living in guangzhou

[frobbit]

I may be moving to Guangzhou for September to start my new job.

The school will be paying my apartment, meals etc.

I'll be earning around 7,500 rmb a month.

Can anybody tell me what the daily cost of living is like in Guangzhou.

I guess I am right to believe that it will be more expensive than Harbin, but are we talking Beijing expensive, or Shanghai expensive?!

[Quest]

The average university graduates make about 4-5K RMB a month. With 7.5K, I think you can live comfortably if you don't plan on saving big money to take back to your home country. Guangzhou has traditionally been ranked among the top 3 of China's big cities。I don't know if trends have changed, but Guangzhou's per capita GDP was still higher than both Beijing and Shanghai last time I checked. Also, Guangzhou has very nice transit and metro systems (I apologize for the little promotion I stuck in there, few Chinese students are interested in Guangzhou because it's a Cantonese speaking city, so I am glad when people come to my city, and welcome =)

[frobbit]

Thanks for the info, but as I can't open Wikipedia (topark isn't working properly!) and can't read chinese I didn't learn too much

The main costs I'll be likely to incur would be public transport (bus, taxi, metro), restauraunts and going out every now and then for a couple of beers (sh)

If anyone can breakdown these costs, and anything else that could be helpful, that would be lovely!

[studentyoung]

The main costs I'll be likely to incur would be public transport (bus, taxi, metro), restauraunts and going out every now and then for a couple of beers

Bus: common prices are A. 1Yuan (without air-conditioner, but only very few of this kind of buses still remain to charge you at 1Yuan); B. 2Yuan (with air-conditioner, and almost 80% buses are this kind). You can see check the price on the bus-indication board at a station or check it on the coin box on the bus.

For example, please check the link and pay attention to the photo.

http://www.gz-bus.com/news/guangzhou2005/news234.htm (广州公交网)

Metro: The basic way for you to count your metro fee is that each two adjacent stations is counted as one span, three spans (i.e. four adjacent stations) are one section. One section is 2Yuan, and it will add another 1Yuan as long as you step in the next section (i.e. five adjacent stations or more).

For more details, please check this link and pay attention to the photo: http://www.gzmtr.com/en/

Taxi: The Taxi fee is counted in two parts, i.e. the start-fee 起动价/ 起步价 is 8RMB Yuan, and the remaining part is from 2.2Yuan to 2.6 Yuan per kilometer (it depends on what kind of taxi you take). The only thing I don’t like is that the mile meter will keep running in traffic jam. You can also check the fee information on the taxi’s window.

For example, please check this link-> http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2005-04-15/00276389193.shtml

Beer: The basic prices for retail both glass bottle or tin can are from 4 to 10 Yuan, which depends on its brand and quality. For those sold in bars or clubs, I am told that the prices are from 50Yuan to more than 500Yuan per jar, which depends on where and when you take them and their quality. (I am sorry, I don’t drink wine or beer in my daily life. So the information above is for your reference. )

Some others have said some words on living in Guangzhou, I hope their words can help you a bit. Please check the link below.

http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/5-how-many-characters-do-you-know575&highlight=Guangzhou

Hope you can enjoy your staying in Guanghzou!

Thanks!