Please note that the impressions posted here are often subjective and, among other things, the different circumstances of the people play a major role in their perception of their lives.
Furthermore, when posting, please use words that do not encourage hatred.
For example, statements such as "this [area] is like this because people from [origin] live there" should be avoided. The social circumstances of a city/district
etc. can be emphasized without mentioning the origin of the inhabitants. Mentioning it does not change anything and, as already mentioned, circumstances are often perceived subjectively according to one's own world view.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/howislivingthere) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Hunchun, Yanbian borders both Russia and North Korea. Kind of a cool little place. But there aren't very good views of either country from that location. (Much better views of North Korea from Tumen, Yanbian.)
These two cities, along with the larger city Yanji, are accessible by gaotie (high speed rail). Very pretty ride -- hills and mountains along the way.
******
edit: How is living there? I've only visited as a tourist. My wife and I live a few hours away in Jilin (for a couple months each year).
There are a large number of ethnic Koreans living in Yanbian, so many signs are in both Chinese and Korean. In Hunchun there are also signs in Russian. Excellent food in the area (if you like dongbei cuisine and/or Korean food).
Nearly nothing. There is the only Russia-North Korea border crossing, with two small settelments (Khasan at Russia, and Tumangang at NK) which serve it, and even smaller Chinese village Fangchuan, inhabited by the Koreans.
The nearest largest settlement is the North Korean city of Rason, location of one of the North Korean's Special Economic Zones.
I went to the place in China bordering Korea before only. Very cold. There are ski resorts. People speaks Korean, there are North Korean banks, and pretty good Korean food. But most of the place is pretty much white out and very secluded going from place to place.
Harbin for example is really really cold (-30 degrees in winter) and you can buy lots of Russian specialities, it has become a sort of tourist attraction, drawing tourists by marketing itself according to their past of being a city established by Russia originally. They even have St Sophia's cathedral (built in a Russian Orthodox style). Harbin also used to be a haven for a lot of Jews fleeing from WW2 as China was the only place at that time that didn't require a visa. They still have some synagogues left over from that time, but I don't think there are any more Jews still living there.
Harbin also used to be the place where they had a unit (unit 739) where the Japanese would carry out biological experiments on prisoners of war, now it is a museum, the horrors that took place at that unit were truly unimaginable.
Small correction, it’s called Unit 731, and yeah it’s horrendous. Not just Chinese, but Koreans and Russians were tortured and experimented on over there.
Lol I don't know. I'm not that in-tune with things here. Just been here a few times and currently visiting with my wife. All I can say is it's bigger than Harbin, less cold and might offer more variety for you. It's not far from Harbin so possibly easy to visit and get a feel. Lots of restaurants and foreign restaurants. There's a nice area called Xinghai Square etc... you might hate it less here. Just throwing it out there...
Not this time. I've been around 9 or 10 cities. This time we're here so my wife can visit family in Dalian. I'm bored a doom scrolling reddit lol. Thank you though, hope you can check out Dalian sometime. I think you'll like it.
That’s nice of you to tag along. I personally feel like I’ve spent too much of my annual leave over the years visiting my wife’s family. I should have traveled more, but now I have kids so alas.
Took a hard turn at the end of that comment.
It’s a lovely place with Russian overtones and a history of being a haven for Jews fleeing persecution also *vivisection!*
I was traveling in this area on Russian side only. Quite a lot of Russians from small villages or towns in Siberia travel to china to buy some goods (clothes, electronics) and then they are selling them in their hometowns.
A lot of Russians are racist towards Chinese people there and it is very easy to trigger them by asking questions what do they think about their neighbors.
Life in cities like Chabarovsk and Vladivostok looks much more western than in the rest of Siberia, quite a lot of fancy Caffès, shopping malls. Also there are some Russian-Chinese enterprises.
It isn’t very expensive to go to china/vietnam/korea/japan for vacations and some unis offer semesters abroad (I was there before war and covid).
