If you want to live Beijing, here are some tips to help you along the way.
1. Get a job: If you want to live in Beijing, the first thing you will need to do is to secure a job in Beijing. This is important for your visa application. For example, once I got a job with Aihua, they had to send me a letter that I had to take to the Chinese embassy stating that I was, in fact, employed with them, and not just some random person making things up for no apparent reason. The visa process is complicated and long and honestly very frustrating if you have no patience (like me), but Aihua made it a whole less complicated, a lot shorter, and definitely less rage inducing then it could have been. They will help you every step of the way and will let you know exactly what you need to do by when. This is very helpful if you are a chronically disorganized mess like I am.
2. Find a place to live: Once you have a job and arrive in Beijing you need a place to live. If you come over with Aihua this will luckily be very easy as they will meet you at the airport and drive you to your apartment. They will also give you some very nice and practical things the day you arrive like a pillow, blankets, soap, toothpaste, toothbrush, etc. so that you can sleep through your jet lag in comfort and also so that you aren’t gross the next morning. Trust me, you will appreciate this.
The school will pay the rent for the apartment you will be living in so that will be one less thing for you to worry about. This is great if you have problems keeping track of things like deadlines and bills and anything financial and boring (again: like me). You will have to pay for the electricity, water, internet, and gas yourself which is not that expensive- the hardest part is remembering to do it before you are suddenly plunged into the dark early on a Saturday night, which, after a valiant fight with some candles, matches and a flashlight you will slowly, begrudgingly (and just a tad pathetically) admit defeat and crawl into bed at 9 P.M. This will make you feel old and a little boring but it’s ok because you will sleep well because without electricity there is literally nothing else to do but sleep.
Your apartment will also be furnished so don’t worry about having to sleep on the floor your first night. You may have to buy a few things like plates and cups depending on how much the previous people in the apartment left behind, or you might get lucky and have everything you need right off the bat (thanks Max and Lauren!)
Your apartment will also come with a roommate who, in my experience, will be a wonderful person who will add a much needed aura of calm to your apartment. This will be very helpful for you when you suddenly get very angry over something very stupid like wanting to wear a certain pair of socks but for some reason only washing one of them and now you have to wear a different, and so obviously inferior, pair. This is, of course, a horrible situation and you rightly should be upset, but with your newly acquired roommate you will soon calm down and realize that you can wear a different pair of socks and that it will be ok.
3. Familiarize yourself with the city’s transportation system: This is important because you will need to use some form of transportation to get to work, which you will need to do to if you want to get paid. The methods available to you for accomplishing this are: bus, subway, taxi, bike, scooter, or feet (your own). The method you will choose will depend on: how far you are traveling, how early (or late) you leave your apartment, and how much money you are willing to spend. If you are brave you can buy a bike. If you are brave and willing to spend some money, you can buy a scooter. If you are not brave and don’t want to spend money, you can take the bus which works just fine.
No matter what form of transportation suits your needs best you will need to adjust to the Chinese ‘rules of the road.’ These are often very different from what you are accustomed to back home. After a month you should be reasonably versed in the more obvious rules and customs of Beijing road safety and etiquette. Remember: if you are ever in doubt, just do what everyone else is doing and you should be more or less ok. Unless of course they are doing something stupid. If they are doing something stupid, then don’t do that.
4. Acquire sustenance: In Beijing, you will need to eat and drink on a regular basis if you hope to continue living in Beijing (or at all). Once you know how to use public transportation (tip 3) you can venture out of your apartment (tip 2) and buy food with money you have received from your new employer for the work you have done (tip 1).
You will have many options available to you, most of them Chinese, so if you don’t really care for Chinese food, start caring for it now because that is what you will be eating most of the time. Also, you should learn to use chopsticks because there is a very unique form of frustration that will come over you if you are very hungry but you aren’t particularly good at eating with chopsticks because it will take you forever to finish your meal. When this occurs, it will feel like the worst thing that could possibly happen to you (which is wrong: stepping on a Lego in the dark is the worst thing that has ever happened to anyone ever. This has been scientifically verified).
So, learn to use chopsticks. If you struggle at first don’t worry because you will soon get the hang of it and then you will be considerably less angry at your bowl of rice. Also, after your first month here you will be inordinately proud of yourself because you will stop leaving restaurants with the table you sat at looking like a two year old ate there with no parental supervision. This is a rite of passage that every foreigner experiences but no one really talks about so remember to make note of it and give yourself a pat on the back.
If you do begin to crave more Western food, there are many good places to go that specialize in that sort of thing but you will need to take the subway (see tip 3) to get there. Good Western food here is a little more expensive but if you have to have a burger right. this. second you can find one soon enough (although like I said, it won’t actually be ‘right this second’ no matter what your stomach is insisting on because you will need to take the subway).
5. Have fun: There is no point in living in Beijing if you are not having fun doing so. Not having fun is stupid so don’t do that. If you have a particular hobby at home, bring it over with you. Beijing is a city which means that a lot of people live here which means someone here is bound to like the same things you do- you just have to find them. There are many websites and groups dedicated to westerners living in Beijing with similar interests- just google whatever you are interested in and you should be able to find something worth checking out (except don’t actually google it because google is banned in China so you will have to either Bing it or use a VPN). If you don’t have a hobby, or just want to try something new, there are many options available to you here. I would really recommend having some type of interest that you can focus your time and energy on here outside of work. Work is, of course, important, and working at Aihua is fun and very rewarding, but it’s not the only type of fun and rewarding experience open to you here in Beijing. So go out and discover something new while you are here. It will be fun! I promise
Congratulations! If you have read and implemented tips 1-5 above, then you are now successfully Living in Beijing!