Thanks for the advice. What exactly do you mean by getting scammed? And what kind of rake are talking about here?

don't recall rake, as a rule i avoided them and couldn't even tell you where those are, you have to know a guy to know a guy for those games and i'm no longer in the beijing poker scene

however, i regularly played at one specific 10/20 game that was raked because there were some real degen swedes that played there and i noticed they were definitely grabbing more rake than they were supposed to be grabbing - this is common anywhere at any raked home game, not just china - the chance of getting caught is very low and if they are the evidence is dropped into the box, nobody wants to be "that guy" and at the end of the day they can just say "oops i made a mistake" if they are caught so it's a freeroll for them to periodically grab an extra chip or two

the main thing you gotta worry about are cold decks and electronic cheating, those cheating devices are all made in china and don't kid yourself, there is a massive global market for them otherwise there wouldn't be so much supply

we'd often catch people marking cards, trying to swap cards, bringing in outside chips, etc etc

if you don't use custom chips, there's going to be more chips than money in the bank at cashout at least half the time (why it's never a good idea to play until the game breaks)

when dealing with other expats, let's be real most are dregs of society, there's going to be a lot of perverts, degens and functioning alcoholics in any large group of expats, then when you introduce chinese players you get the inherent us vs them mentality so cheating is rampant

good rule of thumb is don't play a home game unless you don't care about the money, hence why those bar leagues can be fun

if you play with other expats, not a group of friends playing poker but a group of people who only know each other through poker, then there's going to be a few bad apples in the mix and if you are sitting down at a local game then you can basically guarantee there is going to be a plot hatched at some point to get the laowai's money through either a cold deck or more advanced cheating

for reference, i was a teahouse/private game/restaurant back room pro for abut a year in 2006 and there's a reason why i stopped because there was way too much paranoia and shady things going on all the time so started migrating play to online and trips to macau

still played tournaments for a while (and always game for a lol 1-2 game) but next time you play a tourney, count the chips at the end, I promise you there will be more chips than possible - someone along the way pocketed chips from the table of extras and slipped them into their stacks mid tourney - play is still terrible enough to be +EV despite all the cheating though

Wow, thank you so much for these insights! It really helps me to get a clearer picture of Chinas poker scene.

I'd like to discover the Central and Northern Asian parts of China - Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia. If some of you have been to these regions, what are they look like? And are they strongly sinicized now?

Just went to Shanghai for a couple days. A brief trip report/my 2 cents.

Seeing mainland China is worth it. Also, if you are traveling to another destination... i.e. you are not doing a straight round trip, you probably won't need a visa. Research the particulars of your own situation, but it's useful and seems to be not widely known.

https://www.travelchinaguide.com/emb...isa/intro2.htm

I could go to Shanghai for up to 144 hours without a visa.

I knew China was fairly capitalistic, but I was still surprised by the number of luxury cars and stores. At the same time, there were police checkpoints and the internet is so heavily censored that it becomes a PITA. Yeah, you can't watch porn or whatever. But it's hard to communicate with people back home. You can't use google maps. Etc.r

Most people still seem to live fairly modestly. They ride scooters and bikes. They have very small shops specializing in a few items, as you often see in the third world.

On the other hand, many people speak English and the street signs and many other things have English subtitles, which is a tremendous help, since your chance of remembering Chinese characters is very low.

The food rocked. I had some Yang's dumplings, recommended on trip advisor. They are filled with broth, which I didn't realize and so I bit in and squirted it all over the place.

I had a simple mutton and noodle soup at this one place that I've thought about many times since.
I ate this fruit that was pre-peeled and sliced. Looked like giant orange segments. Very tasty.

All of this was quite affordable. I got a steal on my room at The Fish Inn. It was under $30 a night, last minute via an online booking. The room was comfortable, the service was great.

The airport is in BFE. I thought I was getting long hauled on the cab in, but nope, it was about 25 miles and cost me about $75.

I'm not a lady killer, nor is it my top priority, but I do like to hit the apps when I travel. I just tried tinder here and the results were better than in the US but poor compared to many foreign countries.

I had a date. She was no model, but good enough for me. Anyway, part of the reason I like to date on these trips is just to meet locals and have conversations and to be shown around town. So, we went out to dinner. Meat on sticks. Local crabs. It was quite good. We had several drinks that I didn't really think about. I got a bill for like $250.

Can't really say if this was a larger scam, involving the restaurant, or if the girl just figured she could get an american to buy her a really expensive meal. However, my hotel had a warning about similar things where a local will take you to a teahouse and stick you with a huge bill.

