How to survive in China

Rumors are currently running wild on Chinese social media that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is currently searching for a Mandarin-speaking nanny who will be extremely well compensated for her work. The rumors are linked to a job recruitment notice on the website  Indeed . com  which has recently been circulating around the WeChat groups of Chinese living and working in Silicon Valley. That notice for a nanny includes all of the requirements that you might expect: at least three years of experience, a bachelor's degree, a love for children and basic medical training. However, netizens have picked up on one detail that is a bit out of the ordinary -- the nanny must be fluent in Mandarin. According to the notice, the nanny will have to work five days straight (from 8am to 9pm) before getting five days off, and will be paid an annual salary of between $110,000 to $130,000 while receiving full health benefits similar to that of a Silicon Valley engineer. ...

In addition to having the one of the strongest tea cultures in the world, coffee culture is also exploding in China. As of July 2015, Coffee Consumption is in a growth cycle of 7x the global average, about 25% to 30% year on year.① With Coffee Cafe’s popping up everywhere, themes and gimmicks to set them apart from the rest are popping up too! You can hang out with docile, pettable cats in a cat cafe while drinking coffee, or you can drink coffee made from beans that cats have pooped out!   (猫屎咖啡 – Māo shǐ kāfēi   is also known as Kopi Luwak, or civet Coffee – lit. Cat Feces Coffee.) You can even visit the re-created set of FRIENDS in Shanghai and have a cup of Joe(y) at Central Perk.② Regardless of your preference of location or fake TV coffee shop, there is something for every stripe of coffee lover in China. When you visit, you will need to know what to say, so without further adieu, here are some useful vocabulary and phrases for ordering Coffee in China. Coffee: 咖...

China is a fascinating and special place for many foreign travelers. It has exotic Chinese culture, bizarre foods, unique customs and many interesting people to meet. There are so many mysterious things to explore there. However you may be daunted by something such as language barrier and China’s web censorship, which limit your ability to obtain information through Internet. To tackle these challenges we made a list of essential mobile apps for china travel and hope they will make your China trip much easier. This list includes some very useful apps including language translation, giving directions, taxis, and best VPN to unlock websites. 1 Express VPN Virtual Private Networks, or VPN for short, is the most important app that you should use when travel to China (No need to use VPN if you travel to Hong Kong, Macau or Taiwan). In Mainland China many world famous sites, e.g., Google, Youtube, Gmail, and social media platforms, e.g., Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are all block...

It's a big decision to make, that's for sure, but once you've decided to go and learn Chinese in China you'll, naturally, want to find out as much as you can beforehand: well here's some great advice to the most frequently asked questions: 1. Should I just learn Mandarin using simplified Chinese characters or traditional Chinese characters? Unfortunately, there is no definitive answer as to which character set to learn even though there is a frequent long-lasting debate on the subject. Mainland China and Singapore use Simplified Chinese characters whilst Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and most overseas Chinese use Traditional characters. So, if you ’ re going to be spending a lot of time in Mainland China, it ’ s going to make more sense to start learning Simplified Chinese; obviously if you ’ re going to spend more time in Hong Kong or Taiwan, start with Traditional. The good news is that after establishing a foundation in either Simplified or Traditiona...

As language evolves, it goes without saying that meaning will alter or even completely change. This is true for all languages and Mandarin is no exception. So, let’s look at a few seemingly innocent phrases and their hidden meanings. 戴绿帽子 dai lu maozi: To wear a green hat This is an unusual concept but nonetheless very interesting. Ever wondered why you get more than the usual weird looks when you wear a green hat? During the Ming Dynasty, Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang made it a law for all men working in the prostitution trade to wear green hats. Later on, this green hat was used to identify a man whose wife had been unfaithful and thus, “made him wear a green hat.” This is why you will never see a Chinese person, especially a man, wearing a green hat. It infers that his wife has been unfaithful 吃软饭 chi ruan fan: To eat soft rice Literally this phrase means “to eat soft rice” but has the interpretative meaning of a man who is supported financially by a female. 飞机场 fei ji...