Has it been two months?

[cashew]

OK, not quite two months, but very close. I got my flu shot today, mostly sponging off of dad's hospital registration. Yeah, health care is still another thing I have to get on to registering for at some point, but I've been very meh at keeping up with the bureaucratic work. On the other hand, I've finished editing two sections of my dad's newest stuff, so that's something. Of course, just as I finish, Dad sends another section for editing. It never ends...

Meanwhile, I'm getting the hang of online shopping, huge here in the East. Everything is done by phone apps, which is a bit annoying, as I prefer being able to use the computer. But here things have gone full wireless and it's pretty much impossible to get any service whatsoever if you don't have a working phone. Which makes me wonder how anyone gets stuff up and running in the rural areas. Like, I get that 90-98% of the population is in the metro regions now, but even a small percent of a large population is still a huge amount of people. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I finally got an update from the shipping company, so my stuff is due to arrive in about 3 weeks if all else goes according to schedule. I'm crossing my fingers that customs won't give me too much trouble when I ship stuff in. Although you never know with bureaucrats.

Gaming wise, I've been pretty meh on things. Honestly, haven't really felt like dumping much time into doing serious gaming (although I finally got Tales of the Abyss up and running, so that's something). And now NaNoWriMo is sneaking up on me and I have no freaking clue how I'm going to do this when I'm constantly overwhelmed with doing a bunch of other stuff. (Just spent like, 2 hours trouble shooting computers as I figure out how the home network is set up because both parents have no idea what they're doing when it comes to technology.) Anyhoo. Yes, I realize the poor Pokémon AU is once again on hiatus. I haven't completely given up on it, but it's looking hard to even get some regular writing in, let alone going back to work on a previous piece of work.

Oh, also forgot how immensely cold and dry it gets over here. My skin is dying. (And yes, I know I'm being very vague. I'm trying to not leave too many digital footprints because...y'know.)

Comments

[tanithryudo]

How (in)convenient would you say the state of things are in China for visitors/tourists?

Like, I hear that tour services don't even offer any services for tourists from outside China anymore. And that foreign visitors are only allowed to book at specified hotels. And so forth...

Is planning a tourism visit to China if you don't have a chinese phone something just not worth the hassle?

[cashew]

I would say that not having a Chinese number (and having Chinese phone apps) can get pretty annoying, although all places do accept credit card (and cash), so it's not like you can't pay via the older methods. However, locals all use phone payment apps (either WeChat or Alipay). The other commonly used apps (like delivery stuff - JD, Alibaba, TMall etc.) all accept credit card binding, so you can bind a credit card to the app instead of binding WeChat or Alipay. The biggest issue is that everything is based on IRL ID, and foreigners might be hesitant scanning their passport into the app just to access the convenience due to *woo~ooo~* scary surveillance. (I guess Chinese citizens have all accepted they're being spied on already, so whatever. As long as it's not a scam app, go ahead, here's my National ID number.)

Getting a Chinese phone number isn't too difficult, from I understand, as you just need to go into the store and show your ID, then buy a SIM and stuff it into a phone. What a lot of people are hesitant about is putting a Chinese SIM on their non-Chinese phone, so getting a China-only phone is how most foreigners do it. But for people who are only gonna visit China once, that's probably too much hassle for them to bother. For people who visit China frequently, it's worth the expense, as smartphones (the middling ones) are less than the plane ticket, and most daily use apps aren't exactly resource hogs. Also, the Chinese apps run better on a Chinese OS anyway (in my experience).

The other thing about Chinese apps is that they don't accept foreign credit cards (although that's changing from what I understand), so the bigger issue is opening a local account to bind the payment stuff. So, again, for a short visit, it's just not worth the effort of setting up a bank account for the payment apps. Paying with cash is still accepted everywhere, if a bit bulky. And major cities still have very decent public transportation (metro + bus; you can buy metro cards to get around the phone-based ticket payment). It's just the scanning of rental bikes and calling a taxi (again, based on phone apps) that's a bit difficult. You can still get a taxi at dedicated transit centers like airports (there's usually a line of some sort), but good luck trying to flag one down on the streets.

Specific to the travel agencies, that one I have no idea. I haven't tried to use travel agencies yet, although there's still plenty of domestic vacationers around the capitol. There's been a bit of a crack down on travel agencies the past few...years, maybe? But there's supposed to be a loosening of regulations this year.

[tanithryudo]

If you purchase a chinese phone + SIM, would they also work in the US?

[cashew]

So, phone and SIM are on different systems.

Phone - If it has the bandwidths of whatever US service you have, it will also work with the service when you plug in the US SIM. Unless the phone you buy in China is Huawei, which is under trade embargo, so the US cell service will just ban that machine. (As I understand, OPPO and OnePlus are still kosher.)

SIM - Using Chinese SIM in the US depends on what service you buy with the SIM. There's international roaming, like all major cell services everywhere, so if you use the Chinese SIM while on US soil, it'll count as international roaming and charge accordingly.

You basically have two options getting around international roaming charges: Swap the US SIM out for a Chinese SIM while in China or have two sets of phone+SIM, one for each country. Most people use two phones instead of SIM swapping (or dual-SIM if your phone model supports that) mostly because it's easier to keep things straight. Also it allows each phone to have a second SIM slot free. There are bandwidth SIMs (no talk/text, just data) in China that you can slot into the 2nd slot to get internet and the 1st slot is used solely for talking minutes/SMS.

If you go the one phone, two SIM route, there's the option of using e-SIM for the US number, a physical SIM for the Chinese number, and the recommendation for that set up is to use a Google Pixel. The only hurdle I see is that if you have your current WeChat set up for a US phone number, you'll need to set up a Chinese phone number WeChat account...or you can see if the English version has all the services functioning at this point and stick with that account. (I'm noticing that the mini-apps seem to be the same in the English ver. compared to the Chinese ver., but I haven't actually tried to use the US account to do any payments.) The thing is, payment with Chinese apps require "Real ID" confirmation. I've only done that with my Chinese cell number, so I have no idea if this will cause problems if your accounts have a US phone while registering a Chinese bank/ID or whatever. Also I have no idea if US bank cards will work with WeChat at all.