China Expat Forum

petboy520
Joined 2016
Posts: 4

7 years ago

To TheTerran: Here Is Your Perfect City In China!

7 years ago

Okay, from my experience, I have to tell you that the only city I know that fulfills all your criterias is the city Xiamen. It's in Fujian Province, to the south-east of China, just by the sea. It's actually an island, connected to the mainland by five (or six?) crosss-sea bridges and one subbottom tunnel.

1. Climate: it's a subtropical climate which means it's hot in the summer, warm in both spring and autumn and not very cold in winter (the lowest temperature in winter is about 7~8 degree centigrade).
2. Living expense: it's a little bit higher than most North-west cities, but just a little bit (may be around 5%-10% higher). So it should not be a problem if you are an ESL teacher or something like that. You know all around China, except for the gaint cities like Beijing or Shanghai, the living expenses are famously low.
3. Travel: Since Xiamen is an island which is not very big, travel around the city is soooooooo much easier comparing with the situations of the big cities. About every 500 metres, you can see a bus stop. And it also has tube and BRT as the supplements to the public traffic. So no worries here.
4. Traffic: The private cars are fastly increasing these years in Xiamen (actually in every city all over China), so the traffic situation is not as good as before. But it is still okay.
5. Basic Needs: There are two major hospitals on the island, which have their own helicopters. And there are also a whole bunch of comparatively small hospitals all around the area. So medical issues should be taken care of with no problem. And there are also schools, universities in Xiamen, among which The Xiamen University is quite famous in China. Internet? Since China Telecom has already connected the Internet to the deepest mountains, so...no problem there.

One more thing I have to mention here is: although Xiamen is a city by the sea, the view of its coastlilne is just so so. For one, there are over 1M people living on this big island, and secondly, the seabed around the island are mostly sediment, so it cannot be compared with the coastline in Boracay, or Bohol. But if you rent a car to drive south, about 2 hours driving, you will find a beautiful shore called LiuAo. It has wonderful beach and sea, which is quite a view.

That's about everything I need to tell you about this city. I lived there for 8 years, and it's like a second-hometown to me. You can check for more info online about it. Hope you have a nice travel there.

My name is Alan, and I am Chinese. I lived in Canada for four years and now I'm back to China, living in my hometown Xian. If you come to China, you can contact me and let me show you around. :)

Alan

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