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Q: What do you find to be rude in China ?
Sure the horking and spitting here sometimes makes me cringe,especially indoors. I find what is or even what is not said to be rude. Or just the complete ignoring of anything I wish for, my opinions, my tastes. GF always has to go ask a friend, not me for advice. The driving makes me crazy, so now I play road warrior, I yield never.
I just took a vacation to Thailand and went with my girl friends friends. The woman is a professional interpreter. She works in China, Japan and Thailand. She says my English is not correct because I'm not British and I talk too fast. So she keeps telling me that if she does not understand me, she just ignores me. I think my accent is North American neutral, no twang or drowl. I speak clear, no lisp or stutter. I find this rude, can't she say, sorry I didn't get that? As for my accent, if I wanted one I'd want it to be Scottish. So when I talked to her I would use slow speech with a fake English pansie accent sometimes. She never sees the humour in this and sometimes I would talk like an East Indian which she totally could not understand or find funny, even tho people around might laugh.
My biggest complaint when talking to Chinese is not answering questions. My mother has a narcissistic personality disorder. My entire life I have had to repeat questions because she does not answer. I usually only ask very short pointed questions and have very limited patience for repeating myself as a result. I find Chinese people will not answer questions too often. I have never had a reply when I ask what a Chinese word I hear is. I went to Thailand to lie on a beach all day and have food and drinks brought to me, never happened. We went shopping mostly. But let me look for shoes and all I get is harassment. I kept asking to be informed of what the plans were. Never happened. I lost it one night after being rushed to the Ladyboy Cabaret when I asked what the ticket taker said. The reply I got was I was standing there, didn't I hear? I just lost it walked away and said if I heard I won't ask. They think I'm crazy because I get angry. I never bring up that they ruined my vacation. I spent 2 days in Bangkok, 4 days in Phuket, and 3 days in Bangkok mostly shopping. I took a torcherous all day island tour in a speed boat that rattled my teeth and finally got to lie on an island beach for an hour. But my wishes, opinions or advice are ignored.
You guys were right, I should have gone to Thailand by myself. I spent $5000, I'd have a better time with a Thai ladyboy. So what do you find to be rude in China? What else will get to me? I think my honeymoon stage with China has worn off. Thailand looked good, usually 30 degrees all year.
Thailand is the adult Disneyland, but I'm not sure if I'd take the ladyboy extreme. But yeah if the Chinese honeymoon stage is already passing so fast, prepare yourself, even the small stuff is gonna starting hitting hard.
But it will get better, if you can stand it until the feeling passes without going crazy.
Good luck, or if not... thanks for visiting the Middle Kingdom, spend some time elsewhere and come back with a fresh breath afterwards.
TedDBayer:
So I need a chill pill until I get used to things. I will learn to have more patience.
Yeah, I would think Thailand is a trip better taken with the bro's, not the ho's....you got gypped 
I also find the ignoring thing to be super rude. So now I alternate between just keeping silent and asking again and again to the point of being obnoxious.
TedDBayer:
gee I mentioned Ho in a post and I meant it affectionately and I got flamed. One of my best friends is a sex worker in China.
cooter:
Haha, no flaming intended. Ho was more in reference to the British accent preferring translator friend you spoke of 
Ignoring questions, that REALLY burns me up!!!!! Sometimes, when I had to give a paper to someone in the school office, the person would say it was not her, but would not tell me WHOM. I would ask in Chinese and she would just stare at her desk. I would ask his or her name opf the person I needed to see. Nothing. I would ask when would they be back. Nada. And this is stuff that THEY asked ME to bring THEM!!!!
However, my REAL peeve is lack of instructions. My problem here is that often they do not give you full instructions of what is needed or what to bring. This is what I mean:
Last summer, I was invited to a hike where "we will walk along the river".
Ok, great, so what do I bring. Just bring some water.
Anything else? Yes, your swim suit.
Anything ELSE? No, thats all.
WELL....
What they REALLY meant to say was that we were going to be hiking up a tall hill (Guilin has many of those) for three hours and then, when we got to the river, which was FILLED with large slippery and SHARP rocks we were going to hike INSIDE that!
Not enough water to swim in, but enough to be EXCEEDEINGLY slippery.
Well, I had my sneakers, and two bottles of water.
THEY had army boots, bottles and bottle and bottles of water! Some even brought bike helmets in case they slipped on the rocks!
Not only did I use up my water in the first 45 minutes of the hike, but my shoes were torn to shreds. I had to tie the soles of my shredded shoes to my feet with the laces and when THOSE wore out, I had to rip pieces of my shirt to tie the soles to my feet. Twice.
Cut bruised, dehydrated (I drank the water in the river! God only knows what I may have picked up last summer!).
The cherry on the sunday? The same girl whom I asked then asked my "Why dont you come prepared??!!"
It is the ONLY time in my adult life that I have truly wanted to hit a girl.Hard.
Ted welcome to the story of my life. Every time I ask my gf a question she either ignores more or complains I ask too many questions. If it is something she does not want to answer I have to ask her 10 times before she replies in Chinese swearing and says I ask too many questions....but I still get no answer.
