Welcome to another video.
Why did I choose to live in Shenzhen. There are quite a few reasons.
But the first and probably the most important reason is that Shenzhen is a
first-tier city
and I've been getting a lot of questions about
the tier system because I do mention it in my videos. I mentioned, you know, Shenzhen being first-tier. Huizhou being second
sorry, third-tier.
And so I thought I'd talk about the differences between you know first-tier city and say for instance a third-tier city in China.
Alright. What's up guys. We're out here with Winston and Prozzie. Stay Awesome!
So I'm here with a friend of mine who happens to live in a third-tier city.
So I thought we just discuss what the difference is between living in say for instance Shenzhen and
Huizhou where you live. So
let's kind of try to explain the whole tier thing to you first. There are only four "first-tier" cities in China.
That would be Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou.
That's it. Everybody thinks there's more, but there's not.
Prozzie: right.
Those are the best cities, means, it's got the most modern infrastructure.
It's got like for instance, there's a stock exchange here in Shenzhen.
There's one in Shanghai, and they're quite a few things that qualified as being first here that basically means
it's at the "top of the pops" in China.
Prozzie: The highest quality of cities. I guess you could say. First-world.
Yeah, there we go. There are a bunch of new cities
that are kind of on a waiting list to become first-tier and who knows by the end of this video
maybe or in 100 years who knows anyway.
I wanted you to start off by just explaining to everybody what it's like living in a third-tier city,
which is Huizhou, and then we can do some comparisons.
Prozzie: Yeah. I mean living living in a city like Huizhou
you're not going to get all of the sort of western amenities that you're so used to here in Shenzhen.
Every time I come here. I feel a bit spoiled like we just had a nice lunch thing.
You're not going to get that in a third-tier city.
It's a lot more, as a foreigner anyways, you're going to feel a lot more
um...
I guess you could say uh. What's the word I'm looking for?
not "excluded" but
Winston: When you mean in the first-tier or third-tier?
Prozzie: Third-tier. You feel a lot more like "isolated" I guess.
Winston: "Isolated". Yep.
The foreign community is a lot more tight-knit everyone kind of knows each other.
You know, someone does something, everyone knows about it. It's very
"small townie-ish", I guess, because there's less foreigners there. It's perceived as quite a bit "smaller".
Yeah, I mean living in a city like Huizhou also a lot less regulated.
I find then Shenzhen. Shenzhen is very... you guys get like
police and
security and everyone's just kind of
"regulated" I guess in a weird way. Which I know for you it might not seem like that.
Winston: It is. It is.
Prozzie: Yeah, but in a Huizhou. I mean, you know, you can ride motorcycles, but then it's also kind of illegal.
It's like this grey area, right?
It's just yeah.
I mean.
I could go on for days the differences between, I mean, you know you've been to Huizhou
every week for the last couple years.
Winston: I mean. Yeah. It is a gray area sort of a thing.
It's more like the wild west. You can get away with a lot. Like for instance,
you said, riding a bike when it is currently illegal in Huizhou you go can
and as long as you just kind of avoid certain areas. You'll get away with it.
You can kind of do stupid things that you wouldn't be able to do here. Prozzie: Oh definitely,
yeah, for sure.
Winston: So you've got that extra freedom, but it comes at a cost and the cost is that everything's kind of chaotic and rundown, you know.
Prozzie: Yeah, I mean, that's one thing...
I don't really like about living in Huizhou is that you're gonna get a lot of
just lower quality things and I mean everything. The buildings are falling apart
You know, the people are a lot less
I shouldn't say. I sound horrible if I say that but... Winston: A little less civilized.
Prozzie: Yeah, well, yeah. A little less civilized. A little less...ah...
Winston: It's just the fact. People, you can say what you want, but you come here yourself
you come and spend a day in Huizhou, and you spend a day in Shenzhen. You'll see people are more sophisticated here.
Prozzie: Yeah. You know it comes down to money as well, people in Shenzhen obviously make...
Winston: A lot more.
Prozzie: Usually make quite a bit more money than people in Huizhou.
Winston: you have to and that's another thing
we should talk about is cost of living now. That's a big plus for you.
I mean. Tell me how big is your apartment and how much do you spend?
ah...
Prozzie: Ah... Jesus. I don't know how big it is.
Winston: Would you say it's bigger than 100 square meters?
Prozzie: I've only got one bedroom, but it's a decent size apartment. I've got my living room.
