Life in Shenyang

Hi, I%26#39;m going to be living in Shenyang for a year from this June onwards. Does anyone know how easy it would be to rent a room with a family there? Otherwise I%26#39;d be interested in sharing a flat with a student or local. How much should I be prepared to pay? The accommodation doesn%26#39;t have to be large, but I would like my own room.

Life in Shenyang

yes you can rent with family but i would ask why? why do the people who are organising your stay not get you a place?

A word of worning. contractually it is very difficult, you will need letters of approval and you must go through the checklist of items carefully and make sure they all work as stated before you sign.this cabn be a very frustrating and time consuming period. Suggest you start now and settle it quickly.

See if you can get into a teachers area for your own nice place. about 1200 rmb pm

Life in Shenyang

The college is willing to give me free accommodation or pay RMB1000/m for me to find my own. I%26#39;d rather live with Chinese people as I%26#39;ve been learning Chinese for a few years already and that way it would be easier to regularly use it.

OK but learning chinese and living with them is very different. what you think you know and how things may pan out can be very very different, as culturally they are different to westerners. this is neither good or bad but more a matter of our our thinking. I have this discussion many times with my chinese friends and eventually we have to agree what I like and my values are, deep down, somewhat different. Have you been to china, particularly in the far north east before? can you eat korean? there is a lot of it there and its good. maybe only 8 hrs to the border by car but it takes a long time to get a visa - you will find out once there.

no doubt you will have a good time but I suugest eventually you may want to find your own place.

and oh, there are very few westerners there so in comparison with big cities you will have to speak mandarin the vast majority of your time out and about. I hope they can understand your accent... and look out for what i call the springfield reactors of mr smithers.

Looks exactly the same as the simpsons as you come down the highway.

Thanks for the advice! I like Korean food very much; I spent two months there a few years ago. I think you%26#39;re probably right, that it would be better to get to know Chinese people without necessarily living with them. I%26#39;ll probably just go with the accommodation the school provides.

Is it actually possible to visit North Korea from the Chinese side? A friend of mine (technically) did it from South Korea on a tour of the border area.

I%26#39;ll look forward to seeing the reactors, I think I may have seen a picture of them online!