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Leaving China

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Re: Leaving China

#61

Post by s1artibartfast »

chasil wrote: post #33
askonomm wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This hits home for me a lot. I've lived in Spain, Argentina and Finland, all in hoping to fill whatever gap I thought it would, whether that would be life quality, weather, culture or whatever. But after the honeymoon period, the cracks started to show at every place. I'm now back in my home country, Estonia, which I (now) think is the best for me - but that creeping feeling of something better being somewhere out th…

There is no place, and no time, where people are better than what you see before you right now. Sometimes, the political system is better. People? There is nothing new under the sun.

This a a strange postmodern take. All places and cultures are really equal?

Maybe Im missing your point, but to take a hyperbolic example, surely you wouldn't live in north Korea and say "There is no place, and no time, where people are better than what you see before you right now."

Re: Leaving China

#62

Post by amrocha »

ersiees wrote: post #3

Why do we call people expats and not rich migrants or something like that?

Because US and EU citizens think that "immigrant" is a dirty word for people from poor countries.

To all the other people talking about intent to settle or not: read the post. The author lived in China for 20 years and built a family there. They're not an "expat" under any technical definition of the word.

Re: Leaving China

#63

Post by jasonjei »

I used to travel to China all the time for work during my first job in 2008. Those times were super optimistic. Hong Kong was filled with Chinese pride, and it seemed inevitable that China would absorb Taiwan. China had just hosted the Olympics.

I visited Hong Kong late 2018 after many years of not having been there. It was a very different place from the Hong Kong I had visited in 2009-2011. The energy was a bit darker. It almost felt like another Chinese city. I had even been to HK several times when I was in middle school in Taiwan (I was born in America, but was a “reverse import” to Taiwan) as well as a mandarin language tutor during university, and was always amazed by the richness of HK culture from fishing villages in Saikung to bustling life in Tsim Tsa Tsui and in Central with relics of British colonialism. Now many unique elements of HK life had disappeared.

Meanwhile, Taiwan’s value to the Chinese diaspora can’t be understated—it’s a bastion of a mandarin-speaking democracy, or in software terms a hard fork of an alternate reality of what China could have been. It has cultivated its own culture, and retained elements of Chinese culture cancelled during the cultural revolution. It has its own identity from the aboriginal population, the settlers from the dynastic period, Japanese colonization, and influences from the Republic of China refugees (or occupiers, depending on your POV, post 1949 Chinese settlers) and American forces. And since 2018, I’ve seen the Taiwanese double down on their Taiwanese identity and pride, and in many ways Taiwan is the envy of China (also literally).

If I were to live in Asia, it might have once included Hong Kong because of its unique British history. Now I would probably live in Taiwan and Japan.

Edit: Taiwan hasn’t always been a democracy, and the path to democracy hasn’t been easy (just ask America). It’s not perfect like any other well-running democracy, but it’s the closest paragon we have in the Chinese diaspora. The presidency has transitioned peacefully to different parties since the 1990s.

Re: Leaving China

#64

Post by ren_engineer »

>But in order to live everyday life, most people living in China find it necessary to turn a blind eye until it affects them directly. That became impossible during the Covid-19 pandemic, when the force of China’s technocracy was on full display

it's amazing how people were able to delude themselves for so long, Tiananmen should have been enough to make people and governments realize things weren't going to change

Re: Leaving China

#65

Post by s1artibartfast »

nonethewiser wrote: post #55
hayst4ck wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not an expat, but I was considering spending several months in China. After Hong Kong, there was a strong message of "Americans caused this," likewise after covid there was a strong message of "this didn't start in China, this actually started in America." It wasn't just a message of "America is our enemy," but looking at how the People in Hong Kong were robbed of due process from an impartial justice system it…

> Another woman I met on a plane said that the people who ran the school she taught at threatened to revoke her visa trapping her in China. She said she was leaving for "vacation" but was not going to go back. She was also visibly shaken. I know someone working as an architect in China and apparently his company holds onto his college degree. Hes concerned he won’t get it back if he doesn’t remain on good terms. I wa…

What does that mean? College degrees aren't like passports. Can't you just order a new copy? I haven't seen my college degree in 15 years

Re: Leaving China

#66

Post by mschild »

nonethewiser wrote: post #55
hayst4ck wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not an expat, but I was considering spending several months in China. After Hong Kong, there was a strong message of "Americans caused this," likewise after covid there was a strong message of "this didn't start in China, this actually started in America." It wasn't just a message of "America is our enemy," but looking at how the People in Hong Kong were robbed of due process from an impartial justice system it…

> Another woman I met on a plane said that the people who ran the school she taught at threatened to revoke her visa trapping her in China. She said she was leaving for "vacation" but was not going to go back. She was also visibly shaken. I know someone working as an architect in China and apparently his company holds onto his college degree. Hes concerned he won’t get it back if he doesn’t remain on good terms. I wa…

I'm not sure I understand this. How are they holding on to his degree? A physical copy? Couldn't he just ask his University for another one?

Re: Leaving China

#67

Post by majormajor »

tiny_ta wrote: post #13

It's so interesting to read this perspective since it drives home "the grass is always greener.." for me. I've lived a pretty charmed life in the US for the past few years (like the majority of HN, I imagine) but I find myself longing to move to a country with dense cities, affordable housing in the city center, great public infrastructure and a modicum of agreement among the citizens and China fits the bill pretty g…

In 2014 I worked with a company in Beijing for a few weeks. The local engineers all had pretty long and packed subway commutes from various outer developments, so my first guess would be that "affordable housing in the city center" is long gone for most major cities.

The surface-level infrastructure was interesting, it felt like Los Angeles - much more than it did Manhattan or SF aboveground - just blown up 3-to-5x. Wider streets with more lanes of cars, big mega apartment complexes just all four times taller than the common 5-story ones, etc.

Re: Leaving China

#68

Post by lr4444lr »

tiny_ta wrote: post #13

It's so interesting to read this perspective since it drives home "the grass is always greener.." for me. I've lived a pretty charmed life in the US for the past few years (like the majority of HN, I imagine) but I find myself longing to move to a country with dense cities, affordable housing in the city center, great public infrastructure and a modicum of agreement among the citizens and China fits the bill pretty g…

I dunno, man. Net migration numbers don't lie.

Re: Leaving China

#69

Post by ren_engineer »

tomohelix wrote: post #4

What I find ironic is that as businesses leave China, they move into the exact same type of culture in Vietnam and India. Vietnam is basically a mini China and India is trending towards the same authoritarian regime that most people find distasteful. The entire western world is so addicted to cheap labor I don't know what would happen when there is no more cheap labor to be found. There will be a huge social disrupti…

>What I find ironic is that as businesses leave China, they move into the exact same type of culture in Vietnam and India

most of those are just Chinese shell companies or doing final assembly on parts made in China to get around sanctions and as a PR stunt by big companies to appease DC by claiming they are moving out of China

Re: Leaving China

#70

Post by FpUser »

ren_engineer wrote: post #64

>But in order to live everyday life, most people living in China find it necessary to turn a blind eye until it affects them directly. That became impossible during the Covid-19 pandemic, when the force of China’s technocracy was on full display it's amazing how people were able to delude themselves for so long, Tiananmen should have been enough to make people and governments realize things weren't going to change

Things do change over the time. And if you are so willing to look back I am sure you'll find enough trash in a history of your own country.
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