Visiting or living in another country is always a difficult experience. From greetings to where to put the toilet paper (or even where to get the toilet paper), food shopping to apartment hunting there’s a wealth of information that we’d like to know NOW.

Now there’s a way. Send us an email with your question and if we choose your question our resident experts will answer it for you. Drop us a line at cs@eChinacities.com. Don’t worry, help is on the way.

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Questions:

1. Which cell phone provider should I choose?
2. Other than hanging out at Starbucks what are my options for internet?
3. Can I work on a student visa?
4. Is the New York Times website blocked all of a sudden?
5. I see a lot of restaurants that have what looks, to me, like Tibetan writing on them, are there really a lot of Tibetan restaurants and what kind of food do they serve?

 

Which cell phone provider should I choose?

Well, you really only have two choices – China Mobile or China Unicom – and I think are website says it quite well, actually: “both have their strengths and weaknesses: China Mobile has wider national coverage but China Unicom is more popular with price-conscious users, and has just strengthened its signal in major cities to penetrate common signal blind spots such as subways, basements, stairwells and elevators. China Mobile is the provider of choice for most expats. It offers three broad plans…” which are explained well here. China Mobile has English language customer service while Unicom does not, but in all honesty, it’s not that great and you’re probably better off having a Chinese friend call for you either way.

Other than hanging out at Starbucks what are my options for internet?

Internet service in China, at least in the big cities, is quick and, usually, readily available. There are more broadband users in China than anywhere else in the world and Beijing is planning to take a big chunk of the city wireless by 2010. In Beijing your best bet for ADSL is probably China Telecom. Most homes already have it installed, check around your house for a phone jack with a bigger than normal – standard Ethernet cable – hole. Ask your landlord or real estate agent for the password. If it’s not already installed the person holding the deed to the property i.e. the landlord has to go sign up for installation and this can be a hassle, or (speaking from bitter experience) impossible. In that case you can get a wireless modem for your computer with a CDMA card inside. The card and plan will run you between maybe 600 and 1000 yuan and the service is slow, dialup speeds, but it works and you can use it anywhere. Information for: Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, or elsewhere. Even if you’re not in the big cities don’t worry, the Ministry of Technology was planning to bring broadband to 95% of the nation’s villages by 2008. If you’re out there in a village somewhere let us know how they did.

Can I work on a student visa?

No. You most definitely cannot. Not legally at least. Of course many foreigners do work on student visas but is absolutely not legal and you can face deportation and fines if you get caught. And it does happen, an English school I was working at once got raided by the Public Security Bureau and several of my coworkers were fined and deported. They had to leave the country within 10 days but they were able to reapply and come back afterwards. But it was expensive, disruptive, and a bit scary for them so stay in school kids.

Is the New York Times website blocked all of a sudden?

No one seems exactly sure if the site is actually blocked or if there is just some sort of innocent computer answer to this question but it is definitely true that last week one could read the NYTimes online in Beijing without any problem and this week any link to the site comes up with a 'page cannot be found' message. The good news is that someone has figured out a workaround. And it's really simple: just delete the “www.” portion of the URL and the page will open fine. Which does seem to indicate a block doesn't it?

I see a lot of restaurants that have what looks, to me, like Tibetan writing on them, are there really a lot of Tibetan restaurants and what kind of food do they serve?

Actually, the script you're seeing is probably not Tibetan but, rather, the Uighur langauge. Uighurs are from the Xinjiang province in Western China and Xinjiang restaurants are very popular all over China. Many Uighur's are muslims and the restaurants feature a lot of lamb kebabs and a bread called 'nan' that looks a bit like a pizza without any toppings.

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