Anyway, she was really flirty but ultimately shut me down. But it is what it is. We had some good conversation and I had some good food. I learned a bit of a lesson.

On the whole, I'd say the people were fine, but... the best word is probably joyless. Very little smiling and laughing. The exception to this is when I'd pull out one of my few Chinese phrases. They thought this was HI-larious!

I lost my phone in KL so no pics, sadly. My favorite was of a huge church, the biggest KFC I've ever seen and a skyscraper with a sign reading CapitaLand in the same frame. How marxist!

The city itself is not very pretty, but interesting to see. This kind of sums it up as a whole. It is well worth seeing mainland China for yourself. However, I would not recommend it as a primary destination. If you do not get to travel much, like if you get 2 weeks a year, I can think of several better places. If you are bouncing around asia it's worth a stop.

This also worked for me airfare wise. RT from LV to Shanghai was just $400, so I could make a pit stop as part of my larger trip to Malaysia and it theoretically cost me no extra money. 2 $75 cab rides and a $250 dinner later...

Nice trip report mate, thanks for sharing.

I was in Xinjiang a couple years ago. It was easy to fly there, but don't list it on your itinerary if you're applying for a visa! Urumqi is pretty heavily sinicized, but Kashgar and it's surroundings is not. I took the train there from Turpan, which is a mostly Uygur city outside of Urumqi, which was pretty cool. I stopped at two towns along the train route but it's a bit tricky as there are only a handful of places they let foreigners stay at. I met some young Chinese backpackers and they had me come with them to the one backpacker hostel, but of course they wouldn't let me stay there, I had to go to some nicer hotel. The Chinese parts of these cities are pretty boring and the Uygur parts are much more colorful and interesting - and poorer.

Kashgar is a really cool city, I loved it. Definitely go while you still can! The animal market there was amazing! The food is great. But traveling in Xinjiang can definitely be a PITA with lots of police checks whenever you go outside of town, with some places getting shut off to tourists every now and then. And in every city they have these mini police stations everywhere. The police presence is crazy. And at least in Urumqi a lot of the Uygur housing blocks are gated, have curfews and under heavy security by the police, it's actually very sad. The Chinese govt is awful obv. And your average Chinese citizens are taught to believe that Uygurs are dangerous/terrorists.

I'm not sure if things have changed in the last 2-3 years with increased media coverage of the Uygur situation in Xinjiang, so hopefully this isn't too outdated. But I would be worried that eventually they'll stop letting tourists go there without a tour group/guide like in Tibet. But I'd definitely recommend to go, it's a fascinating part of China! Central Asia as well...

I'd love to thank you so much, cardsharkk04, for providing me a lot of helpful facts about the real life in Xinjiang. It's also fantastic for me to enjoy your story and learn all the experiences.
Since your old story, some parts of Xinjiang were still not sinicized. And many local people hesitated to let foreigners stay at their home. On the other hand, Kashgar and the Uyghur parts were very cool and interesting. But, Chinese control was very strict.

It's true that China is afraid of separatism, terrorism, and anticommunism in Xinjiang. Besides, while protecting local cultures, the Chinese government also tries to spread Chinese culture and language over the region.
Despite being a part of China, Xinjiang's native ethnic groups are Turkic and Iranian peoples. And there also existed Indo-European peoples in the past, particularly the Tocharians to whom the Tarim mummies belong.
The most notable person from Xinjiang I know is Dilraba Dilmurat, an Uyghur actress starring in many Chinese movies

Anyone have a good vpn that will work from shanghai? Its not even letting me search in the chrome store for one.. very annoying I cant access half my stuff

try astrill with stealth vpn addon, should help

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

Yeah but the stealth one is problematic at times.

They have a website mirror that isn't blocked i think it's astrillinchina or something. Astrill is a Chinese company so they are in the trenches and handle China specific issues better than anyone else

If you dm Sandr1x or me your email we can send invites that get you a minor discount and either of us a free month

100% pay for the router, it's worth every penny and absolutely amazing

Private ip gets around a lot of the generic VPN detection software used by places like Netflix but it'll basically double your bill so you can always add it later. Their customer service is great too.

So in 2020, what sites can we play on in China, with or without a VPN?
I know you can play on PokerStars, are there any other mainstream sites available?
How about the Asian rooms? Has anyone tried them, and what's your experience been like?

Iirc correctly sites like stars and 888 all work. Sites that focus on Europe like party/Rio tend to ignore you.

There's a lot of apps but high rake and scam frequency make it dumb to play there. Acr works too.

