Why did you leave China?

[roddy]

Or why would you? 

 

The number of foreign folk I know from China who are still there is dwindling. People who might once have looked like being confirmed lifers are upping sticks and moving home, or starting again elsewhere. 

 

I think there are interesting conversations to have here, so I'm starting this one. 

 

I quit back in late 2010. When I left I wasn't saying I was never going to live in China again, but that I was going to go and live somewhere else for a while and see if I missed it. 

 

There's no way I can point at one reason for deciding to leave. Visas were a big hassle (no wife, no company, no job, no university - hello, Mr Dodgy Visa Agent) and becoming more expensive. Even when you'd sorted out one visa, it wasn't long before you were worrying about the next. It's not a particularly enjoyable way to live, and I wouldn't do it again. 

 

Cost of living was going up, especially if like me any of your income was USD/GBP. In 2007 a £1000 income would give you maybe CNY15,000. Skip to post-Global Financial Apocalypse 2009 and you're looking at less than CNY10,000. Add in inflation, particularly in rents, and things start to feel a lot less cheap. Still affordable, mind. 

 

Quality of life wasn't, I felt, keeping up with the cost of it. I'm not sure how much this is due to actual changes - did Beijing get more polluted between my first year and my last, or did I just notice it more due to all the media attention? Was the city more crowded, or did I just get older and more jaded, and hence less inclined to joyfully accept the scrums as all part of living in China? Either way, I felt a sneaking suspicion I might be better off elsewhere. You can buy your way out of some of that hassle with taxis and expensive restaurants and nicer apartments, but... do you want to?

 

I think another factor might have been that I was just kind of finished. I'd spent over a decade in China, across four different cities, and had gone from teaching six-year-olds English to quite happily freelancing as, variously, translator, copywriter, websiter. The next progression might have been a cushy company job, or starting my own company, but neither appealed at the time (or all that much now).While China undoubtedly had a lot of stuff to offer me, it wasn't anything I particularly wanted at that point.  

 

I was also curious to see what moving back was like. You hear tell of people who can never go home, maybe I wanted to see if I could and survive (the answer is yes, but that's a tale for another day).

 

So do I miss it? Yes, but not enough to want to go and live there again, yet at least. The right job or opportunity might tempt me, but I'm not actively looking for that job or opportunity. But oh, that one restaurant, or the evening light in a quiet hutong. The clack of the chess pieces. The whistle of the pigeons. Ah, now where did I put that Kleenex...

 

Would be interesting to hear from some other long-timers. Kdavid I know has said he's on his way home. Imron's location is no longer 北京. Gato, anonymoose and msittig are as far as I know all still settled in Shanghai (maybe it is, after all, better). And those setting out on what may be long-term stays - you lucky beggars, you - what are you planning? Do you see yourself leaving, and if not, what might change your mind?

 

 

[icebear]

I left once before, for a few years, because of a great job offer elsewhere. At the time I was still quite excited about China, but also curious about other places and it was a good professional/financial opportunity, so I took it. Within a few months I found myself deeply missing China, and while it wasn't the same when I came back (how could it be), I have once again been quite happy here.

 

I'm fortunate in that way-back-when I managed to transition from teaching English into a career I enjoy and is reasonably well paid (those three together being the lucky part!), so I doubt those reasons won't be what push me out anytime soon. I also find I still find Beijing/China evermore fascinating and exciting, which helps put up with many of the small annoyances.

 

That said, there are a few clear reasons to go back, which I've seen more and more foreigners and even locals leave for. Most of them are aging specific...

• Health - a recent experience opened my eyes to how bad healthcare is in this country can be, even at the fanciest of foreign hospitals once you need more than a GP. With that in mind, it becomes very easy to see why some friends have left due to personal chronic illnesses that are too inconvenient to treat on the mainland, concerns about pollution interacting/aggregating those conditions, or because of child development issues. Hard to fault anyone for that, and I think in the same situation I'd make a similar choice.
• Family back home - especially related to having a child. It's only natural to want grand parents and other family to play a role in your child's life. For some, sending kids "home" for a few weeks/months each summer works. For others, closer/more time is needed. Again, can't fault this, although a less likely reason for me, as it would be hard to work within a few hours flight of my family in my sector.
• Education/social opportunities for a child - no explanation needed.
• Friends moving away - a lot of what I love about it here is my small group of closest friends, about half of whom are expats. Most of them are lifers, or at least medium-termers, so the risk is relatively low for the next few years at least, but if they left (especially in close succession, making it harder to "restock") it would be a major blow. Local friends are great, too, but my feeling so far is that as they age its harder to maintain those bonds as richly, given different familial obligations. They are still great friends and people, but they have a lot more on their plate than comparably mature/aged/encumbered expats.