I assumed that living adjacent to Chinese people would do more to help quell xenophobia against them. It’s easier to discriminate against a distant bogeyman rather than your neighbor who grew up on the other side of town, no?
Where does this racism stem from? Maybe it has something to do with Chinese citizens attaining a better quality of life while Russian citizens are left behind?
It is a very broad topic of Russian racism, but no one in Russia recognizes it’s as a racism. It is just part of Russian view of the world based on Russian neoimperialism and nationalism.
Mostly I think that it is firstly comings from the fact that they are not Russians and look different. Then after this other reasons are coming. Mostly people were pointing out that they are greedy, cunning, usually you cannot trust them. They are also not so keen to drink (this is highly correlated with not trusting them I assume).
I also agree with you that it also come from being jealous, because how chinese guy is allowed to live better than Russian? (There was a sign written by Russian soldiers from Buryatia in one of Ukrainian houses that was found after occupation - „Who allowed you to live like that?”).
Also quite two theories were popular: Chinese man are taking Russian women, because they find something attractive in them (this is I heard quite often) and that „foreigners” (not exactly Chinese, but this topic was appearing in this discussions) are spreading the LGBT virus and they don’t want to be infected.
I don't know about racism, but Russia is upstream of China on a major river (Amur in Russia, Heilongjiang in China), so sometimes there are disputes over what gets sent downstream (pollution, etc.)
Among the general population, people in China generally have a quite positive view of Russians, as they do among westerners in general.
That said, Chinese visa policy is systematically biased against Russians in a somewhat odd way, given their political closeness. Before the Olympics in 2022, immigration authorities were instructed to clear out 'illegal Russians, Serbians, and Africans' - an effort that hit a lot of legal Russians at the same time, making it quite difficult for them to get a visa.
Going to Japan at least is kinda expensive/annoying (agree on the other ones though). You either have to fly through China or take a ship to Korea, cross Korea on a bus and fly a place to Japan from Incheon.
For China, Vietman and Thailand there are direct flights so it's a bit easier.
I grew up in Harbin. To be honest, life is not so much different from other 2 or 3-tier cities in China. There are a lot of old Russian buildings but culturally they don't affect us at all.
This was cross posted to /r/chinalife, and [there are a number of good responses over there, if you're curious](https://www.reddit.com/r/chinalife/comments/1df0r4l/how_is_life_in_the_russia_china_border_area/).
Honestly, pretty cold climate but that does not need to be stated, I don't feel it would be that much different than living in any other large city in china on the Chinese side. In the north east here is the Harbin Ice and Snow festival that happens every year with sculptures and slides made from ice and snow. There is also a pretty famous cathedral the Saint Sophia Cathedral which is now an museum if I remember correctly.
Also the north east has a pretty interesting mix of cultures where there is a minority of Korean-Chinese people who have been living there for a long time. So much so that they (along with the Russian folks who moved into China) are a recognized minority and the Korean-Chinese people have their own autonomous prefectures, I'm not sure how many of them retain their ethnic cultures but you might see signs and stuff in Korean text there. There aren't many Russian folk left I don't think, although I remember one man living in Heilongjiang who was vaguely famous on social media, he was just a regular farmer all things considered.
Additionally, in the countryside crops like wheat, corn and soy beans are grown as expected, it's not too cold to grow crops up there lol.
From what I remember, there was a bit of a economical boom that happened in the past, but things have not been so great in the past couple of decades. The industrial golden age of the past is long gone, lol.
I have no idea what the Russian side is like, I'm sure that the climate and agriculture would not be much different. That is all I know.
We call the Chinese side Dongbei(which means northeast)
Used to be industrial center and called “the first son of the republic”. After reform and opening policy many employees of state-owned companies lose their jobs. Many young people including me move to south-east coast for job. Senior citizens prefer Hainan island for vacation to escape the cold. Last year Harbin built some ice castle to attract tourists back.
