have finally found some time to reply this post. First i would like to thank the OP for writing this book. Having been in China for the last 5 years it was a very welcome comic relief. I have since passed this little gem along to many of my coworkers. So now i wanted to give the most unbiased opinion on coming to China and working here that i could. A little background on myself, i have been an expat for over 10 years. I have been to 95 different countries and lived in 13. China for the last 5 years. I am from the states. You can take my opinion for what its worth but i think i have a pretty good background to be able to comment on this book.
First let me say for those back home if you have a job at a Legacy DO NOT LEAVE to come here. Unless you owe money to the mob i couldn’t see any reason at all to come to China when your quality of life will be drastically changed. However if your on a leave then yes it might make sense. Do NOT look at just the salary because behind those numbers is a lot of hard work, patience, and sacrifice.
I do not work for Tianjin, i work for Shenzhen Airlines. HOWEVER, i do have a good friend with the initials SS that did work at TJA from around 2011-2014. The stories he told me were the same as the OP, spot on!
I do not BS, i tell it like it is. I am not here to promote anyone or company. I have had interactions with HNA, Juneyao and China Southern. Juneau seemed OK, CSA was OK but from friends that are there now on the B787 its very disorganized. HNA was a complete disaster. Like a monkey show. And from what current friends there on the 787 tell me it still is.
Now about the book. I would like to share my opinion on what is good and what is not so good.
GOOD POINTS ABOUT LIVING HERE IN SHENZHEN
1. I came here 5 years ago from Japan. I managed to pay off my House, my Car, my Motorcycles, buy properties, invest, and by the end of this contract next year i will have enough to semi retire. I am only in my very early 40s.
2. I met my wife here. I also met many woman here and had many great times. Its like disneyland.
3. I have gotten to see some cool things and places. Meet some very unique people.
4. Hong Kong is right next door. And Shenzhen is not the real china. Its very westernized. Health care is good at the Hong Kong or Western Hospitals here. TCM has been good too but not for everything.
5. My apartment is very nice. Everything works unlike my experiences in india and Africa.
6. I have a car here. The driving is Horrendous but ill touch on that later.
7. There is lots to do. Nightclubs are great except for the smoking. Shopping malls are modern and good.
8. One hour from Shenzhen you have some very nice beaches.
9. The food is good here if you like Chinese food.
10. Coffee shops are numerous here and some very good ones.
11. If you like hot weather (i do not) then you would love it here.
12. There are good markets here to buy fake products. Some are just as good if not better. I had lost my power cord to my IMAC. And i had also broken the glass on my IPHONE. I found both here that were just as good and much much cheaper.
BAD POINTS ABOUT LIVING IN SHENZHEN AND OTHER PARTS OF CHINA
1. The OP never talked about driving in China that much. Let me be the one to tell you that these people are some if not the absolute worst drivers on the planet. Esp the female drivers. Its almost like they do not even know they are in a car. Never use blinkers but masters at using the horn.
2. People here generally are slow as hell. Esp the drivers. Pls name one Chinese F1 race car driver????
3. Accidents ala plenty. Totally moronic driving skills. There is a reason more chinese drive bicycles than cars, you can kill less people that way.
4. SZ is not really polluted but Beijing, Tianjin, other places are HORRIBLE. That stuff really scares me. Ironically sometimes there is no pollution in BJ. Esp when there is an important summit going on. The call it the APEC blue
5. Manners do not exist. Forget about people holding the door. Spitting here drives me nuts. Totally disgusting. The loud talking will drive you insane.The word courteous and considerate is nonexistant here.
6. Forget about manners while driving. Its insane the stuff i have seen.
7. China is getting expensive.
8. Be careful where and what you eat. You can get very ill. I would NEVER eat the food off the vendors in the street.
9. Police are VERY lazy here. Clowns with uniforms. But in some ways its much better than in America which IMHO is turning into a police state.
10. There are many fake things. Be careful as the liquor your drinking could be fake
11. Banking here is a complete headache. The OP was incorrect about sending money. As foreigners we can do as much as we want. There is NO LIMIT. However you must show your tax receipts from the company, your passport, your contract and as of 2015 your salary slip. I have sent 140,000 USD at one time back home and never a problem. But be prepared to spend atleast one hour. Also many times in China the lazy workers will pass the buck so you need to be forceful with what you want.
12. Noise. These people have no idea what volume control is. Take for example there walkie talkies, their ATMS, when they talk on the phone, the speaker in the cockpit, all have only 2 settings for these morons. OFF and LOUD
13. The people can be very annoying. There is a good joke. What is the difference between a racist and tourist in China? TWO WEEKS!!!
GOOD POINTS ABOUT FLYING IN CHINA
1. What would take you maybe 7 to 15 years to do in the states you can do right away here, that is be Captain.
2. Some companies will type you on B787, A320, and A330/340 as well as business jets. I PERSONALLY know MANY people that have done this.
3. The best part of actually flying in China is flying OUTSIDE of china. Flying domestic is the 7th level of HELL.
BAD POINTS ABOUT FLYING IN CHINA
1. Ok this part could be a book in and of itself. Lets start with Delays. Delays here are more than ANYWHERE in the world. It is a FACT that Beijing, and Shanghai have around a 30 % on time rate. They are the most delayed airports in the world. I would venture to say that the average delay over my 5 years here has been 1 hour. That is AVERAGE. I have had 10 hour delays. All this week i have had 4 hour delays on every flight. The total control of AIRSPACE by the Chinese PLAF is the main reason. Other factors are inept and zero management skills in both the airlines and ATC.