Clearly, it's mostly kid related - nearly every flaw that is bearable becomes much less so once you have a Chia-YOU to grow for a few years. Not sure if that will sway me over (much will depend on how things develop here in the next few years wrt education, environment, health), but its the most likely trigger by far.

[kdavid]

I'd like to think that I've grown quite a bit as a human being since I arrived in August 2006. I arrived immature, inexperienced, and single. I'll leave this coming June, somewhat more mature, with a good deal of business and life experience, and married with two children.

 

China is not a place I want my kids to grow up for number of reasons. Becoming a father was really the major life event which shifted my priorities.

 

Thankfully, I've made good use of the eight years I've spent here. From running a moderately successful business for six years to completing a Masters degree (in Chinese) at a local university, I've given myself an opportunity to realize my dream of completing a PhD at a top history program in America and going on to become a historian and professor.

 

While I love China, and will be personally and professionally tied to her for the rest of my life, I just don't want to live here anymore, nor do I want my family to. The health system provides a lot to be desired, education does not foster the types of skills I'd like my children to develop, and I cannot develop professionally as I'd like to.

 

China has served as a great intermediate step for me, personally and professionally. Now it's time to take things to the next level.

[abcdefg]

Haven't seen any posts from @Liuzou in a long time. Did he move home too? Pretty sure I recall there was some mention of that possibility.

[zhouhaochen]

If there was one thing that would make me move then it is friends moving away. And that unfortunately happens quite regularly.

 

The pollution annoys me today, but did not 10 years ago even though I am sure it has not gotten significantly worse (I think in fact better, I remember not seeing the son regularly in 2003, I just never thought about why back then), which is due to the media attention and people CONSTANTLY talking about it.

 

Another thing is that Beijing is starting to have more and more expats who were posted here and have no real interest in the culture and it's people. The result are the typcial expats you get all over the world, complaining all day why things are not like home and how stupid everyone is, while not even making the slightest effort to try to understand the culture and appreciate it. These people also just kind of lower the general mood in the expat community because if people around you complain all day it starts affecting normal people too at some point.

 

I think one of the main reasons why I still enjoy China is because working at a language school I see new people arriving in Beijing almost every week, who are interested in the culture, language and are willing to be amazed by China (everything I and I am sure most other people who posted here were when we arrived). They discover the culture, language and are able to be amazed by all those amazing things in Beijing that I just started to take for granted and not notice anymore. Being a part of this experience through work reminds me that really it is not China that changed that much, but more myself and some of the - foreign - people around me (getting older is an important part of it). And it helps me to be a little bit amazed myself again as well.

 

The increase in rental prices in Beijing is a severe issue, however general cost of living I still find cheap. There is no way I could afford to go to a restaurant every night at home. I do of course miss the days where life in Beijing was basically free back in the day....

 

Overall, at least for me this is all rather irrelevant. I work at a Chinese language school and want to continue to do so, which means that I have to be in Beijing, unless Mandarin becomes an official language in Austria (and then I probably wouldnt want to go anymore).

[anonymoose]

I came to Shanghai at the end of 2006 as a (not English) teacher. The pay was very good, and life was pleasant. However, it had never been a career aspiration of mine to be a teacher, and I felt I was not gaining much from the job itself, even though it allowed me a comfortable life in China and the opportunity to improve my Chinese.

 

The thing is, I always have an inner struggle between just living for the moment and trying to work towards something better for the future (let's call it the urge to fulfill one's potential), and usually it is the latter that wins. I could have quite happily continued doing the same job teaching year after year, but had that been the case, I'd still be in exactly the same position now several years later with no sense of progression.

 

So I decided to do a degree in Clinical Medicine here instead. That way I could continue to learn Chinese intensively, whilst at the same time following a path to something more rewarding.