I've got a separate kitchen and a separate bathroom
and it's nice, and it's in the most expensive part of Huizhou in the kind of "New Development Area".
and it cost me about
1,800 RMB (185 USD) every month right and that's the top, the tippy top, that you're going to get for a
normal apartment. Of course you can get some crazy five-star apartments but that's like the top your gonna get for a normal apartment.
What do..ah.. what would you pay here in Shenzhen?
Winston: Okay. I got a 45 square meter apartment. It's tiny.
Basically it's the size of most people's kitchen. You know maybe smaller. It's tiny. It's horrible. I can't stand it. It's badly lit.
You know. There's like one window in the bedroom.
there's no window in the
Living room. The kitchen doesn't even have a place bigger than, like, this to prepare food on. It's terrible.
And it's rundown, and it's crap but it's in one of the best areas. So for that 45 square meter apartment
I'm getting a good deal. I'm paying 4,500 RMB (662 USD) a month.
That's a good deal.
That's only because my wife knows the owner but usually they go for about six to eight thousand for those tiny little places.
So you know that cost of living is...
Prozzie: Through the roof.
Prozzie: That's one of the reasons why I chose Huizhou. Third-tier city is so much cheaper.
Winston: Yeah
But you're paying for what you get for, right? Like you're gonna pay quite a bit more money... quite a bit more money
but you live in the better parts of town.
Winston: Yeah, I can go downstairs.
There's a nice supermarket, shopping malls, access to the subway straightaway. So yeah, it makes up for it.
Yeah, that high-speed internet at least for China
Um.
You know that kind of thing so it's kind of worthwhile.
What about parking?
Ah Yeah, I mean...
That even you were talking about your parking. I had a car not too long ago, and you could park it literally anywhere.
It's cheaper. Parking for me
cost
120 RMB (18 USD) a month.
Winston: That's nothing. Yeah.
For me, it's about five to... no. What am I saying?
It's way more than that because I just got back. 40 days was 1,020 so it's probably about
700 RMB (103 USD) a month or something like that where I...
Prozzie: You can... you can get an apartment for that much money like rent
I also wanted to debunk this kind of idea,
I think a lot of western people have is, that if they go to a smaller city
they're going to get more culture or they're going to get more kind of Chinese-esque
Ah...
feeling or you know. I don't think that's true after coming to Shenzhen enough. You do get
Shenzhen is a much more of a lively place. I feel like people think that just because there's more foreigners here. It's more western. It's more ...ah
you know, it's lost some of its Chinese culture. Just because there's more of an international community here.
I can say that after being, you know, in Guangdong area for three years that it's just not true.
Winston: I agree. But in small little kind of
alleyways, and there have been villages here, and you see everything that you'll see in Huizhou, if not more.
Yeah, and then you can just walk down the street
And you got like really nice restaurants and really cool infrastructure and things to see. A good mix of both worlds. Yeah.
Prozzie: I would agree. Yeah. Where as Huizhou you're only gonna get
I mean. Yeah, it's tough. If you watch what C-Milk put on his videos, you kind of see what I'm talking about.
You're not gonna get the crazy skyscrapers here, but you're also not going to get the alleyways. Yeah, it's all big open kind of
roads, and you know.
Winston: Let's talk about public transport for a moment because that's something I love about Shenzhen.
Hop on the metro, get anywhere, and it's expanded all over the place. You can literally pretty much go.
You can sit on the metro for like an hour and a half and get to some far-flung place
that's still a part of Shenzhen. Miraculously.
Even though it's passed the airport and it's in this weird, in fact, you want to see Huizhou
it's pretty much the same as going to Huizhou in those far, far flung places
but this amazing underground network which is probably going to be the biggest in the world soon.
I think that's their plan and you've got buses that go everywhere.
You got taxis that go everywhere. All the time. 24/7 so. Well not the buses, the taxis. What about in Huizhou?
Prozzie: Oh uh yeah, I mean, I don't use public transport in Huizhou because I've got a motorcycle, but um
you know I take a taxi from time to time if I don't... my bike is not available. Also very convenient. Cheaper.
Yeah, I think we start at 7 RMB. You start at 10.
Winston: 10.
Prozzie: And they yeah, they would go all over the city. Taxis are quite nice
but you mentioned the subway, which I love about Shenzhen. Cause of course,
I don't have a vehicle here, so I have to take public transport. Yeah, the subways set up here is like nothing
I've ever seen before. It's incredible and it's clean and it's cheap. Huizhou..
we just got one subway line and it's a joke. It runs like once an hour. If you're a foreigner
you have to use your passport and it's more expensive.