2. Flying in China is pure HELL. My first year here was fine, and then it slowly got worse and worse. You get to a point here where you just don’t care about anything anymore. Its more like a game, and a game of survival that is. Trying to deviate weather is a pain in the ass. ATC on many occasions will ask you to do the most ridiculous of things. How many times in Beijing have i pushed back to taxi to RWY 36R and then told to make a U-Turn basically and hold as our takeoff time changed. So we are sitting there wasting fuel when they just could have simply left us at the gate.
3. ATC in China sucks. They truly have no clue. They do not even use correct phraseology and they love to use the words EXPEDITE and MAINTAIN. You will hear many times an ATC controller tell you to descend to lets say 6000 Meter (19700FT) and you are like 280 miles away from the airport and this guy tells you descent rate more than 2500 FPM. Go ahead and ask him why. His answer will be traffic. Ok traffic where? Oh its 12 o’clock same direction 80 kilometers away. ***!!!!!
The real reason they have you do this is so they can hand you off to the next guy but they lie to you all the time. Ok and lets talk about use of the word MAINTAIN. Not sure where you all flew, but ATC where i come would use it like (Hawker N125CF maintain 2000FT until intercept the GS your cleared ILS RWY 22L at Newark. Well here in China you will be flying along and all of a sudden out of the blue ATC will say, Maintain 2700 meters. Your like HUH??? Even when they have you change radio freq. they tell you maintain level. It totally screws with your head because it makes you think you did something wrong. It is TRULY annoying.
4. I am not sure about TJA, but at SZA you have a crew bus that picks you up at designated points and takes you to work. Myself i have a car. The bus SUCKS because 1. It picks you up way early, 2. your the LAST one to be dropped off. So just to give you an example of how retarded the airline is, and how in China the LEFT hand NEVER talks to the RIGHT. Today my flight is supposed to be from SZ to SHA at 1615 local. Well i call and they tell me the plane is still in Chengdu with no takeoff time.
So at our company we need to be there 1:35 before departure time or 30 mins before inbound plane landing time whichever comes last. So since it takes me about 35 mins to drive to airport i tell the “dispatcher” pls call me when the plane takes off from CD. She calls me FORTY mins after it took off to tell me its landing at 310. Ok so i just need be there at 240. Great!
Well, i get there and my FO comes to me and says, Oh Captain the landing time is 430, our plane coming from Wuxi. WHAT??? Oh yea they changed planes. So now i am at the company at 3pm and now have another 1 hour and 30 mins to sit in the crew room with the smoking copilots (chainsmokers) or goto the hotel which would clearly extend my duty time. Plane gets here, we go out and i ask the FO to find out about flow control.
ATC tells us our departure time is 1207 at night!!!!!!!! Well our company never put in a new flight plan when they changed. Then this idiot at ATC tells us to report ready which means all pax onboard. Well how the F am i supposed to do that if i got 8 hours to go, board the pax and have them go crazy????
An hour later ATC tells us we can leave now. *** again…..
This is a typical day here.
5. Passengers here are animals. Just go on youtube and type in crazy chinese passengers. Nuff said
6. Copilots here are not that bad and some are very close friends of mine. For the most part they fly ok. However, they cannot fly a visual to save their life. They have no concept that flying is an art not a science. They way they do things will **** you off. Talk about finger banging the FMC, well these automatons cannot put in a HDG, ALT, SQWUAK CODE, OR FREQ without typing it into the FMC first. It drives me NUTS.
7. Pilots in China fly SLOW AS HELL. Almost in reverse. They have no idea what the hold short line is. Just hang out at 36R in Beijing and look left and right. You will see that they are always holding short of the CAT 2 line. They are too afraid to come to the actual hold short line.Its ridiculous especially when your taxing past the and that A330 tail is sticking out cause the moron won’t pull all the way up!
8. How many times i have been blinded by taxi lights or ldg lights because they refuse to turn them off even when they are facing right at you. IDIOTS!
SOME OTHER KEY POINTS
1. This place will make you crazy. If your already crazy it will make you insane.
2. Woman is the only good thing here and money
3. You will change after spending a few years here. You will grow to HATE flying. You will be applying for a job at Walmart in no time
4. Even writing this I’m getting ****ed off. These people are the most ANNOYING on earth.
5. There is a reason they copy, they learn by rote memorization, they are the slowest humans on this planet.
6. Lets configure to Flaps 1 at 20 miles away Captain because i don’t know how to fly 210 or 180 to the marker!
7. Without and FMC they would die
8. Their idea of aerobatics is a 30 degree banked turn
9. Watch them drive in an underground parking lot its hilarious. Ya know if the incline that goes to outside? Chinese never will drive up the incline if there is someone waiting to pay. They will ALWAYS wait at the bottom. They do not have the skill to make the payment to the attendant while holding the E brake or normal break.
10. Again Chinese drivers are the worst. Leading cause of accidents is chinese.