 

Anyway, it looks like my days in China are numbered. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, now that I have more direction and focus, I am looking forward to having a more stable career at home. On the other hand, there is nothing really that makes me yearn for home or want to leave China, so I can't say I'm not reluctant to be going. In fact, I have been working very hard over the past few years, so to some extent I haven't really had the freedom to take full advantage of being in China. So in spite of having been here for a long time, I don't feel at all that I have exhausted China as an experience. It may be that I can stay for another year, perhaps in a different city, but it is almost certain that the curtains are gradually closing on my China dream.

 

So that is my reason for leaving. Not that I'm jaded with China at all, but simply for practical reasons. It is just a case of 鱼和熊掌不可兼得.

[gato]

Job, financial security, language, interest in the culture, friends, family -- all those things are all key to staying in long term in China.  

 

To look at this question from another perspective, think about the reasons why so many Chinese leave China.  The main reason is the better economic opportunities abroad -- or for certain rich people who made from money by skirting the law, it's protection from the government.  They usually don't know much about daily life in a foreign country, but it seems that life abroad would be better than what they have in China.   

[roddy]

What keeps you personally here though, Gato? Or is that your list?

 

Interesting responses - had no idea you were doing that degree Anonymoose, look forward to hearing about it!

[amandagmu]

I, obviously, was never a long-timer in China since I only lived on the mainland a total of 1.5 years (and only one of which was consecutive). Taipei, where I also lived for a year during ICLP, was such a different experience I simply can't compare. My main reasons for not wanting to live another day in Beijing were quite personal - I love green space and had a lot of sinus infections when I lived in Beijing, I had to have an expensive air filter running 24/7 to keep them at bay. Plus healthcare was abominable for dealing with such issues - in some cases I waited until I was back in the U.S. (yes, even though it was expensive) or Germany (great system here IMO) to go see the doctor. I would never want to live long-term in a place where I felt that way. (Worth noting that when I broke my hand and had surgery in Taipei I felt that the system was light years better.) But the single biggest change for me was that between my first time in Beijing (2005), Dalian (2006), Taipei (2007-2008) and the year in Beijing (2010-2011) I met my husband, got married, and his academic job took him to and we still live in Berlin. We also decided that we would start a family in the next few years and I just could honestly never see myself as raising a child in a place like Beijing. 

 

I have a lot of expat friends who have decided to leave China in the last two years or so, and these are mostly long-timers who I met through running groups. I noticed that the ones who stay are either single and love their job and the culture, or they're married to someone Chinese and are unable to move because their spouse doesn't want to move (although of course some spouses want or do move). Of all that I have met, I personally only know one expat couple - neither of whom is from mainland China - who recently had a child and then decided to stay on for another few years... though I am pretty sure that the wife flew back to Canada to have the child, which sort of brings up the fact that healthcare is clearly an issue for them. In another case, a French-Belgian-Canadian friend of mine (married to a Beijinger) decided to move the family to Canada partially for these issues and partially because that friend didn't want to pay exorbitant fees to send the kids to private schools (i.e. feeling that the local Chinese school would be inadequate). This was someone who had lived in China many years and eventually got married, had two kids, and decent job in Beijing. They stayed in China until it was time for the eldest son to go to kindergarten and then last year moved. So, it does seem to be that issues icebear and kdavid have raised that hit the closest to home for many expats: healthcare and kids, and related to those two pollution, food safety, and schooling. Many expats don't worry about pollution or eating food off the street (god I miss 煎饼), but once they have kids these issues start becoming real concerns. Likewise, I think it's probably true that most expats cannot imagine attending a public school themselves, so if they cannot afford to send their kids to private school in a place like Beijing or Shanghai then they start seriously considering the move.

 

