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If you are travelling within the 3rd ring road then it’s usually easier to get around without a car. Buses are frequent and on main roads have their own lane, making them quicker than cars. There is also the metro if you are going north<->south. They both get crowded during rush hour though.
Taxi’s are abundant in off-peak times. Great for getting home from a bar or restaurant at night.
The fastest and most reliable way to travel is usually by bike or electric bike. You don’t have to wait, and you don’t get stuck in traffic. Make sure you park somewhere safe and get a good lock though. Bike theft is very common.
Parking in Chengdu is a nightmare, which is why so many people illegally park then get a ticket or towed. The large multi-stories are expensive, charging 5kuai for the first hour then 1 or 2 kuai for every subsequent hour. Most street parking is 4 to 8kuai for the day, but it is difficult to find a spot.
If you are making frequent trips outside the 3rd ring road or long distances across the city then a car will be extremely useful. Otherwise the convenience of a car is marred by the lack of parking, endless traffic jams and inconsiderate drivers.
I think the only requirement, beside a job offer, is some kind of higher education qualification. They are always screwing with the requirements for the work/residence permit though. So I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they instituted an age limit.
Toni & Guy is a famous worldwide chain of salons originating from the UK. It’s also an international hair care brand, owned by Unilever in the US.
Google “toni & guy chengdu” for the correct store location.
Qinguang Gong is a really nice Daoist temple, and there is an art/antique market close by which is worth a visit.
Have lunch inside Wenshu Temple. Vegetarian food made to look and taste like meat. Delicious.
The peak and temples on Emei mountain are fantastic. You can combine it with Leshan to make a 3 day trip.
I found Dujiangyan a bit boring, but you can combine it with a trip to Qingcheng mountain.
Some of the best trips I have been on are out west in to Tibetan areas around Kangding. Might still be a bit cold in April.
$5 is quite a lot for such a simple application. It quickly becomes obsolete once you get to know Chengdu, or leave. I hope it’s kept up to date too. The European chamber was a bad example to use for your screenshots as it has just moved, or is currently in the process of moving, to Tianfu square.
Take your friend and a translator with you to the police station. Explain that you are visiting him, not renting the place yourself. This is a fairly common occurrence. Failing that check in to a cheap hotel.
Swedish owned cafe mentioned above. Fantastic food.
It depends on which country you and from and which brand you intend to purchase. Also how long do you intend to stay in China. Many warranties only cover the purchase region.
You can get everything in your list from a supermarket. Carrefour is probably your best bet. You should also check out Ikea, in the south on the 3rd ring road.
There are a collection of streets near Tianfu Square which are dedicated to cell phones. Just get in a taxi and head to 太升南路 (tai sheng nan lu). You can pick up a cheap phone and SIM card there. You can then buy an international calling card when needed which is cheaper than dialing directly from your cell phone.
Never heard of Hurricane Electric. It could be some small ISP providing internet to buildings via a larger carrier, or it could just be an error or old entry in the APNIC database.
This is the result from my office’s fibre connection.
The result from my home China Telecom (CHINANET) DSL are the same as Charlie above.
TBH that doesn’t mean anything. You could do a speed test to HK and get a really low speed, then do another speedtest to the US and get a super high speed. It’s peering between networks that’s important. Peering between HK and Western China is bad. This is because Western China networks are mainly run by China Telecom, and Eastern China/HK is mostly China Netcom. These companies are fierce rivals and connectivity between them is bad. This makes speeds variable.
There are a few things you can do to maximise connection speed.
-The first and simplest thing is to encrypt your wifi. People WILL suck up your bandwidth if you leave it open.
-Buy a VPN connection. A server in a data centre in London or San Francisco will have a good unfiltered consistent connection to the whole of the internet. You have a good connection to that server. This means that if you route all your traffic through the server then everything will be much quicker.
– Don’t run any downloads, especially P2P software, while using the internet. These will seriously slow down the speed, especially if you are using an older router.
– If you know you really need a consistent high speed, then plan to use it at a time you know not many people will be on.
Good movie. Best cinema by far in Chengdu is at 万大广场. Thankfully it’s not in 3D. The most annoying thing was the Chinese censorship of the word Russia/Russian! I think a couple of scenes were cut too, but nothing that spoiled the plot.
The best visas for long term stay are either a student visa or working visa. To apply for a working visa you will have to find a job at a company that is authorised to employ foreigners. You’ll then have to return to your home country to apply for the visa. Student visas require less documentation. However you can’t legally work on them. Under the new rules I’m not if you are required to leave the country or return home to switch to a student visa. You should ask at a local uni. to find out more.
As a last resort you could get a business visa in HK. Check out Charlie’s Chengdu Living post on the subject.
This is from my home 2mb/s ADSL connection (120RMB/month) at 9:30pm. I did the same test a couple of hours earlier and got a much lower speed.
Forgot to post a speedtest. This was done on an office network in the middle of the day from a 2mb/s China Telecom fiber to dreamhost’s network in LA.
AFAIK there are 3 options available for internet access in Chengdu. Cable, ADSL and fiber.
Fiber is great, but expensive. It’s 2000-3000RMB for 2Mb/s and only available in certain areas. This sounds ridiculously expensive. After using it though you realise why. It’s 2mb/s up and down guaranteed. Which means no matter what time of day you can get your full 2mb/s. It also gives you much faster international access. Downloads from servers in Europe or the US, which often trickle down with ADSL or cable, fly down at maximum speed with fiber.
ADSL is available from 2 companies, China Telecom and China Unicom. I have only had experience with China Telecom. However China Unicom are probably worth a try since they are owned by China Netcom, which operates in HK. This should mean better international connectivity. Also there aren’t as many China Netcom users in Chengdu, meaning more available bandwidth. China Telecom ADSL is variable. How good it is depends on a few factors. The first being if you live in a residential or businesses area. ADSL is contended. This means you are sharing your connection with 40 or more other homes. If you live in a business district, then your internet will slow to crawl during the day. Residential areas will slow down in the evening when everyone gets home from work. Another factor is what ADSL equipment was installed for your building. Older ADSL equipment is only capable of 2mb/s, and China Telecom rarely do upgrades. This means that if your building is new, then you’re more likely to get a decent connection. Sometimes older buildings also get new equipment though. Either because the older equipment breaks, or because no equipment was previously installed. So you’ll need to check with your local China Telecom office.
Cable is the worst option in my opinion. In the South of Chengdu Great Wall is the biggest provider. They use fiber lines to connect to apartment complexes. Then share the bandwidth using a standard cat5 cable network. These connections have bad international connectivity, and are often over shared. Also RFC1918 address are assigned, instead of real public IP address. This makes p2p downloads and on-line gaming slow or unusable.
I don’t know what your business is, but I would say that it’s no problem for you to work here. Just find a newer apartment with a fast ADSL connection. If that’s still not fast enough for you then buy a VPN connection with a server based in whatever country you need a fast connection to.
