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<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nTo be clear, ours was a carefully curated itinerary. We stayed at the best hotels, enjoyed private guides and drivers, and in general traveled in comfort. (We very highly recommend WildChina<\/a> as a tour operator, if you\u2019re interested.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s lots to like about China. Despite all the negative reporting we see here in the US, we found it modern, cosmopolitan, and the people unflaggingly friendly. Here are a few things that surprised us:<\/p>\n\n\n\n We were all over the country. Everywhere the highways and main roads were smooth, well-paved and up to date \u2013 not a pothole to be found anywhere. Many were lined with mile after mile of flowers: one guide told us that they close the highways in the middle of the night to water and fertilize them! In the countryside highways were usually bordered with trees and shrubs; and very few (there were some, to be clear) billboards littered them. None for personal-injury attorneys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5G connectivity was available literally everywhere with excellent response times. Even on the tops of the mountains we climbed (or ascended in comfortable cable cars) I had no trouble. (I was testing a web application I wrote which runs on Microsoft\u2019s Azure cloud back in the US \u2013 and got as good if not better response time up on the peaks than at home.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ll talk about the Great Firewall in a moment, however.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes, China is a surveillance society. There are cameras everywhere.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n But as a result street crimes are virtually nonexistent. No pickpockets (as in Europe, or for that matter, New York). None. With all the cameras they wouldn’t dare. You can hold your wallet up and no one will take it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Xi\u2019an we visited the crowded terra-cotta warrior museum (amazing). We were jostled everywhere. I never feared for my expensive camera or phone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I have to admit, I liked it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n China is in the midst of a building spree for high-speed trains; we here in the US are at least a decade behind. From Beijing to Xi\u2019an, from Xi\u2019an to Chengdu, and other routes, we thoroughly enjoyed the trains, travelling upwards of 340km\/hour (over 200mph).<\/p>\n\n\n\n WildChina reserved \u201cBusiness Class\u201d seats for us, which on the trains is more luxurious than first class. The seats are larger and more comfortable than first-class on airlines; well-dressed attendants serve snacks and drinks; you can get up and walk around anytime (no seat belts! \u2013 hey, it\u2019s the little things); you don\u2019t have to go through invasive security as at airports; and, above all, they are consistently on time to the minute. <\/em>The train stations \u2013 which are huge \u2013 sport pleasant lounges for business-class travelers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We loved the trains and will miss them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why can\u2019t we have them here? I have some thoughts at the end of this essay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2025, over half the cars sold in China were EVs. <\/em>Let that sink in for a moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You can tell an EV in China as they possess green license plates where gas-powered cars have blue ones. From what I could tell, overall the number of EVs on the road easily matched the gas-powered ones (there are tax incentives as there used to be here).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why are there so many EVs? One reason is that, unlike the US, in China there is a nationwide network of charging stations. And charging is much cheaper than filling up with gas. We were supposed to be building such a network after the Infrastructure Act<\/a> — but it didn’t happen. Why?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now, there are traffic jams in the Chinese cities just as there are here. And some bad ones: we were there during the 5-day May Day (they call it Labor Day) holidays: whew! But many Chinese get around the cities on scooters (think Vespas) except nearly all are electric, which means they\u2019re dead silent \u2013 and clean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They do, however, tend to sneak up on you when you\u2019re walking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nearly all the cars we saw on the crowded streets were relatively new; not a clunker to be found anywhere! (I suspect the reason has to do with the sudden inflow of money from the West within the last decade or so — all that cheap stuff from Amazon and Wal-Mart!).<\/p>\n\n\n\n I like cars. And I lusted after several. Xiaomi makes a lovely little sports car somewhat reminiscent (but way cheaper) of a Porsche, for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We visited the Huawei (yes, that Huawei<\/a>) flagship store in Shanghai and there was a full-size SUV there I\u2019d give my eye teeth for. Wraparound video on the dash, electronic seats, gorgeous interior, fully electric of course \u2013 all for around $60K US.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course you can\u2019t get them here and I have some thoughts on that at the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Much has been made in the West about the human cost of the massive investments China has made in hydroelectric power, that is, dams: in particular, the Three Gorges Dam, the largest in the world, which displaced over million people during construction. And to their credit, China makes no secret of the fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That said, however, the enormous amount of renewable energy the dams create powers the vast network of trains mentioned above, as well as the explosive expansion of the southeastern cities of Chongqing (population almost 4x that of NYC), Chengdu (2.5x), and of course the bright lights of Shanghai (3x).