She also will not ask me for advice but only ask her friends. And I have given up on going out with her and her friends because they always do what they want to do without asking me and my gf will talk to them in Chinese all night and barely acknowledge me. Next time I go to a bar with them and this happens I am going to go hit on other girls and ask them to dance and see how she feels about that.
I feel sorry for you man...the problem was not going to Thailand with her but allowing her friends to tag along...big mistake.
TedDBayer:
yeah I know having her friends along was a mistake, thought she would be happier with her GF around. That should have been a great vacation. Not enough alcohol either, no one else drank and her GF promised to get my GF to drink, I had one Mia Tia the day we got there and one night at dinner i got the bar to make Mia Tias like i wanted. i got cut off at 5, never felt them,, maybe another 10 or 20, but thats what i wanted to do, sit on the beach and drink.. i didn't have a say in the hotel,, they wanted close to the beach, which we never walked to, only saw once, and there was construction next door, jack hammers in the morning, but it was close to the beach. I didn't leave without slipping out once to see a Go Go club, ran the bar tab up to 6000Bat with 4 strippers, checked to make sure they were drinking Techila, and when one came over wearing a belt,,,,,,,,,
thedude:
I would have gone to the Gogo bar more often and ditched them. My GF used to drink with me before we got serious and now I have fight tooth and nail just to get her to go to the bar with me or even drink with me at home.....but's it's OK...I have a female drinking buddy at the bar down the street...and the gf is sooo jealous now she goes out with me more now.
For me, it is one of those "tests" I perform on a potential girlfriend. If she cannot or will not answer my questions, it is a deal breaker. Eventually the day will come that it will make me mad enough to break up, so why not nip it in the bud.
Single for life? Maybe/maybe not. I just cannot stand being ignored or blown off.
Rude in China? boring answer, but I have to go with the StArInG !! Just seems so very odd to me... I live in semi-suburbia, but of a Tier1 city. Still , u cannot imagine how much they stare. I got on the bus, sat in the back, just about every 'person' on that bus turned around in their seats to watch me pay my fare.
I have said it before; I'll say it again. Simple-minded rubes.
Wow, reading that question was like watching a car crash. 
Also Ted, you've posted on one or two occasions about your temper, if I remember rightly. Please do research Thailand properly before you move... it's a country where it's completely inappropriate to show any flash of anger, ever.
TedDBayer:
Everyone has a temper, mine is like a match, quick and then over
Raf brought up a good point: lack of instructions. I'm just going to round it out and say that they never volunteer information, you always have to drag it out of them. If you forget to ask them something you think is important, I guarantee they will not tell you, and you will regret it. For instance, I think time is important. How long will something take? There was this one time where a teacher from the school invited a student of mine and I to take a trip to Hangzhou. That is about a 4-5 hour drive? I mean, I guess I should have figured we weren't going to drive back the same day, but I didn't really think about it. They didn't tell me we were staying in a hotel overnight until we were already in Hangzhou. I was pissed because that meant we'd stay until Sunday, and I needed to plan my lesson for the week. That night we were going to "some place where a lot of foreigners go." What was it? A pub, which is fine I guess, but I didn't expect to sit there forever while he and his friend chat for 3-4 hours. The next day, where did we go? West Lake, to walk around. However, he didn't plan where we would end up, and spent an hour waiting to get a taxi because of all the traffic. The next time someone invites me on a "trip," I'll say no. What a waste of my time. They don't plan anything and end up spending a lot of time doing nothing.
Also, not answering questions irritates me. It's like they don't even hear me. The other half of the time they answer "no why." However, I am lucky in that most of the time it is not important. And I find it slightly annoying that almost everyone will ask if I can speak some Chinese, but then they don't say anything in Chinese to me, or say something I don't understand at all.
TedDBayer:
There was no planning. They picked a hotel after we arrived in Phuket. Not what I want to do on vacation, I have everything looked after ahead of time. My GFs visa didn't arrive until we had to leave. Too late to take a train or bus and I couldn't book a flight last minute with a foreign credit card. Almost couldn't go.
O, my biggest regret is that while I did get an elephant ride, I forgot to stand up on it and do a Tarzan yell. But i probably would have fallen off due to the sandels (I HATE SANDELS. my GF talked me into because I can't find shoes.) and fallen face first into elephant dung. Anything for a Kodac moment.
GuilinRaf:
That is actually good! The dung would have cushioned your fall and kept the pesky trinket sellers away and maybe even given you a nice wide space at the bar!
GuilinRaf:
P.s. I hate sandals too. Unless you are a Roman Legionnaire, they strike me as "girlie". The only thing I hate more is going barefoot.
HugAPanda:
Oh come on! Guys in those black wide strap sandals are... dreamy. Add the black knee socks with the bermuda shorts that fall about an inch above the socks and a colorful hawaiian shirt that clashes with the plaid on the shorts, you'll have to pick my jaw up off the ground cuz I want me some of that!
TedDBayer:
where can I buy hawaiian shirt in china, settle for any ugly pattern, there are lots of them? I hate plaid, wouldn't wear it for all the tea in China or babes.
TedDBayer:
Hey Guilin, thats the first time i ever saw anyone use the''all the tea in China quote"