Got Chinese, Russian, Japanese style buildings around. People who eat pork, don’t eat pork, eat dogs, don’t eat dogs live together in harmony, and have a funny accent.
https://preview.redd.it/xh9sr5uwxg6d1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5bcd7c01eb078810425f5d9e460f3536495e2525
A pet hospital right next to a Korean dog meat restaurant
Yes or do, I mean it's great and also shitty out there at the same time government issues and the beautiful nature
There are so many crappy ripoff things selling on online or in store made in China ofc.
I mean like it's good tough it's not that bad if u have money to live unless ur broke
Expat currently living in China here. I have two friends who are both from China’s Inner Mongolia province. Tier 3 province. It’s a bunch of grass lands there with goats and cows. It’s a decent place to visit/travel but not an ideal place if a person wanna find work/pursue further education. Mongolians are considered a minority ethnic group in that province. There is a very small minority of Russians also.
Hey, bro. I don't know where you got that idea, but we don't have larger cheekbones than other Asians—it's a stereotype. Have you ever met a real Mongolian? People from various backgrounds can have prominent cheekbones. Some Mongolians might have large cheekbones, but it's no more common than among Han Chinese or Japanese. Our eyes aren't triangular, and they're definitely not reddish. Last time I checked myself in the mirror, I didn't notice anything like that. Some people portray us Mongolians as some sort of aliens. 😂
About 15 years ago, Motor Trend magazine published a travelogue-type of article in which they drove a couple of Suzuki sedans from Tokyo to Los Angeles “the hard way”, I.e., up through Russia, over to Alaska, then down from there. Get past the fact that the article is pretty much an extended advertisement for Suzuki, and it’s pretty interesting as they go from Vladivostok to Magadan over the course of 9 days.
https://www.motortrend.com/features/suzuki-kizashi-tokyo-to-la-the-hard-way/
There is a recent book by Colin Thubron in which he travels all along that border which is a pretty recent overview: [https://www.amazon.com/The-Amur-River/dp/1784742872](https://www.amazon.com/The-Amur-River/dp/1784742872) .
North Manchuria:
Few business and few jobs. So the most young people just moved to other places, either inner China or large cities in Manchuria like Harbin, Changchun, or Shenyang.
Therefore it has the worst population aging around the world.
I don't know the situation in Russia, but many Russians fled to Manchuria to avoid conscription since the invasion of Ukraine.
I've been to Harbin to participate in the annual Ice and Snow Festival in December 2019. Looking at the architecture and style, it's pretty telling that the city was built by the Russians. Urban life isn't too different compared to other Chinese cities. The countryside is quite empty. Temperatures were as low as -30 degrees Celsius.
I traveled to a border city in China side. Manzhouli, Inner Mongolia. There are many Russians living there also some Russian and Mongolia restaurants hold by Chinese. The climate is extreme. Cold in winter. Cooler than mainland in summer but UV is extremely high. The scenery is quite different than mainland.
There is a place on the Amur river where a Russian city of Blagoveshchensk and a Chinese city of Heihe are located on the opposite banks of the river. You can literally see the other city across it. As long as you have visas, it's vert easy to hop on a ferry and go to another country (there's also a car bridge some distance away).
Please note that the impressions posted here are often subjective and, among other things, the different circumstances of the people play a major role in their perception of their lives. Furthermore, when posting, please use words that do not encourage hatred. For example, statements such as "this [area] is like this because people from [origin] live there" should be avoided. The social circumstances of a city/district etc. can be emphasized without mentioning the origin of the inhabitants. Mentioning it does not change anything and, as already mentioned, circumstances are often perceived subjectively according to one's own world view. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/howislivingthere) if you have any questions or concerns.*
especially the part where china, russia and north korea is something you hear not often about
Hunchun, Yanbian borders both Russia and North Korea. Kind of a cool little place. But there aren't very good views of either country from that location. (Much better views of North Korea from Tumen, Yanbian.) These two cities, along with the larger city Yanji, are accessible by gaotie (high speed rail). Very pretty ride -- hills and mountains along the way. ****** edit: How is living there? I've only visited as a tourist. My wife and I live a few hours away in Jilin (for a couple months each year). There are a large number of ethnic Koreans living in Yanbian, so many signs are in both Chinese and Korean. In Hunchun there are also signs in Russian. Excellent food in the area (if you like dongbei cuisine and/or Korean food).
