The heads-up board · by everyone

Learned it the hard way? Pin it here.

Real tips and near-misses from people living in China, pinned for the people about to arrive. Read theirs, then pin your own. A name and a real avatar are part of the deal: public words come with a face here. New notes go up after a quick human check, usually within a day.

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A friend from the Netherlandsheads-up #1

Set up and do the passport verification for Alipay and WeChat in your home country, before coming to China. I did this with Alipay in the Netherlands and had no problems at all here. I downloaded WeChat after arriving and had a lot of problems with it.

MartinShanghai · runs this site

Every time you move to a new address, or even re-enter China, register with the police within 24 hours. Hotels do it for you automatically. A flat does not. The online form takes five minutes and saves you weeks of paperwork later.

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