I guess something that no one has really brought up yet is the notion of moving somewhere else not in China that is also not "home" or even your passport country. Personally, since I have spent so many years of my life in other countries (lived in France as a kid, etc), I always have felt sort of transient and expat-y, more like a Third Culture Kid. As such, l live in Berlin with a husband, who is from Spain originally but has not lived there in 14 years, and still find myself content most of the time with learning a new language and discovering new places. Sure, it's not Chinese language and culture, which I am still fascinated by, but it's not bad. It's actually a lot like living some of the places I've lived in the U.S. (bureaucracy aside - that is a goddamned nightmare here), at least when compared to a place like Beijing, and historically speaking Berlin doesn't let down for obvious reasons... difference being how open the average person here is about 20th century history and all the monuments and memorials. Practically speaking, Berlin is far cheaper than Beijing these days as well (we pay under 700 euros, including utilities, for a 2 bedroom apartment/ 75 sqm in a nice area), even though the bureaucracy and nightmare of finding employment is as bad as in almost any European country. We have green space everywhere and live next to a forested area with lakes and trails. In any case, I've been here over two years now since I left Beijing and I'm pretty content. I don't really see us leaving anytime soon, despite the fact that for the purposes of my research and studies it would be far better to live in an area with more Chinese speakers. My point is: when you think of leaving China, you don't necessarily need to think of it as meaning you will return to some sort of primordial home (whether town, city, or country), or even as jumping ship on Chinese studies/interest (though you will feel "homesick" for it on occasion), but you can consider moving on to the next place and trying some place entirely new... maybe it will be the place you wish to settle for another long period of time or forever. The world is a big place and even though China is a big country it doesn't need to be your last stop.

[Guest realmayo]

I lived in China for two two-year stints. I left not because I wanted to leave China but because I had to be back home. But second time around I would have left the mainland anyway and have no desire to live again in the mainland, mainly for the reasons people have given above. If I had the choice I'd love to try Taiwan, or perhaps HK, or even Vietnam or Korea.

 

When I first went to China in 1999, the optimism and sense of progress was infectious, thinking about it now just makes me smile. I remember working out then that for friends my age, early 20s, when their parents in their early 20s, it was maybe 1970-75. Different era. My friends were living lives unimaginable when they were born. 

 

I absolutely loved my first two years back then and was desparate to return. But of course the place has changed, far fewer people have that sense that of unlimited horizons and lives getting better every year. At least that's how it seems to me. But then again perhaps a chunk of that is simply that I'm not the wide-eyed 21 year-old I was when I first arrived.

[gato]

What keeps you personally here though, Gato? Or is that your list?

That's most of my list, though I'm not really an expat in China. I was born in China was it was still a poor third-world country, spent 10 years here, nearly finishing elementary school, then lived in the US for 20 years, and then returned about 10 years ago and have been here since. So about 20 years in China and 20 years in the US. Things are a little complicated, as you can imagine. The questions for me might be what made me leave the US (where I was an "expat", you could say, or an "immigrant", the more common term) and return to China. Bush might have had something to do with it. But it was more the wish to see what it would be like to live in a majority-Chinese country again and not have to feel like an immigrant/minority. I was young, and it probably mattered more then. Now living in China, I hardly ever think about my ethnicity, whereas it was always there in a conscious or unconscious way back in the US . I am sure that's something expats in China can relate to, in reverse.

Most problems in China don't faze me because I grew up in a China without indoor plumbing. The sky and air were much cleaner back then, though. I am more annoyed by the authoritarian government and underdevelopment of the culture. I am deeply interested in history and politics, so the ready access to Chinese books here (and in HK for banned books) is a bright spot for me. And now that Kindle makes the world of English language books available at a click of a few buttons, I don't have to miss out on that part of the world, either.

But a rewarding career might be the main reason that I can see myself staying here indefinitely. I "wandered" more when I was in the US and only settled down into a practical career when I came back to China. Maybe because the career choices are more limited here and there is no culture of "you can be anything you want to be" here like there is in the US, I became more practical and learned to enjoy the simpler pleasures of everyday life, and not always think that thing just around the corner will make me even happier.

[Lu]

Quality of life wasn't, I felt, keeping up with the cost of it. I'm not sure how much this is due to actual changes - did Beijing get more polluted between my first year and my last, or did I just notice it more due to all the media attention? Was the city more crowded, or did I just get older and more jaded, and hence less inclined to joyfully accept the scrums as all part of living in China? Either way, I felt a sneaking suspicion I might be better off elsewhere. You can buy your way out of some of that hassle with taxis and expensive restaurants and nicer apartments, but... do you want to?

In my experience, one of the problems was that you couldn't really taxi and nice apartment your way out of the problem, because there were no taxis and the nice apartments were either not that nice or they came with an even more expatty lifestyle (that I didn't come to China for).

I've left four times now, twice simply because my year of studying in Beijing resp. Taipei was up and twice for my own reasons. I left Taipei because I felt I was done there. I had a nice job and was enjoying myself, but career-wise I didn't really see a way up, and life-wise, well I could build a life there, but I already had a life back home. So I came back, in search of new adventures, and lived happily ever after (for two years and then I moved to Beijing).