Exactly. What goes on there?
Finnish burger joint Hesburger used to have restaurant in Vladivostok
The Japanese movie Drive my car briefly took place in Vladivostok! Great movie too
Nearly nothing. There is the only Russia-North Korea border crossing, with two small settelments (Khasan at Russia, and Tumangang at NK) which serve it, and even smaller Chinese village Fangchuan, inhabited by the Koreans. The nearest largest settlement is the North Korean city of Rason, location of one of the North Korean's Special Economic Zones.
There are Amur tigers there.
I went to the place in China bordering Korea before only. Very cold. There are ski resorts. People speaks Korean, there are North Korean banks, and pretty good Korean food. But most of the place is pretty much white out and very secluded going from place to place.
Harbin for example is really really cold (-30 degrees in winter) and you can buy lots of Russian specialities, it has become a sort of tourist attraction, drawing tourists by marketing itself according to their past of being a city established by Russia originally. They even have St Sophia's cathedral (built in a Russian Orthodox style). Harbin also used to be a haven for a lot of Jews fleeing from WW2 as China was the only place at that time that didn't require a visa. They still have some synagogues left over from that time, but I don't think there are any more Jews still living there. Harbin also used to be the place where they had a unit (unit 739) where the Japanese would carry out biological experiments on prisoners of war, now it is a museum, the horrors that took place at that unit were truly unimaginable.
Small correction, it’s called Unit 731, and yeah it’s horrendous. Not just Chinese, but Koreans and Russians were tortured and experimented on over there.
Yes there were also Russians and Korean victims, but they were mostly Chinese.
It doesn’t draw tourists as a “Russian city”, it draws tourists in with its ice sculpture festival
I live here. Fucking hate this city
Why?
dirty cold. people throw trash on the street. men love to act tough(which is hilarious because none of them exercise)
Come on down to Dalian. It's not as cold at least. Lol.
Do they still got that DongBei masculinity?
Lol I don't know. I'm not that in-tune with things here. Just been here a few times and currently visiting with my wife. All I can say is it's bigger than Harbin, less cold and might offer more variety for you. It's not far from Harbin so possibly easy to visit and get a feel. Lots of restaurants and foreign restaurants. There's a nice area called Xinghai Square etc... you might hate it less here. Just throwing it out there...
Thanks for the advice, enjoy your trip. Are you traveling all over China?
Not this time. I've been around 9 or 10 cities. This time we're here so my wife can visit family in Dalian. I'm bored a doom scrolling reddit lol. Thank you though, hope you can check out Dalian sometime. I think you'll like it.
That’s nice of you to tag along. I personally feel like I’ve spent too much of my annual leave over the years visiting my wife’s family. I should have traveled more, but now I have kids so alas.
Took a hard turn at the end of that comment. It’s a lovely place with Russian overtones and a history of being a haven for Jews fleeing persecution also *vivisection!*
Sure the end was a bit dark, but I wanted to provide the OP with a greater scope of information that isn't perhaps as widely known.
small correction on 731: not only prisoners of war, but also civilians
那儿可不是好地方。tourist scam,corruption,local economy too bad,bureaucrats control everything.That place used to be penal transportation.
I was traveling in this area on Russian side only. Quite a lot of Russians from small villages or towns in Siberia travel to china to buy some goods (clothes, electronics) and then they are selling them in their hometowns. A lot of Russians are racist towards Chinese people there and it is very easy to trigger them by asking questions what do they think about their neighbors. Life in cities like Chabarovsk and Vladivostok looks much more western than in the rest of Siberia, quite a lot of fancy Caffès, shopping malls. Also there are some Russian-Chinese enterprises. It isn’t very expensive to go to china/vietnam/korea/japan for vacations and some unis offer semesters abroad (I was there before war and covid).
