Reigning In the "Ugly Chinese Tourist"

Discussion Open Forum
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[quote]It looks like the government in the PRC is working on plans for a code of behavioural conduct to rein in what has been dubbed “the ugly Chinese tourist.” However, the test run didn’t seem to be too successful. Trying to change 5000 years of habits can be very hard indeed.

Does Taiwan’s government publish anything similar to this? Considering the behaviour of certain political appointments when they are on diplomatic trips, I think Taiwan’s government should follow suit and make it required reading for the public and for government officials (including the political appointments).

canada.com/vancouversun/news … =98974&p=2[/quote]

I’m more interested in how the local Beijing citizens will interact with hordes of foreign national barbarians storming Beijing for a few weeks in 2008.

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:roflmao:

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[quote][quote]Does Taiwan’s government publish anything similar to this? Considering the behaviour of certain political appointments when they are on diplomatic trips, I think Taiwan’s government should follow suit and make it required reading for the public and for government officials (including the political appointments).

[/quote]
I’ve just been informed that certain companies in Taiwan used to provide “manner lessons” to their customers. Dynasty, the in-flight magazine for China Airways, used to provide information for Taiwanese on how to act civilized in overseas environments. Furthermore, 16 years ago, the “good” hotels in Singapore wouldn’t take in a lot of Taiwan citizens.

I wonder if Orchard Towers and Geylang in Singapore were dominated by Taiwanese freelancers 16 years ago? Perhaps these establishments were dominated by off-duty airline stewardesses from Taiwan. It is common knowledge that stewardesses from one airline from Taiwan often moonlighted as “ladies of the night” in Hawaii. Perhaps it was also true in Singapore. In any case, they were probably a hell of a lot cheaper than the Singapore Airlines ladies.[/quote]

The LBFM syndrome I presume?

A few weeks ago I took the SO to Taipei 101 to check out the observation deck. Apart from the awesome views etc, some of the things that stands out in my memory:

  1. The staff were awesome, helpful and spoke Chinese, Japanese and English.
  2. It was all well regulated, you didn’t have to wait too long and got to enjoy the views, take pictures and see what you wanted to for as long as you wished to stay.
  3. The “ugly Chinese tourist” availed himself everywhere. They were loud, rude and obnoxious. All the staff could do was look apologetic.

Not the first time I’ve experienced this either. On plane trips back home you can very easily distinguish the Taiwanese from the Chinese.

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[quote=“bismarck”][quote][quote]Does Taiwan’s government publish anything similar to this? Considering the behaviour of certain political appointments when they are on diplomatic trips, I think Taiwan’s government should follow suit and make it required reading for the public and for government officials (including the political appointments).

[/quote]
I’ve just been informed that certain companies in Taiwan used to provide “manner lessons” to their customers. Dynasty, the in-flight magazine for China Airways, used to provide information for Taiwanese on how to act civilized in overseas environments. Furthermore, 16 years ago, the “good” hotels in Singapore wouldn’t take in a lot of Taiwan citizens.

I wonder if Orchard Towers and Geylang in Singapore were dominated by Taiwanese freelancers 16 years ago? Perhaps these establishments were dominated by off-duty airline stewardesses from Taiwan. It is common knowledge that stewardesses from one airline from Taiwan often moonlighted as “ladies of the night” in Hawaii. Perhaps it was also true in Singapore. In any case, they were probably a hell of a lot cheaper than the Singapore Airlines ladies.[/quote]
The LBFM syndrome I presume?

A few weeks ago I took the SO to Taipei 101 to check out the observation deck. Apart from the awesome views etc, some of the things that stands out in my memory:

  1. The staff were awesome, helpful and spoke Chinese, Japanese and English.
  2. It was all well regulated, you didn’t have to wait too long and got to enjoy the views, take pictures and see what you wanted to for as long as you wished to stay.
  3. The “ugly Chinese tourist” availed himself everywhere. They were loud, rude and obnoxious. All the staff could do was look apologetic.

Not the first time I’ve experienced this either. On plane trips back home you can very easily distinguish the Taiwanese from the Chinese.[/quote]
:slight_smile: probably one reason why the Taiwan govt is planning to allow only 1000 Chinese tourists a day into Taiwan in the near future.

5

When I went to HK disney land I saw someone pooping in the bathroom sink. No kidding

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I have heard that Hong Kong disneyland is a nightmare…

Full of mainlanders spitting everywhere, hocking up big blobs of phlegm onto the ground and smoking wherever they like…

Sounds wonderful :frowning:

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I dont even want to THINK bout that . UGH !!

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Sounds like Danshui to me. I had so many articles of clothing ruined by bing lang spit. Don’t get me wrong. I have my fair share of bing lang chewing friends, but they at least spit into little bottles or what not…
Nevermind. I’m going back to my trailor now.

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As a regular traveller to China, and literally just back after a return train trip and a week in Beijing, I can tell you that mainland folks are copping a very bad wrap here. I reckon it’s time Forumosans spent more time in China and less time imagining how shitty it might be.

For my money the Cantos are absolutely the worst follwed by the ‘tai shang’ . . . erh, and then there’d the HK whiteys in Shenzhen. . . sheesh! What fucking scum!

HG

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Grace, which airline was it? (Or perhaps you could just give the initials…)

I’d heard that stewardesses were rich girls whose parents got them their jobs through bribery. I suppose the two rumors don’t necessarily contradict one another, but it’s a bit of a stretch…

Some edition of Lonely Planet China reported a sign in some hotel in Xinjiang, in the shower room, that said something to the effect of “don’t do the big relief in the showers.” (Which is what’s known in Sanskrit grammar as an “affirming negative”!)