I left Beijing for a variety of practical reasons (work contract ended, both my grandmas were not well), but I was glad to leave because Beijing hadn't been working out for me. Life there was just so much 麻煩. The difficulty of getting around, of finding things I wanted or needed to buy... Also I never really found a social group I fit with. And the air, of course. For the first months after I came back, I was very consciously grateful and happy with simply breathing clean air.

I wonder if I've left for good this time. My stay there was very worthwhile in many ways, but mainly because it gave me a feeling again of what China is up to. I can read the newspapers here, but it's not the same as knowing what taking the bus is like, noticing when you find FLG money in your wallet, seeing the highways and high speed trains, the everyday life things that you can't really read about. I've been back a year now (almost to the day), and don’t feel like packing up at the moment, but give it another year and the right push and pull factors, I don’t know if I wouldn’t be tempted again.

[eion_padraig]

We've returned to China, though a different city, after about 10 years back in North America. When I left China to return to North America, I knew I wanted to live overseas again, but I knew it would have to be for work that was more lucrative than teaching English. My wife and I made the most out of time with valuable work experience, additional education, and adding another passport. When we looked for ways to further our career and go overseas, China ended up being one of the easier places to make that happen. I had started studying Chinese again a few years before the move, which made me an even better fit.

 

It's been wonderful coming back. The break neck pace of change is still apparent every day. China forces me to be mindful and observant to get things done. Back in North America it can be easy to do things without much thought. I'm making language and cultural connections daily that are personally rewarding.

 

Technology (e-books, iPods, smartphones, Skype, digital cameras) has developed in a way that eases a number of the challenges I found to living in China before. I like being in the PRD more than my time in Shanghai for reasons of climate, access to Southeast Asia, and differences in local culture. On top of the lifestyle benefits, the savings potential has been great so there's hope that I may one day be able to retire. I think we'll probably stay here for another 4 - 5 years. Even after that time, we may see what professional opportunites exist in Hong Kong.

I certainly see how raising children in China has significant challenges. I've heard how multinationals are having trouble bringing in executives with families to China due to concerns about health. When people start to feel vulnerable (as having kids tends to do), I think people start to look for the familiar as it feels safer. And certainly sometimes it will be safer. But I'll say based on my own feelings about the relative safety from violence here compared to some other places in the world, China looks pretty good to me.

[amandagmu]

 

 

I think people start to look for the familiar as it feels safer.

 

Just to be clear, for me this has little to do with familiarity. I actually think it's great to be in a place where one is always learning or trying out something new. Unfortunately, I personally don't think that healthcare or local schooling is particularly good anywhere in China. It is possible to get decent schools in a large city, especially if one has the money to pay the fees and live in a nice area. Healthcare... well, you have to also have a generous income to get half-decent treatment and there is a lot of corruption in the system. I know some well-off people (Chinese and expats) who have told me horrible stories about bribing. I never dealt with anything like that, but I still found the medical treatment I received at Western/Expat-y hospitals in Beijing (supposedly some of the best or best in the city) to be sub-par. In any case, that's probably a debatable issue for some people, but for me I know that my kid is going to be better off here because the German healthcare system is pretty good (my husband had brain tumor surgery here last year, so I feel I know what I'm talking about!) and the schools have a good reputation, plus there are government-subsidized bilingual schools. So yes, in some ways this has been a conscious choice based on our specific situation, but that is not based on familiarity.  (Also I'm not sure we'll stay here forever, I am not crazy about some things here... and I wouldn't mind trying out another place in the future!)

[msittig]

I guess I'll chime in here since roddy "tagged" in the original post. I don't think I have a lot to add because I see a lot my own situation reflected in the first few posts at the top of the page. A quick summary...

 

I've lived in Shanghai for almost ten years. When I came I was a young China nerd with about four years of formal Chinese study under my belt, had just dropped out of grad school, didn't have a career to speak of, and was still "finding myself" as a person. Now I'm married with three daughters, have a substantial resume and the foundations of a career, and mostly thanks to my wife I'm a lot more sure of who I am and what I want out of life. My Chinese is at a high intermediate level; I'm struggling through a wuxia novel at the moment, but I can communicate reasonably well during parent-teachers conferences. As you can see, things have changed over those ten years, but other things haven't: my interest in the Chinese language, the excitement of moving and setting up in a new home, and my personal values and outlook.