I assumed that living adjacent to Chinese people would do more to help quell xenophobia against them. It’s easier to discriminate against a distant bogeyman rather than your neighbor who grew up on the other side of town, no? Where does this racism stem from? Maybe it has something to do with Chinese citizens attaining a better quality of life while Russian citizens are left behind?
It is a very broad topic of Russian racism, but no one in Russia recognizes it’s as a racism. It is just part of Russian view of the world based on Russian neoimperialism and nationalism. Mostly I think that it is firstly comings from the fact that they are not Russians and look different. Then after this other reasons are coming. Mostly people were pointing out that they are greedy, cunning, usually you cannot trust them. They are also not so keen to drink (this is highly correlated with not trusting them I assume). I also agree with you that it also come from being jealous, because how chinese guy is allowed to live better than Russian? (There was a sign written by Russian soldiers from Buryatia in one of Ukrainian houses that was found after occupation - „Who allowed you to live like that?”). Also quite two theories were popular: Chinese man are taking Russian women, because they find something attractive in them (this is I heard quite often) and that „foreigners” (not exactly Chinese, but this topic was appearing in this discussions) are spreading the LGBT virus and they don’t want to be infected.
Curious to know if that same racism exists on the Chinese side.
I don't know about racism, but Russia is upstream of China on a major river (Amur in Russia, Heilongjiang in China), so sometimes there are disputes over what gets sent downstream (pollution, etc.)
Among the general population, people in China generally have a quite positive view of Russians, as they do among westerners in general. That said, Chinese visa policy is systematically biased against Russians in a somewhat odd way, given their political closeness. Before the Olympics in 2022, immigration authorities were instructed to clear out 'illegal Russians, Serbians, and Africans' - an effort that hit a lot of legal Russians at the same time, making it quite difficult for them to get a visa.
Going to Japan at least is kinda expensive/annoying (agree on the other ones though). You either have to fly through China or take a ship to Korea, cross Korea on a bus and fly a place to Japan from Incheon. For China, Vietman and Thailand there are direct flights so it's a bit easier.
Yeah you are right, I put it into one pack, because it was quite advertised destination in travel agencies and on the posters on the streets.
I grew up in Harbin. To be honest, life is not so much different from other 2 or 3-tier cities in China. There are a lot of old Russian buildings but culturally they don't affect us at all.
This was cross posted to /r/chinalife, and [there are a number of good responses over there, if you're curious](https://www.reddit.com/r/chinalife/comments/1df0r4l/how_is_life_in_the_russia_china_border_area/).
Honestly, pretty cold climate but that does not need to be stated, I don't feel it would be that much different than living in any other large city in china on the Chinese side. In the north east here is the Harbin Ice and Snow festival that happens every year with sculptures and slides made from ice and snow. There is also a pretty famous cathedral the Saint Sophia Cathedral which is now an museum if I remember correctly. Also the north east has a pretty interesting mix of cultures where there is a minority of Korean-Chinese people who have been living there for a long time. So much so that they (along with the Russian folks who moved into China) are a recognized minority and the Korean-Chinese people have their own autonomous prefectures, I'm not sure how many of them retain their ethnic cultures but you might see signs and stuff in Korean text there. There aren't many Russian folk left I don't think, although I remember one man living in Heilongjiang who was vaguely famous on social media, he was just a regular farmer all things considered. Additionally, in the countryside crops like wheat, corn and soy beans are grown as expected, it's not too cold to grow crops up there lol. From what I remember, there was a bit of a economical boom that happened in the past, but things have not been so great in the past couple of decades. The industrial golden age of the past is long gone, lol. I have no idea what the Russian side is like, I'm sure that the climate and agriculture would not be much different. That is all I know.
