Reader Comments
As a couple of Oregon transplants going on our 7th week here in Guangdong Province, Nanhai district, city of Guicheng.... your book, Getting Around in China, has been a real bonus. I really appreciate your no nonsense take on things. We loaded up on a variety of guide books before coming, but I agree anything that you read will not give you the "low down" on some practical advice. Your chapter on trains and maps is worth the price alone. I will definitely take your book back to the states with me to trade in at Powell's City of Books in Portland... as I'm sure there is nothing on the domestic shelves like this. I know, I looked! We've been very fortunate in many ways to land where we have, but now our little expat world has just gotten a little bigger. Thank you.
Your readers and new fans,
------Gail and Rocco, currently teaching at Southern China Normal University, Nanhai, Guangdong,
Getting Around in China is a landmark work that portrays modern China and its people better than any other Western author that I've seen. By taking a "saturated" experience and commentary down to the "street" level, it avoids the pitfalls of "cultural assumption" that every other visitor's guide, including the Lonely Planet Guide series, cannot avoid. The patient explanations of the forces influencing the lives of the ordinary citizen is extremely valuable. I believe this book should be required reading for every US Foreign Office employee working in or about to leave for China (from the Consul down).
I spent 3 ½months in China in 1987 surveying the conservation status of bears, including pandas. (Bears of the World, Facts on File Publishing, 1988) It was a rich and rewarding experience but in reading this book it is apparent that the China that I experienced for the most part no longer exists.
------Terry Domico, naturalist and world traveler
The guided traveler has become such a phenomenon... everyone pawing their Lonely Planet or Rough Guide... and everyone ending up in a place only to confirm or deny what they already read. It always struck me as strange. I think Getting Around in China is a very much needed sort of travel book, one that doesn't tell the reader where to go, why, or what to expect.
------Gerald Roche, an Australian teacher in Qinghai Province