r white, black or yellow.
*If black--->mostly bad treat (up to 99.99%)
*If white (from America, UK, Europe)----> mostly nice treat (up to 99.99%)
*White (from Australia, NZ, Latino)---->From average to good (up to 60%)
*If yellow (like my Filipino friend)---->Average (up to 60%)
My advice to my nigg@@: be strong if u want to survive here, life goes on
Mateusz:
Not sure what city you're talking about, but where I live, I don't see this 99.99% nice treatment going to any white folks. Black folks and white folks both are discriminated against, though blacks most likely get it worse (I'm not black, so I'm just going on the experiences of black friends and coworkers here). Likewise, there are times when blacks and whites do get treated nicely... people are people, and some of them have shitty attitudes on people of what they see as the "wrong color", especially in a culture that promotes Han superiority.
Also, I'm not yellow, but friends who are both yellow, and non-Chinese (most have Chinese ancestry, but non-Chinese citizenship) tend to tell me they're treated like unicorns, wondrous creatures. They "look like they should be Chinese", but they're not, to the amusement, and bemusement, of the general population.
Again, individual experiences vary, and I'm just going with what I was told.
Strawberry66:
Mostly true.But they treat Australian equal to European.They view US and the UK the first class world.
laowaigentleman:
It is funny because NZ and Australia have much better education systems than the USA and the UK.
In shenzhen, they dont care wether you're white, black or yellow. Because even chinese people here were not native if the city. They are also from different parts of China. So do your thing and they dont care
In Changshu, I am invisible.
Which I guess means that they dislike foreigners.
I've been living here in Shenzhen for several years, and working in a so-called "world-class" company, and I can assure you that the treat is still different
well, honestly, people in beijing treat foreigners right most of the time unless you do something that apposes their culture
I live in Zhengzhou. I often go an entire day without seeing another obvious foreigner. Genereally, I get stared at constantly, everybody wants to practice their terrible English on me, and girls flirt constantly.
Some days its fun. Some days, its annoying. Some days, its scary.
I find the attitude to foreign women veers between the adolescent and the super-creepy.
FFS, we are people too, not some alien being. 
Mostly i have felt very uncomfortable: I can not relax when out in the evening.
But spending months with the same people, they finally treat me like a human.
i lived in a old fashioned compound in zhongshan park,Shanghai it was full of local shanghainese and one or two out of towners who did things like bbq at night or recycled cardboard boxes. Gypies, tramps and theives.
It was a xenophobic place to live and extremely unwelcoming and to me it epitomised the real dislike for foreing people over here.
what i think about chin ease peoples they r very rude kind and they r not helpfull.
I am asian, so they dont know whether im a foreigner.
Shenzhen is a very anti social society unless they need you for something.
They treat me like a King - Rodney King to be exact.
I have found that the way you treat people they will reciprocate. In over five years in China I have found that being nice to the people results in their being nice to you. I always say hello in both Chinese and English as well as thank you. Smile and the whole world smiles with you!!!
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