Stars can be strange, you sometimes need a VPN to connect but need it to be a non us connection. Ie if I do sports betting there the poker side runs fine with pure China connection but if I want to bet on sports I'll need to connect to England vpn. If on stars tell them you're in China to avoid a temp ban when they see you hop between connections.

Does PokerStars still work in China? No matter what I try I can't get the installer to start on my Mac. It just doesn't want to download the software. Network connections all show up as healthy. I tried KR/TW/UK vpns.

Any advice?

Rickroll what's so special about the assdrill router?

worked for me as of a few months ago

believe i used hk vpn to install software and would need vpn to get app loaded up but once connected i could turn off and play with normal connection

but if they had some kind of promotion that was an html5 page within the app then i'd need vpn again and if sportsbetting that too is html5 and wouldn't load without uk vpn

weird stuff

be sure to email them ahead of time and give a heads up, they know the drill and it'll prevent your account from getting locked

edit: just read the router part - it's awesome because it just makes your home wifi by default vpn - so you don't need to mess around with any individual devices like phone or pc and it's also great for smart devices like amazon echo or your tv etc which lose out some functionality without a vpn - just great because it makes it so you don't need to manage anything, just always there - during vpn crackdown periods you may need to fiddle with it and mix up servers a bit for for the most part it's set it and forget it

it's not they are awesome, it's that the others are just that much worse, i've tried a bunch and some of them are so lazy that you aren't even connecting to the servers they tell you - ie you choose germany and your ip says poland, you pick taiwan and your ip says dubai etc etc - this isn't a problem for most people but it's a very big issue for anyone playing poker/sports betting/netflix/etc - just imagine if your hk listed vpn was actually connecting via a place where pokerstars doesn't operate and you get banned etc

it's nowhere near competitive on a price level but they are china focused so when china switches something up to disrupt vpns astrill will have a fix out in an hour with a new methodology whereas another one will take a week or so before they are even aware of the issue

they also have great customer support - when something is too slow or whatever i'll get in touch with live chat and sometimes the fix is an unpublished one so the ccp doesn't know, like there'll be a secret button on the app you need to tap 4 times to open up a new windows and check a box to get through latest ccp controls etc - some real secret agent stuff

also, astrill is chinese, some people may be uncomfortable with that, but i view it as an edge because that's why they are so focused on china - obviously your data could be compromised in a ccp handover but they got you no matter what if they really wanted you - astrill has been around a while, i've been using it for years

There are some tournament series held periodically in China (two coming up in golden week in Shanghai and Dalian, but have seen others). Am I going to be able to play these tournaments if I speak no Chinese whatsoever? I'm assuming that raising by using multiple chips and such live rules are still applicable, but worried about getting counts during AI's and such. If anyone has recent experience it would be much appreciated.

Also, as I'm currently trapped in China (borders closed, so if I leave I can't return to my job) any tips for how to find underground games? I live in a T1 city so there must be some but I work with a bunch of squares and can't speak Chinese so I have no idea how to find them.

How did you find out about the poker tournaments?

Western facing poker sites had the information available. I imagine there are more tournaments than I know about. Why do you ask?

Yesterday started Asian Poker League in BJ, they got some nice tourneys with Main event 5500RMB (~800$). its a 3 days turney and 5 day 1s.
Also Runner Runner poker club have some dayly/weekly/monthy special tourneys.
BTW if you have Residence/work permit you can exit China and you are able to get visa to come back. But just crazy Quarantine time (4 weeks)
They have updates on WeChat, just need to subscribe their official account for updates. If someone needs let me know.

Brilliant. Thank you for the info. I've managed to find the APL and Runner Runner on WeChat (not easy searching in English). Can't play in the APL but I am off work for golden week so was planning on a trip to the SPC (couldn't find their account on WeChat). Do you know of any clubs in Guangzhou / Shenzhen or the surrounding area? Find it hard to believe that Dalian & Chengdu have a poker club but those two don't!

Yeah, I know you can do that but its slow and my employer has basically said don't leave. I don't blame China for the quarantine though. Its great that there are next to no cases here and life is largely back to normal.

You are welcome. I am in BJ area and not familiar with other citys. I recommend you go to RR or APL and make some friends and ask them. Usually they are happy to help. In October RR have some poker festival.

Sorry to hear that about your employer. I can consider myself lucky then, i am going home in 2 weeks. I just hate the 4 weeks quarantine when i return...

I've played at runner runner club back in 2015 or something. It's not bad there. Even had a buffet and such. Go check it out!

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

The only thing bad at Runner Runner are the players I actually enjoyed the buffet food.
Tommorow i plan to go to APL to play the ME, if someone else go I will be only other foreigner there, easy to spot