It's just... it's... it's not... the City's not big enough to have a subway system, but the public transport
Ok buses, how much is the bus here?
Winston: It starts at about 2 RMB (0.30 USD)
to go like a couple of stops and then I think the
maximum it can go for, if you're on the bus like over an hour, it's like 7
Prozzie: Ok yeah. it's one RMB in Huizhou to go pretty much anywhere.
But I would not I don't think too many foreigners take the bus.
Winston: Yeah, there's a reason for that. It's the same here.
There's no English on the bus.
So, you know, like you really need to know where you're going and be able to recognize the place or know the name.
Yeah, so even for a seasoned foreigner to take a bus here can be quite daunting because you need to be able to understand Chinese.
Yeah, pretty straightforward. Do you have a system like we have here in Shenzhen. We got something called the "Shenzhen Tong"?
Just like a card. It's like an Octopus card. You can basically
use... you can use it in a taxi now.
You can use it in the subway, on all the buses and you can even in
7-Elevens and stuff buy drinks and stuff with. Do you have anything like that there?
Prozzie: I don't think we do. We might and I could be wrong
but I'm pretty sure we don't just because we don't have a subway system.
The buses are less common. We have a lot more e-bikes and things like that and plus with WeChat pay.
That's definitely the most common way of paying is with your phone. I don't think we have that card.
Winston: It's actually quite cool in Shenzhen. You can get a sim card for your phone
which has that built-in so you can use a phone to like use the subway and pay for stuff and all that.
Just by like, beeping it. Cause the sim card acts as like an NFC thing. It's pretty sweet.
Prozzie: We don't have that fancy stuff Huizhou.
Winston: So I mean, that's the thing though.
There's a huge difference between tier 1 and
tier 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, tier 88. We call tier 88 it's like the worst. Of course,
I think there... I think there are only like three or four tiers.
Correct me if I'm wrong. In fact, I'm going to "Wiki" it. I'll put it up
so I don't get my facts wrong.
But having been around the whole of China
From the very north to the very south I've seen pretty much everything China has to offer. I've been to the other tier 1 cities
a bunch of the tier 2 and tier 3, excetera.
Shenzhen still my favorite for a number of reasons. Number one, you might agree with me here, proximity to Hong Kong.
Prozzie: That's huge.
Winston: You can literally just pop over. Now something that sucks for me, but it's actually really good for you
and you should do this is next time you cross over. If you've got a passport
That's got that little. It's got a little chips on it.
Prozzie: You don't have to wait in the line, right? Yeah. Winston: You go register...
Winston: Have you done that? Prozzie: I will soon.
Winston: Okay, but you can actually go register it
I tried this the other day with my friend Pete and because my South African passports the piece of crap.
They were like "Sorry, South African passports don't have this chip in it."
You can't do it, but everyone else can and you basically get a... you can go through that e-channel.
You don't need to go through customs anymore. You just go fingerprint and go through.
Prozzie: And it just goes through.
Winston: No stamps, no bullshit. Any passport you just go through so that is cool.
Like if you had that which I don't. I still have to go through the line and get all the stamps and crap. But if
you have that living here. 20 minutes here in Hong Kong.
Prozzie: Yeah.
Winston: No problem. Just like that.
Prozzie: No. That's.... that's... Winston: Yeah. Prozzie: Yeah.
Prozzie: Yeah, really. That's awesome. Which would you recommend?
For people that have never been to China before and they're interested in coming here
Which would you recommend they go to tier one or like a tier three something like Huizhou?
Winston: I'd say, it's kind of like when you play a video game.
You choose easy mode, hard mode. You know, that kind of thing.
I'd say the first tier cities are easy mode. The reason is like
especially places like Beijing and Shanghai.
Prozzie: Yeah.
Winston: So many people speak English there. There's English stuff. Foreign amenities
They've got like imports stores.
Shenzhen's not even as good as those two when it comes to being foreigner friendly. You know?
Like you go to Beijing. No problem.
As a foreigner, you can speak English to a lot of people you've got stores there.
You can get your favorite kind of cereals and things that you just can't...
Prozzie: You don't even need to bother learning the language.
Winston: No, you don't. So I'd say that's easy mode
but if you're in for more of an adventure. If you want to be like "thrown in".
Sort of headfirst into this mess of chaos and not knowing what's going on around you. Having to learn the language.
Trying to survive and have an adventure.
Definitely, sort of third tier. Go for that. Go to Huizhou. Go to one of these other like smaller...
I don't know. Whatever else you want to go to because tons of places people go to all the time.
You know, Dongguan. Something like that.