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Electricity is the great enabler.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The internet giant Alibaba owns a payment service called Alipay. It\u2019s like Apple Pay or Google Pay but more convenient and far more ubiquitous. To pay for anything \u2013 and I mean anything, from high-end meals to souvenirs on the street to (we did this) a drone video on the top of a mountain to street beggars \u2013 you whip out your phone, load up your personal Alipay barcode, the vendor scans, and boom. You\u2019re done. I loved the convenience and simplicity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes, China is a Communist country with an authoritarian government and central economic planning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But private enterprise thrives, from small shops to giant companies like Huawei, Alibaba, and DeepSeek (the AI company challenging US firms). And walking along South Nanjing Street in Shanghai, you\u2019d could swear you were strolling a modern version of Fifth Avenue in New York \u2013 if not for all the Chinese characters. (At the three-story Nike flagship store I had my feet electronically measured and purchased customized sneakers: most comfortable footwear I\u2019ve ever owned.) All the major Western luxury brands \u2013 Louis Vuitton (who built a Titanic-themed store with a museum<\/em>), Rolex, and so on, are well represented, as are a number of Chinese luxury stores.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now it\u2019s true: the central government helps, cooperates with, partners with, and in many cases outright owns large Chinese firms: major banks, airlines, construction firms, telecoms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then again, the US government recently took a 10% stake in Intel, numerous investments in lithium and rare earth firms, steel, and semiconductors (e.g., Nvidia and AMD). These aren\u2019t ownership like the Chinese SOEs (state-owned enterprises), to be clear; but to some it might all just be a matter of degree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You be the judge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n China isn\u2019t perfect: far from it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n China blocks many Western websites, especially news and social media sites including the Washington Post, New York Times, and Facebook \u2013 all of which I use. It is beyond annoying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You can usually get around it. If you\u2019re a Westerner with a Western cell service like Verizon and international roaming, you can (usually) get to any site. I also had an eSim which also bypassed the firewall and the combination (I was never exactly sure which route the phone took, but it didn\u2019t matter). I emphasize \u201cusually.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n My laptop was a different story. On it I\u2019d loaded a VPN: results varied. Sometimes it worked great on the hotel wi-fi. In other hotels it didn\u2019t work at all or was sporadic. Sometimes it would work for a few minutes and then something would kick in \u2013 perhaps somewhere the VPN was detected \u2013 and it would stop working.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I don\u2019t understand what China is afraid of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the Chinese I met were, on the whole, voluble, politics was an area that drew reticence or even silence. One person mentioned a friend who had posted something critical about the government recently only to have the police show up as a warning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But all were cautiously curious about how we felt about the state of the United States. Only one Chinese we met explicitly asked how we felt about Trump; and he opened up when we said, well, in a nutshell, we don\u2019t like him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI approve of my<\/em> government,\u201d he said. Another mentioned her ninety-odd-year-old grandmother, who enjoyed a great government pension, ample food, excellent healthcare: \u201cshe loves her government,\u201d she said. I\u2019m certain she meant it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I countered with \u201cI don\u2019t care for the people running our government now. But I have confidence in our system<\/em> of government.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, they\u2019re not entirely without snark. There\u2019s a joke that CCTV (China Central Television) news is \u201c10 minutes of busy Chinese leaders, 10 minutes of happy Chinese people, and 10 minutes of crime and chaos in the US.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The \u201cChinese dream,\u201d if there is one, does not include a house. Instead, city-dwellers live in row after row of high-rise apartment buildings, huge groves of them, all roughly twenty stories high and thin, so that all occupants have a window on one side or the other. These massive forests of apartments go on and on, sometimes from the train window reaching the horizon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I jokingly asked a guide \u201chow does anyone find their home?\u201d in row after row of identically constructed buildings? He didn\u2019t find it funny.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s plenty of evidence that these were overbuilt; we saw several \u201cghost towns\u201d of unoccupied buildings. Although one guide did try to downplay the effects, many prominent real estate developers have gone bust in recent years and the crisis continues<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wasn\u2019t crazy about it. Bland for the most part: if you like spicy, you have to ask for hot sauce (they call it chili sauce). The exception was in Chengdu (in Szechuan province) where they serve \u201chot pots\u201d which are, well, beyond spicy: the Szechuan peppercorn actually numbs your tongue (we thought it was an allergic reaction at first).