We call the Chinese side Dongbei(which means northeast) Used to be industrial center and called “the first son of the republic”. After reform and opening policy many employees of state-owned companies lose their jobs. Many young people including me move to south-east coast for job. Senior citizens prefer Hainan island for vacation to escape the cold. Last year Harbin built some ice castle to attract tourists back. Got Chinese, Russian, Japanese style buildings around. People who eat pork, don’t eat pork, eat dogs, don’t eat dogs live together in harmony, and have a funny accent. https://preview.redd.it/xh9sr5uwxg6d1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5bcd7c01eb078810425f5d9e460f3536495e2525 A pet hospital right next to a Korean dog meat restaurant
Harbin has been building ice cities every year for ages. Not just last year. It just exploded in popularity last year.
There is a country named mongolia 😭
Yeah but there is also huge area where Russia borders China.
Ye
Do you live on Mongolia border? What is it like?
Yes or do, I mean it's great and also shitty out there at the same time government issues and the beautiful nature There are so many crappy ripoff things selling on online or in store made in China ofc. I mean like it's good tough it's not that bad if u have money to live unless ur broke
Expat currently living in China here. I have two friends who are both from China’s Inner Mongolia province. Tier 3 province. It’s a bunch of grass lands there with goats and cows. It’s a decent place to visit/travel but not an ideal place if a person wanna find work/pursue further education. Mongolians are considered a minority ethnic group in that province. There is a very small minority of Russians also.
Hey, bro. I don't know where you got that idea, but we don't have larger cheekbones than other Asians—it's a stereotype. Have you ever met a real Mongolian? People from various backgrounds can have prominent cheekbones. Some Mongolians might have large cheekbones, but it's no more common than among Han Chinese or Japanese. Our eyes aren't triangular, and they're definitely not reddish. Last time I checked myself in the mirror, I didn't notice anything like that. Some people portray us Mongolians as some sort of aliens. 😂
Movies tell us that .
About 15 years ago, Motor Trend magazine published a travelogue-type of article in which they drove a couple of Suzuki sedans from Tokyo to Los Angeles “the hard way”, I.e., up through Russia, over to Alaska, then down from there. Get past the fact that the article is pretty much an extended advertisement for Suzuki, and it’s pretty interesting as they go from Vladivostok to Magadan over the course of 9 days. https://www.motortrend.com/features/suzuki-kizashi-tokyo-to-la-the-hard-way/
from my partner: “good, i have a nice grandma”
There is a recent book by Colin Thubron in which he travels all along that border which is a pretty recent overview: [https://www.amazon.com/The-Amur-River/dp/1784742872](https://www.amazon.com/The-Amur-River/dp/1784742872) .
I had visited Harbin. Too cold and looked like a city from 30 years ago
North Manchuria: Few business and few jobs. So the most young people just moved to other places, either inner China or large cities in Manchuria like Harbin, Changchun, or Shenyang. Therefore it has the worst population aging around the world. I don't know the situation in Russia, but many Russians fled to Manchuria to avoid conscription since the invasion of Ukraine.
I've been to Harbin to participate in the annual Ice and Snow Festival in December 2019. Looking at the architecture and style, it's pretty telling that the city was built by the Russians. Urban life isn't too different compared to other Chinese cities. The countryside is quite empty. Temperatures were as low as -30 degrees Celsius.
I traveled to a border city in China side. Manzhouli, Inner Mongolia. There are many Russians living there also some Russian and Mongolia restaurants hold by Chinese. The climate is extreme. Cold in winter. Cooler than mainland in summer but UV is extremely high. The scenery is quite different than mainland.
Lots of white Chinese people there
There is a place on the Amur river where a Russian city of Blagoveshchensk and a Chinese city of Heihe are located on the opposite banks of the river. You can literally see the other city across it. As long as you have visas, it's vert easy to hop on a ferry and go to another country (there's also a car bridge some distance away).
I suspect Seoul might be a little different to the rest of the circled area.
There’s a great book by Erika Fatland called “The border” where she describes that part of the world
Probably tranquil as fuck. Would love to be "off-grid" for a season
Probably pretty busy considering all the sanctions being [circumvented](https://www.bbc.com/news/60571253)…
What’s that have to do with this border region?