And. Um...
That's in the south of course. I can give you a list of northern cities
if you want. Just need a comment below.
Prozzie: They're endless.
Winston: Yeah. In fact, if you say "name some third tier cities" in the comments section below.
There'll be tons of people who will answer for you so don't worry.
Prozzie: Yeah. Exactly.
Winston: Anyway. The thing is definitely do that
but be aware that the risks are a lot higher in third tier cities.
Hygiene.
Prozzie: Yes. Hygiene. Yeah.
Winston: Yeah, I mean maybe you can talk about some of the things you've seen in Huizhou for instance.
Prozzie: Yeah, I mean it's simple. Huizhou is not as clean as Shenzhen.
It just isn't. It's dirty. You're going to get sick quite a lot easier
going to some of the restaurants that maybe look okay
but then you find out. It's like a day later.
It wasn't.
But yeah, now you've got risk like yeah, like I said, hygiene. You've got
um...
scams happen quite a bit because there's just...
There's no support for foreigners, right? Like if you get scammed in Huizhou and you go to a local for help or something you
think something might have happened there like well you....
you messed up dude.
Winston: Totally, totally. Prozzie: so... um....
Prozzie: Yeah, I would agree. I think it's harder to live in a third-tier city
but I think it really comes down to people's personalities because there are quite a few foreigners that live in third tier cities
and they'll go to like the one foreign bar.
And that's all they do and the foreigners hang out together which is fine if that's what you're into. But...
You're missing out on the potential that you can unlock by being in a third city like going out. The one good thing
I like being about being in Huizhou is that we have access to
the surrounding area so much easier.
Like, I feel like, you always have to come to Huizhou get on the bikes
and then we can go and ride and explore and have fun and stuff like that.
Winston: Oh yeah. For sure.
Prozzie: In Shenzhen, you gotta like...
It's more of a process to leave the city. You know. I think it just comes with being (pauses)
Winston: It's okay.
Prozzie: I think it just comes with the process of being in a big city, you know?
Winston: It all goes down to law enforcement really. Think about it. The reason why you get better hygiene here in Shenzhen?
It's because those stickers on the wall that say like "good", "bad" or whatever.
Prozzie: And they are always on "average". The yellow one.
Winston: Yes but they're actually
enforced here, you know? Prozzie: Yeah.
That's the thing. Like if you got what I'm saying. If you got a small village of something forget about it or a little urban village
But if you go to any mall or any kind of you know
bit more upmarket place here they're enforced.
And it's all down to law enforcement here in the big cities like Shenzhen
because they're kind of like a... um...
It's like a showcase for China, right?
and the first tier cities are the first thing the people that come from overseas see.
And it's kind of like they want to show China's best. So they make sure that the traffic is more controlled here.
They've banned motorcycles.
They band e-bikes. They band like the rickety looking bicycles. All since things like that, they clean them up. They throw them away.
All the things that could potentially make China look bad like food poisoning. They try to get rid of it.
So they put concerted effort into actually making this city better.
Just because of face.
But it's good right and that comes down to the whole not being able to ride a motorcycle and get out of the city.
But I go to Huizhou
Things are very lax enforced.
Prozzie: I was going to say that. Yeah. Like no one. I shouldn't say no one cares
but everyone's so comfortable with just living like that
It's a lot more easier. Just to kind of not do your job.
Winston: Yeah.
Winston: Yeah, and the police they'll know the restaurant owner or something and the inspector will kind of like have a cigarette with them and be
like "Okay, I'll give you an average". Just make sure you clean that up sometime in the future, you know?
Prozzie: Yeah, exactly. Way more relax. I mean again. I've been pulled over before in Huizhou by the police and they just kind of go
"Yeah, you know here's a ticket."
"Ticket". You pay a little bit of money, and they're kind of like just be careful.
You know, avoid these areas and then, you know, there's other times that they're quite a bit more strict, but yeah.
It's just so much more relaxed. People are more comfortable just letting it...
be.
Winston: Sure. Here, it's very different.
um...
it can be...
As you say, fairly relaxed if you're a foreigner in the past but not really any more. I know a guy who got stopped on
on a scooter. He was driving in Nanshan near Shekou. It's like a foreign ghetto in Shekou. It's like when foreigners come here
they all go live there because it's more comfortable with lots of foreign restaurants.
You know, it's got that whole foreign vibe and a lot of people ride around on petrol scooters there
and they feel like they're immune to their local laws. But if you go out of that little area,
you're screwed. And a guy, about two years back, just kind of went passed the Walmart area got arrested by the police. 15 days detention.