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It’s not just China. In the changing-rooms of my pool and gym, the management have found it necessary to put up signs pleading with patrons to show self-respect and refrain from pissing or shitting in the showers.

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I’m not sure I would believe anything I read in those books.

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Signs on the Shanghai underground remind travellers not to bring explosives onto the subway.

These signs assume that the savages for whom they are intended can actually read, which is a tad optimistic in my opinion.

I think a lot of people don’t get how barbaric a place China can be. We’ve been living in the centre of Shanghai for a few months and my wife has been mugged (unsuccessfully) twice on our doorstep, seen another girl mugged in exactly the same place, and last night saw a group of men snatch a baby out of the arms of its mother and run away. Needless to say we are moving out of here to somewhere a bit less scary, but tell this story (as I have) to any foreigner in Shanghai and he will tell you “I’ve lived here for X years and I’ve never seen anything like that.” Well, obviously. Step outside Hongqiao or Blah Blah Blah Gardens in Jing’an and it’s all there.

It’s also worth pointing out that these tour groups to HK are not always composed of richer Chinese who have made money through business. A very large number of them are junkets and grace-and-favour trips from some government department or other spending surplus un-explainable funds and thus the members of the group could be anything from bottle washers in the People’s No.1 Manure Factory to the Head of Finance for the Non-existent Department of Slushfundery. The total net worth of the group may be twenty-seven pounds fifty, but who cares, the government’s paying! Family members get to go on these trips too. FF’s sake I have even been offered a place on such trips!!! Gambling to Macau is a particular favourite. So what sort of behaviour do we expect? Mind you, when the government says it’s going to crack down on this sort of thing who knows what to believe…

There’s a mad rush to go to HK now (prices are up around Rmb3,000 from Shanghai return) because there is a rumour the government is going to limit the number of passports issued and the number of exit permits to HK. More like limit the number of people spending public money on HK/Macau junkets.

I was thinking of organising a joint English Soccer Hooligans and Chinese Tourists trip. The Barbarians versus The Savages. Could be fun. We could keep score by turds laid on pavements and chairs/beer bottles thrown through windows divided by the number of arrests.

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[quote=“Huang Guang Chen”]As a regular traveller to China, and literally just back after a return train trip and a week in Beijing, I can tell you that mainland folks are copping a very bad wrap here. I reckon it’s time Forumosans spent more time in China and less time imagining how shitty it might be.

For my money the Cantos are absolutely the worst follwed by the ‘tai shang’ . . . erh, and then there’d the HK whiteys in Shenzhen. . . sheesh! What fucking scum!

HG[/quote]

Had a good time did you? Welcome back to the pleasuredome.

15

Something wrong with their foreskins?

:wink:

16

i hope you suggested they take it da bao.

or at least rubbed their little noses in it.

i had to take an urgent crap in tanzania once (dysentery), and was directed to a ‘toilet’. this turned out to be a room that once perhaps contained a toilet but now WAS a toilet. i balanced on the window sill, pooed, and left via the window.

sorry, no photos. in their defence there was no sewage system or water in this town anymore (or anywhere in tanzania i guess now).

what was her excuse?.

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[quote]sorry, no photos.[/quote] In this case, I think I speak for all of us when I say: “No apology necessary.” Except of course IrishStu. He’s going to be mighty disappointed.

18

One of my (Taiwanese) wife’s prerequisites for where to take our vacations is that it’s somewhere NO Chinese will go. Surprisingly, that’s pretty easy, as they all pretty much go to exactly the same places!

I remember the first time I went to Bangkok, and was on a tour of Vinmanmek (the teak palace). The tour guide was in the middle of a lecture, then suddenly stopped, paused for a moment, sighed and said “Ahhh, I can’t believe how quiet and well-behaved you all are! I just took a Chinese group through here, and they were so noisy and rude I had to excuse myself and ask my coworker to finish the tour, because I thought I was going to scream at them.”

Aside from their noisiness and littering, however, my little pet peeve is that even outside of China they still refer to Caucasians as “wai guo ren”. I once heard a guy doing this, and couldn’t resist saying to him, “Excuse me for interrupting your conversation, but I just wanted to remind you that you’re a foreigner here too!”

His response? If you’ve been to China, I don’t need to tell you. Without even pausing, out come the generalizations: “Wah! Your Pu Tong Hua is so standard! Our Chinese language has characters, not an alphabet like English. Foreigners like to eat bread, but we Chinese eat rice. Our country has a five-thousand year history, you know…” ad nauseum

19

Probably the same as how they interact now. Beijing already gets tons of foreign tourists as it is, and while the numbers will go up during the Olympics, I’m sure 95% of them will stick to areas that are already heavily visited by foreign tourists.

When I went to Cambodia last CNY, I saw a bunch of mainland tourists. It was a shock to be surrounded by that northern accent while waiting for the sun to rise at Angkor Wat after not hearing it for so long. But judging from their clothes and camera gear, they looked more like noveau riche rather than middle managers from #4 Jilin SOE Factory skimming money from the state’s coffers. If anything, I thought the appalling dress and hygeine of some of the Western backpackers was the worst thing I saw.

20

Its true, certainly, that Beijing gets loads of tourists now.

However, virtually all of those tourists now are people who have an interest in China. Heck, many of them also speak Chinese and have an understanding of Chinese culture and history. By contrast, I suppose that virtually all of those tourists who will cram Beijing for the Summer Olympics will have little real interest in or practical knowledge of China.

I mean, there surely is a difference between a tour group visiting Beijing to see the Wall and other attractions and to soak up the culture and those visiting to see the soccer (football) contests and drink beer.

I’m very curious to see how the Chinese citizens and Olympic tourists interact in 2008.