Stay away from your guidebooks, folks. If you’re researching The Great Wall of China in Beijing, they’ll tell you to go to Badaling or Mutianyu. I’m telling you, you’re going to want to visit Jinshanling. After running into The CounterIntuitive in Hong [...]
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ALL the Dumplings! Eating at one of the Best Restaurants in the World!
Din Tai Fung has been rated by the New York Times as one of the top ten restaurants in the world! They have locations all over the globe but, for dumplings, there’s no better place to eat them than China. [...]
Shangri-La is Real: in Southwestern China, on the Border of Tibet [Photos]
The mythical Shangri-La isn’t as mysterious as you think! Shangri-La, or Zhongdian (Xiānggélǐlā, according to modern Chinese), is located in the southwestern Chinese province of Yunnan. Being so close to Tibet, there are a number of political arguments that have [...]
13 Traditional Chinese Foods You’ve Got to Try
Curious to know what real, traditional Chinese food looks like? This isn’t that imitation Chinese you get from the 24-hour buffet around the corner from your apartment. I’ve lived in China for five months, and these are some of my [...]
Dios Proveerá: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Traveling
Can you picture yourself hitchhiking across Burma or riding a motorbike full speed down the center of an active airport runway? That’s alright. I couldn’t either. Like many people, I thrived on stability and certainty. I enjoyed having future plans, [...]
The Cost of Travel in China (and How to Do it on $25 Per Day!)
By western standards, China is a very cheap and inexpensive place to visit. As I’ve outlined previously, the cost of living like a local in China is very, very low. At the small restaurants around the corner from my apartment, [...]
Tiger Leaping Gorge: Trekking Through the Mountains of Southwestern China
The magnificent Tiger Leaping Gorge (Hutiao Xia) lies in the southwestern Chinese province of Yunnan on the Jinsha River. Yunnan is diverse, the southern region being more tropical and akin to the climate of Southeast Asia (it borders Burma/Myanmar). Northern Yunnan, [...]
Why Learning Foreign Languages is so Important: My Epiphany in Southwestern China
My 40 liter rucksack was packed and I was setting out to explore the southwestern Chinese province of Yunnan for ten days. I was an English speaking white boy in rural China, with an extremely limited understanding of Chinese. I [...]
Living Like a Local: What A Chinese City Really Looks Like
As I step outside, my throat fills with phlegm. The thick smog pierces my lungs and lingers at eye level. At first I thought all this spitting was culturally customary. Now I realize it’s a national necessity. Nothing outside a one-block [...]
It All Happened on a Whim, You See: A Tale of Teaching English to Kids in China
If my life was a pole with a bunch of arrows pointing in a million different directions, China had never been on that signpost. It ended up being more like an emergency ejection seat; I didn’t know where I was [...]