You know?
Huge fines. Things like that.
Prozzie: It can get very scary.
Winston: Yeah. It can get very scary here because they do actually enforce the law. That's why owning a car
here is so difficult as well. I parked on the street for like two minutes to run in to get a coffee
Winston: I come out. Prozzie: And there's a cop just right there slapping tickets on it.
Winston: Yeah, 200 RMB fine and like another time because I'd parked in well like on a white line of something.
They gave me like six points off my license and a stupid fine as well
so I had to go in and sign it. So like traffic laws are enforced.
They won't pull you over, but they'll enforce it by camera, or just by walking past.
Prozzie: I have to this day never seen anyone get pulled over yeah ever in China.
Winston: No, they don't.
Prozzie: I've never seen a police chase I guess we can say.
Winston: No. They don't do that. Prozzie: They'll just track you.
Winston: Yeah, that's it. They'll have a roadblock, and they'll be like "Let's stop this car and check them out." Yeah.
Prozzie: Yeah.
Winston: Yeah, so look basically the reason I chose Shenzhen is because it's modern, right? It happened to be the first city in China I went to
which has something to do with it of course.
I got a bit of bias, but it's vibey. It's pumping. Everybody's young here. The average age when I got here was like 25.
I was about 27. You'll notice lots of people around here are very young.
Prozzie: As opposed to Huizhou, the average age is like 100... and 10.
Winston: Yeah. 110.
Winston: Exactly.
So I mean you walk around you see lots of young people lots of pretty girls. Things like that.
Which was very appealing to me as a 25 year old young man coming here anyway, you know, I'm married now.
So that's not so important, but back then it was.
Prozzie: Yeah. You won.
Winston: Yeah, yeah. Exactly.
Anyway, the thing is. It's "vibey". Lots of young people you can go out at night any time on the streets here
and there are people out there and people having fun and having barbecue, and so there's a lot of life here.
There's a lot of electronics. It's very modern. You know all the apple stuff made here. All the big sort of brand-name Foxconn everything's here
and of course the biggest electronics district in China, Huaqiangbei, is here as well.
Prozzie: Which is a crazy, crazy place. Overstimulation is the "word of the day" in that place.
Winston: Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of lots of cool things to do here, but it's a modern clean city and
if you're looking for sort of a higher level of living in China without trying to sound too posh or anything weird like that.
Shenzhen is probably your best bet, to be honest,
at least from my experience having gone everywhere else. So yeah.
Prozzie: Yeah.
Winston: So I hope you guys have enjoyed this. This was just a little chat with my friend. By the way, if you don't know who he is.
He also has a channel. Links down below.
And ah...
Here's a link up here for you to check out. He is a good friend of mine and C-Milk's.
Prozzie: We finally got to do a video together. It's been like... (pauses for background chattering)
Winston: Never mind. Anyway Yeah.
Méishì méishì. Kǎ qù ó méishì méishì. (in chinese)
Prozzie: Anyway we finally got to do a video together
It's been ages like we have filmed before it never gets released and things like that but... ah.
Winston: People have this weird idea that we hate each other or something.
Prozzie: We've been friends for so many years now. It's just like yeah.
He lives up in Huizhou. Every time I go up there is for ADVChina so I'm out with C-Milk somewhere
and we never get together so...
Prozzie: You are only there for a few days. Yeah.
But so yeah. Thanks for having me down here in Shenzhen. It's been great.
Winston: Totally man. You got anything you'd like to tell the audience out there.
Prozzie: (Scoffs and laughs) No, I mean yeah check out my channel and hopefully we can do, film some more stuff together, you know?
Winston: Absolutely. Anyway man thanks for coming on. Absolute pleasure having you.
Prozzie: Was I suppose to say "Stay Awesome" there? Is that what I was suppose to say?
Winston: Yes you can.
Prozzie: Okay. Stay awesome!
Winston: Stay awesome guys!
Winston: So I'm here walking around my friend Prozzie and for some reason he keeps asking me to fly his kite.
Prozzie: What? (laughs)
Winston: Anyway, yeah. Prozzie keeps asking me to fly his kite
but either way
thanks for coming on to the episode today are really appreciate it
and Prozzie, myself and C-Milk are going to be doing a big collab in the future very soon in the very near future.
It's going to be all about the honeymoon period that a lot of foreigners experience when they first come to China. Not only China
but pretty much any country right. So we'll see you in that one. Thanks a lot guys until next time.
Prozzie: Keep the kites flying high! Winston: and "Stay Awesome!".