Forums > Living in Kunming > Dining alone in China/Kunming Yeah people are weird here, but you will find lots of lone diners in the following types of restaurants (which, given we're in Kunming means that up to 99% of the patrons are locals):
Fast food restaurants (KFC, McDonalds, Dicos etc.) @AlPage48, KFC is definately not the place to go for communal dining.
Western style cafes/restaurants (think Salvador's, French Cafe, The Box, A Slice of Heaven, Prague Cafe etc.) Both locals and foreigners can be seen dining/drinking coffee/using the internet etc. alone. In fact, as I write this response, I am in a cafe with only one other patron sitting inside and not only is she alone, but she is CHINESE! Yes, she is a local and she's not eating with anyone! Perhaps we should call upon some other locals to look at her for being "weird".
Noodle shops such as mixian shops where you go for a quick 5Yuan cup of noodles, complete with a hair or eyebrow or two. Or better than this, Brothers Jiang, where for a bit more (about 13-18Y) you can get a much better noodle soup.
The main reason that some Chinese will think eating out alone is weird, has to do with Chinese food being designed to be eaten "family style" with many dishes ordered. This is impractical and becomes expensive for an individual diner.
Finally, I find your first sentence "I never had a problem dining alone at home" funny. I wonder what kind of person would need to have people eating with them all the time, even at home. Even if I wanted to, I'd struggle to find someone to eat with me on a daily basis for every meal - even Chinese people can be busy too. This is perfectly acceptable and I think you shouldn't worry about people "judging" you.
Forums > Living in Kunming > sex first or friends first? @Billdan, haha...whoever said that "western teaching methods" were so easy as to not have tests etc. is either seriously stupid or misinformed.
In China I believe there are no assignments etc. only final (and maybe mid-term) exams. 100% of a student's final mark/grade is based on exams and nothing on assignments or classroom participation etc.
Anyway, I digress.
Forums > Living in Kunming > sex first or friends first? I agree with TICExpats. For starters, I wouldn't believe a girl that tells me she is still a virgin and wants to remain that way until marriage. For those girls aged under 30 or 35 both in China and elsewhere, this is highly unlikely - they simply make it seem as though they were virgins to "look good" in the eyes of their elders, including parents and relatives etc.
These days I have noticed a trend amongst Asian girls, including Chinese girls, to have sex on the first date or soon thereafter, whereas many western girls are not as "easy" as previously thought; which means many of them won't have sex until much later. If you've ever seen American Pie I you'll realize that even though the girls there are portrayed as horny as hell, the ones which have boyfriends didn't have sex until they "were ready".
Just look at the number of posts here on GoKM about local girls looking for sex to confirm this.
Also, don't always blame the guy. Girls these days are as horny as ever.
Forums > Food & Drink > Upscale Chinese How about Yitianyuan near Carrefour on Longquan Lu? OK, it may not be the most upscale option in town, but it's pretty up there and an average meal out for 2 will easily cost from 300-400 Yuan.
Other options include the two Thai restaurants near the Green Lake and Yunnan University.
Forums > Travel Yunnan > China forbids international tourism tibet @dazzer, smoking weed? And we all know how "enlightened" of a world view that people who smoke weed have.
Riding into Kunming's future
发布者There's a flight from Kunming to Beirut? Wow...
Changshui Airport set to debut
发布者Some airlines, particularly international ones like THAI have not updated their systems to reflect the new airport. At the beginning, starting tomorrow, I'm sure there will be some passengers that won't know about the change and will thus go to the wrong airport and miss their flights.
Yunnan goes infrastructure crazy
发布者Yeah the Lijiang line is currently under construction, while the Ruili line is supposed to form part of a proposed Kunming-Myanmar rail link - it will probably also be constructed at some stage (as reported by GoKM last year) but I suspect it will take a little while.
Yunnan goes infrastructure crazy
发布者All of this is quite amazing, but even in China not everything goes to plan. Originally the proposed high speed railway from Kunming to Vientiane, Laos via Jinghong and Boten was supposed to be completed by 2015, but a number of issues will likely push back that project for another 10 or more years, though I do believe that it will eventually be built. Also, since the idea is to link south-western China with the south-east Asian coast, Thai and eventually Malaysian and Singaporean co-operation is vital to building this link in the first place; building a line only as far as Vientiane would likely turn out to be a white elephant project since the objective is to make most income from moving goods between SE Asia and SW China quickly via train rather than passengers and that requires linking SW China to a coastline - something which Laos doesn't have.
Regarding the Hekou line, they've been proposing that one for years now since trains stopped running between Kunming and Hekou in 2002. Finally this article mentions a new high-speed line is under construction, but this will be of little use unless the Vietnamese also build a complementary high-speed line on their side (sure, they already have an existing railway line running from Lao Cai via Hanoi down to Saigon, but it's rather slow). Also, the Vietnamese government recently turned down a proposal for converting their existing line into a high-speed line, citing the high cost and the low passenger volumes that would utilize the line.
Changshui Airport set to debut
发布者Wow, it's finally upon us. The new airport will finally open at the end of this month! Only thing is, I'd avoid non-essential travel in and out of this airport for the first couple of weeks since it will probably be more chaotic than usual and things may not go as planned (for example baggage claim may be unusually slow).
I like the statement "For travelers without cars, taxis are always an option." well of course they are. For starters, most people in Kunming still don't own a car despite all the cars on the roads these days. Secondly, even if you do have a car, who would drive to the airport in order to catch a flight and then park their car for the duration of their overseas or interprovincial stay there? I don't think long-term parking is well known in China so even a week's worth of parking could become very expensive and possibly more expensive than even in some western countries.
I am looking forward to the proposed direct Europe flights. Anyone have any idea about when these flights might begin and who which carriers will offer service (presumably Chinese carriers I would imagine)?