 

That said, we have decided to move back to the US, my passport country. In fact our plane tickets are booked for March 29 and we are in the process of packing up our apartment. Like I said, our reasons have been well covered by other posters above, but a bit of personal detail:

 

• Medical problems: This last year I was diagnosed with a back condition that will require major surgery and a rest period of several months. In the US I will have access to world-class doctors, and family to support us during the recovery. We consulted with doctors at a couple of the best hospitals in Shanghai (China?) and they all condoned our decision to have minimally-invasive surgery back in the US, which is not an option here.
• Children issues: Has the pollution gotten worse in Shanghai in the past year? Will food safety issues affect us directly? We're not sure, but we don't want to risk our childrens' future for our own personal interests. Also, people above mention local schools as an alternative to expensive private/int'l schools, but here in Shanghai there are not enough seats in schools for the local children, let alone waidi hukou or foreign kids. We were obliged to ask for strings to be pulled when our daughters entered a public preschool, and now a public primary school, and we will face this problem for all three daughters every time they rise a level; another risk we don't want to take.
• Career path: My entire teaching career has taken place in China, and while I'm lucky to have been able to concentrate in physics/math, I've hit a glass ceiling in terms of salary and professional development. Furthermore, my wife has a degree from a reputable Shanghai university but, like with any Chinese person, a period of study and/or work in the US would raise her skills and earning potential.
• Quality of life: Like Roddy intimated, Shanghai is still a happening, cosmopolitan, international place and any young person who comes here will have many chances to explore in different directions while finding themselves. There's a foodie scene, an arts scene, underground music, countercultures, tech startups, etc. But as I grow up, my 条件/what I require of my environment in terms of quality of life have changed, and for a middle-aged person Shanghai can be pretty rat-racy and smothering. I'm looking forward to the green parks where you can walk on the grass, the cultural diversity (California!), mountains for camping, a vibrant civic life with the chance to get involved in political action, etc etc.
• Cultural experience: I've had my cultural experience in China and given myself ten years in full language immersion, now it's only fair to my wife and kids to give them the same in my home country.

 

While I'm not 100% looking forward to moving back, I'm pretty close to that number. I, by which I mean my family, will be giving up a few things but gaining many more. I haven't ruled out a move back to China sometime in the future — my wife's parents are still here, and I think the country is developing in a good direction — but our plan now is to stay in the US at least until our youngest graduates from high school, which is a good fifteen years down the road.

[Baron]

Here is my sad story:

 

First time I left China was after 4+ years. After having had quite a respectable job for my final year, I couldn't quite bring myself to go back to the dancing monkey routine that's generally expected of English teacher, so I decided to go back to the UK can cash in on my Chinese skills, which I had assumed would be my golden ticket to a remunerative job.  

 

Needless to say, that didn't work out, so I returned to China two years later. Work wasn't so bad - the ever present choice of well paid teaching or miserably paid yet more interesting non-teaching work, but it was the social side that had changed. In those two years I'd clearly passed an invisible line and metamorphosed in the eyes of my Chinese friends into some kind of social pariah because I didn't have a permanent job and and wasn't married with a kid. The vast majority of my friends at one point or another took me aside and had some very serious words with me about my life choices, and often asked 'why did you come back?'. It was pretty awkward and unwelcoming. As a matter of fact I'd reached the point where I wouldn't have minded being more settled, but I was getting a bit old for going out to sleazy nightclubs with energetic 21 year olds.  

 

Then I got ill enough to slink back to the arms of the NHS. There are only so many useless hand-drips in grubby hospitals you can take. And then I missed my flight back to China and didn't feel that inclined to rebook.  

 

Almost everyone I know from when I was in China went back to their home country, apart from a handful who returned to the UK then ended up in Hong Kong.  

 

I'd like to go back to China, but I'm put off by the pollution. It seems to have got worse.

[carlo]

I don't think of myself as having left China yet. I have now relocated to Hong Kong, and have broken an uninterrupted string of mainland resident visas stretching back to 2001, so in some ways, things are not quite what they used to be.

