Which city to go to?

[tiknaow]

I have spent a semester studying chinese in taipei an have really liked it so far. I well be studying chinese for 2 years and don't want to stay in one city the whole time.

criteria im looking for:

the more chinese the better (Taipei was to internationalized for me..)

I'm a big city/bustling/ very out going, sociable an not looking for a laid back city

Would be a big plus for tourist areas/sight seeing in the city or nearby.

I'm studying chinese so a good repped school is surly a +

Any recommendations?

[abcdefg]

Do you want to stay on Taiwan, or is the Chinese mainland a possibility? Since you found Taipei too international, Hong Kong would probably not be what you are seeking.

[tiknaow]

oh i'm sorry i forgot to mention im looking for a mainland city

[msittig]

I'd guess that good universities will correlate with internationalization.

Nanjing and Hangzhou come to mind. I live in Shanghai so those cities are more familiar to me.

Xiamen might be a good jumping off point for southern China.

If you're interested in getting away from the south, perhaps Xian would fit the bill.

At one point I was considering a move to Chengdu, but I don't know about the quality of language instruction there.

[PengHaoShi]

I am living since more than 10 years in China. I am working in Shanghai, my wife in Beijing. For the weekends, either my wife is coming to Shanghai or I am travelling to Beijing, we both prefer Shanghai over Beijing, but both have their advantages and disadvantages.

For me, Shanghai is a modern city, a "city of the future", a blend of Chinese and western way of living. if you just look at people in the streets, people in Beijing are dressed more in a conservative way whereas in Shanghai, they are dressed more fashionable. A Chinese author wrote, Shanghai has its Waitan (Bund), so its open to the sea and is and was always (during the last 150 years) open to people of all different kinds, different nations, culture, languages, religions, business people, refugees, gangsters, prostitutes....Whereas Beijing is a "City", which he describes as a place, which is closed, which has a wall around and also the traditional houses, the siheyuan, are build in the same way with a wall around, let nobody look into "the privacy". People moving to Beijing were always those people who wanted to be involved in politics. Originally, foreigners were not welcomed to Beijing.

You can find now also very modern buildings and shopping centres in Beijing, but I feel that this is somehow artificial and doesn't blend well with the culture and mentality of the city.

In terms of language, In terms of language, the predominant language in Shanghai is Mandarin, in Beijing it's the Beijing dialect. People might tell you, that in Shanghai the language is Shanghainese, but that's not true. It's hard to find real Shanghainese now, when I first came to Shanghai, the population was around 14 Mill, now it's over 20 Mill, so lot of people in Shanghai are coming from different provinces and don't speak Shanghainese.

You can find a lot of good universities in Shanghai: Fudan, Jiaotong, Tongji...

Price levels in Shanghai are a bit higher than in Beijing.

Weather in Shanghai is more humid and it rains more often, whereas Beijing is often very dry. Last weekend, we had a humidity of below 20% in Beijing, I went out to buy a humidifier, because I had skin problems. Winter is a bit uncomfortable in Shanghai, as almost all apartments have no heating, you have to use the air-con or an electrical heater, in most apartments windows are not of so good quality and they are not tight. January - March/April might be cold. Beijing is much colder, but apartments always have heating system. July/August is very hot and humid in Shanghai, in Beijing it's hot and dry.

Shanghai has a real city center and it's easy and fast to move around within the center. Almost all of the places, where I use to go to, are within a "20 RMB taxi fare". Beijing is much more distributed and the traffic situation is worse than in Shanghai. Cab drivers in Beijing are trying to take advantage of foreigners, quite often, it is hard to find a taxi at all.

I have been to a lot of other cities in China, but I would not like to live there (I am also the big, bustling city fan and we live in both cities just in the heart of the city). Anyway, this is my personal opinion, other people might see it differently.

[jkhsu]

Shanghai is a great city, but the OP found Taipei too internationalized. Therefore, I doubt Shanghai, being one of the most internationalized cities in mainland China, is a good choice. What about Nanjing, Qingdao, etc.?

[Meng Lelan]

Suzhou and Hangzhou would have been my choice im a situation like that.