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Beijing is an affordable and friendly city with strong safety and a wide variety of neighborhoods to suit different lifestyles. Foreigners can find it easy to adapt with translation apps and get around using the highly efficient metro system. There's no shortage of cheap and tasty food options, although you may have concerns about food quality at the ultra-low end. The city also has good opportunities for side income through English tutoring or teaching, making it viable for digital nomads. Internet in cafes is generally good, and many spots offer work-friendly environments.
However, it’s highly recommended to get a local bank account and set up WeChat Pay or AliPay, as international cards like Visa or MasterCard are not widely accepted. This can be a hassle initially, especially for short stays. Also, while most of the city is safe, be cautious in tourist-heavy areas due to potential scams. A major downside is the air pollution, particularly in winter, which can be a significant quality of life issue. Accessing global internet services can also be challenging due to the Great Firewall, and VPNs often perform poorly or are completely blocked, depending on the political environment.
If you can work around these issues, Beijing offers a rich, dynamic base with lots to explore.
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56 years ago
I lived in Beijing for almost 3 years from 2014-2017. It's an incredible city with a lot to offer. It's an imposing place and not the most welcoming, but that's because it takes time to adjust. In a nutshell: beautiful parks, very modern infrastructure , friendly people, good transportation (the subway is FAR superior to London or NYC, for example), amazing food, relatively cheap, extremely safe, loads to do, incredible history. The one major con is the air pollution—it can get really bad, so beware. Throughout my time in Beijing, I was constantly discovering new places and meeting interesting people. When I was there, there were plenty of foreigners and people were mostly very welcoming towards us. It's a special place. There are also loads of cafes and bars where you can work from, with good internet. A must-visit is the Friends Cafe—it's modelled after Central Perk from the sitcom Friends. They have good internet, delicious coffee and snacks, and Friends is playing on the TV 24/7! Disclaimer: Not sure if it's still in operation now.
2 years ago
Definitely an underrated place for nomads - Huge city with a small town feel. Lots of different neighborhoods to appeal to different types of people: some commercial, some hipstery, some historical, some modern. Food and rent is cheap (and the food is damn good). People are very friendly as compared to other big Asian cities. You can also get easy work as a tutor and make good extra cash. I survived for five months tutoring and doing other English related work for max 12 hrs a week (leaving me lots of time to work on other projects). You could also easily get a full time teaching gig but that defeats the whole nomad idea i guess. My favorite area is Gulou, or the Drum Tower. Old, local style with ancient buildings and some great cafes.
6 years ago
The GFW is a *huge* bother in daily work. VPN is not a perfect mitigation as it is throttled and frequently completely blocked (Have tried shadowsocks, outline, lantern, openvpn and expressvpn to about equal success). The VPN availability seems to fluctuate with the political climate (for example if there is a party conference or such).
The air quality is so-so. Worst in winter time. The streets seem very safe and their is little crime (Except maybe in tourist areas, beware the scammers). It is super easy to get by with a little English and a translation app. Metro system is super easy to use. Food is fairly cheap, and it can come as cheap as you want... but sometimes of questionable quality.
6 years ago
If you get an account from a local bank, then you can connect it to your WeChat or AliPay and stop bringing cash with you. You can pay EVERYWHERE with these 2 apps.
7 years ago
You can't pay ANYWHERE with MasterCard or VISA. You can usually pay with cash though. Problem is most ATMs don't accept MasterCard or VISA. Easiest is to go to any ICBC Bank office with your passport, open an account (for $0.50), deposit some money ($50) and install WeChat. Then connect WeChat Pay to your ICBC account. This will let you use WeChat Pay which works with a QR code and is accepted anywhere! WeChat is pronounced Wei-Xin (whey-shin). Ask the ICBC staff to help you set up WePay if you need! Good luck.
7 years ago