 

I have a business to look after, and projects that I would like to see come to some sort of closure before I move on to something else, so I am not in a position to just pack up and leave.. After many years in which I struggled to become "more Chinese than the Chinese", as they say, I began travelling the world more and more frequently, and that made me realize some of the things I had been missing -- not just the clear skies, but a sense of perspective that comes with distance.

 

I've always been a contrarian. When I first moved to China, nobody else at my then-employer had applied for that position - people saw it as an odd choice, a posting for pioneers and daydreamers despite the two decades of economic growth the country had already experienced. I fell in love with people's infectious optimism, their hunger and eagerness to learn, and more importantly I deeply admired their humility, or rather their total lack of complacency, the laser focus on finding what works and becoming better at it. 

 

Now when well-heeled Chinese investors around the lunch table start sniggering about unemployment in Spain, or the "cheapness" of US real estate, I get goose bumps. The more CVs I receive from young foreign graduates offering to sell their grandmothers to work in Shanghai, the more I start thinking that maybe I should be relocating to Greece. It's the contrarian in me again -- I'm very happy for what the country has achieved, and hope it will do  better, but I cannot help myself -- I am much less afraid of failure than I am of overconfidence.

 

Not being able to assimilate used to bother me a lot during my early years -- now it hardly matters anymore, probably because I came to realize that this sense of non-belonging has become part of what I am. I may look the same as most locals in the place where I was born, but sure don't always think the same way or have had the same experiences. I also empathize with my own children, who do not fit in by default in any narrowly defined national community, and never had any choice.

 

Hong Kong, all in all, seems like a good psychological fit at this time. Many HKers, although for different reasons, seem to be asking themselves similar questions these days. China will always be a part of what I am, but by now it has become part of a more tangled whole, and keeping a little bit of distance sometimes can be a good thing.

[roddy]

I enjoyed reading that, Carlo, thanks.

[Mike N]

I'd like to chime in, if I could.

 

I'm hardly an old China hand, with slightly more than 3 years under my belt since 2009. I did a year at BLCU in Beijing from '09-10 and I've been back in Beijing since February of 2012. I'm very serious about leaving China in the next 6-18 months. Why?

 

• Health. Okay, let's just get this one out of the way. Long story short, I'm not willing to trade potential financial gains for my long-term health.
• Environment. Didn't I just cover pollution? Actually what I mean by "environment" is Beijing is an urban jungle full of cement and a smattering of green. I'm a small town boy and I love my nature. I enjoy the energy of a large city but it's not my natural habitat. Even the so-called parks in this town are covered in cement. The most "natural" place I've been to in the city is the Old Summer Palace (圆明园). Sure, 怀柔 is 45-60 minutes away by bus but that doesn't help me when I want to spend a sunny afternoon under a tree.
• Culture. Something I've really been struggling with is whether or not I'm actually interested in Chinese culture. I certainly don't enjoy pop culture (modern TV, music, films) and I have yet to get started in on Chinese books, though I'd like to.
• Language. Much like culture, it has occurred to me I just might not place a considerable amount of value on gaining a high level of Chinese fluency. As it stands, I am an advanced intermediate speaker and I can work fairly comfortably in a complex Chinese environment, though I struggle to explain complicated concepts or ideas with grace. However I just don't feel the burning desire to push myself much further beyond this point because...
• My interests lie elsewhere. I've been with a Japanese girl for almost four years now and though she speaks English very well, and I can actually speak Chinese with her father and brother, I'm very interested in learning more about Japanese language and culture. As it turns out, I was very interested in doing just that back in high school but I never followed through, as opposed to Chinese which is something I just kind of fell into.
• Quality of life. Last but not least, I have to confess that I miss living in a developed first-world environment. I love the convenience and the access to a lifestyle that I pay a considerable sum of money to attain in Beijing. I've spent some time living the hutong life and it undoubtedly has a certain charm, but that just isn't me. I'm not ashamed to admit I enjoy my creature comforts (and not listening to the 阿姨 next door trying to hack her lungs out at all hours).

Anyways, with the exception of environmental concerns, you can see most of my reasons have to do with what's going on inside of me as opposed to what's happening in my external environment. China's been good to me in many ways, but I've come to realize that my personal goals and aspirations may naturally lead me away from the Middle Kingdom.

[Saxondale]

This thread has made me incredibly depressed about going back. Thanks guys!