<\/p>\n\n\n\n And if you\u2019re vegetarian like my wife you\u2019re kind of out of luck: everything is pork, pork, pork, with some chicken and some beef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We learned a lot on this trip: as they say, travel provides you with perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the first time in America\u2019s history, we face a nation that truly presents long-term, existential competition. They have made the core investments (with lots of our money, as mentioned above, that Amazon and Wal-Mart send for cheap goods) that set them up for success over decades if not centuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We in the US made such investments in the 1950s and 1960s \u2013 think for example the interstate highway system \u2013 but China has equaled or surpassed us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And they continue to build: we witnessed many high-speed train tracks and bridges under construction. By contrast we are hobbled by litigation, by short-sighted regulation, and by billionaires\u2019 self-interest. Above all, the trillions we could have invested on infrastructure we have chosen instead to use on useless, valueless military adventures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We must learn to build again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I really want one of those inexpensive electric Huawei SUVs. But I can\u2019t buy one here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is partly because of the “Connected Vehicles Final Rule<\/a>,” released by the US Department of Commerce, which explicitly prohibits the import or sale of connected vehicle systems designed, developed, manufactured, or supplied by Chinese or Russian-related \u2013 the key word being \u201cconnected.\u201d Since every modern car is somehow connected to the internet, that means essentially every car from China (or Russia, but who cares).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The law is, in theory, aimed at protecting US industry and workers: a laudable goal. But it fails in the far more important aim of protecting the US consumer,<\/em> who is forced to pay artificially inflated, anticompetitive prices. Let\u2019s also remember that the history of protectionism \u2013 the infamous Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930<\/a>, which raised tariffs, catastrophically backfired, worsening the Great Depression, comes to mind \u2013 is not a good one. (Read Andrew Ross Sorkin\u2019s terrific history 1929<\/a> for more detail.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now, the US government has demonized companies like Huawei for their alleged connections to the Chinese intelligence community and military. This is an important concern \u2013 but it could be addressed. Just as Microsoft provides the source code to Windows to China (as it does to every government), so too could Huawei provide its code to the US for auditing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But I don\u2019t think the US government wants to address it. I suspect that the car companies \u2013 and Elon Musk in particular \u2013 heavily lobby against the import of inexpensive Chinese cars (in fact, Ford CEO Jim Farley recently said<\/a> that Chinese car brands like BYD are the \u201cbest in the business\u201d). It\u2019s no wonder they\u2019re afraid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Chinese, on the other hand, have allowed Tesla to build a large factory south of Shanghai; Model 3s and Model Ys are popular \u2013 as is, inexplicably to me, Buick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think we should let the Chinese cars in just as they have let American cars into China. Let the buyers decide. That\u2019s what free-market capitalism is\u2026isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s ridiculous. The high-speed rail project in California, connecting San Francisco and Los Angeles, has been underway since 2015 <\/em>and has no confirmed completion date.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Are the airlines quietly lobbying against bullet trains? Maybe, but I doubt it. More likely it\u2019s just bureaucratic bullshit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As we\u2019ve seen with our own eyes, the benefits of high-speed rail are obvious and amazing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We should be ashamed. There\u2019s no excuse for this.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat We Loved in China<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Infrastructure is Amazing<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
China is Very Safe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Bullet Trains: Wow<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Quiet City Streets<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Speaking of Cars\u2026<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nElectrification<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nAlipay<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Communist, Shmommunist<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nThings in China We Weren\u2019t Crazy About<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The Great Firewall<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Free Speech<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Cookie-Cutter Apartment Buildings<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nThe Food<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Closing Thoughts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
China is a Fearsome Competitor<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Protectionism Hurts Consumers<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Bullet Trains<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
And Finally<\/h3>\n\n\n\n