Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong Province, is the third-largest city in China, boasting a population of over 12 million. Founded in 214 BC, this city has played a crucial role in trading, cultural exchanges, revolutions, and reforms, making it a key destination for understanding modern China.
Nestled amid mountainous topography and shaped by early exposure to the outside world, Guangzhou’s lifestyle, liberal ideas, distinct cuisine, and wealth set it apart. It has been a hub for numerous reforms and revolutions, offering travelers a glimpse into China’s transformative history. The city seamlessly blends ancient temples, a millennial-old park, and colonial villas on Shamian with futuristic architectures in Zhujiang New Town.
While Guangzhou showcases vibrant sightseeing options, it’s a haven for shoppers and food enthusiasts. With vast markets offering a range of “made-in-China” products, visitors are often amazed by the real prices and local shops’ profits.
Food takes center stage in Guangzhou, known as the birthplace of Cantonese cuisine. Travelers can savor authentic dishes like sweet & sour pork, wonton soup, and dim-sum. Despite the bustling atmosphere, tranquil escapes are easy to find in surrounding villages, some dating back to the Song Dynasty.
Mandarin is the official language, but Cantonese is spoken by true locals. English is more widely spoken compared to other parts of China, yet carrying your hotel’s business card and having destination names written in Chinese is advisable. While many educated individuals understand English, it’s not universally spoken, especially among drivers.
Guangzhou, though less recognized than Beijing or Shanghai, is a manufacturing hub, contributing significantly to the global production chain. For travelers seeking work opportunities, particularly in management, translation, engineering, or English teaching, Guangzhou offers possibilities. English teaching jobs, in particular, are available across various age groups, from kindergartens to universities, with schools typically requiring native speakers with a degree and TEFL certificate.
MY EXPERIENCE. Guangzhou at the start has not become such a happy city for me as Shenzhen! But I can say that Guangzhou became for me a launching pad, before starting a successful freelance career in Shenzhen.
I flew to Guangzhou towards the end of 2013 to work under a 3-month contract. Two new clubs were opening. “True Color” as the main one with standard Chinese club music, and our “F276” club, with calm launch music, where people can relax, sit and even talk))
Our work, as planned, was initially very simple. Stand in suits near the entrance, smile and show with hand invitation to guests to come into the club. Everything was simple, it would seem. We had to arrive at 21:30, work started at 22:30.
Yes, I forgot to say, we were provided with free apartments from the club, everyone had their own room. And there was even the opportunity, if desired, to come to the canteen and eat with the club employees for free. But we didn’t often take advantage of this opportunity because we didn’t like the food there))
So, the first days we worked as we were supposed to. But the essence of Chinese bosses is that they are constantly dissatisfied with something. And the desire to immediately earn a lot of money always results in the need to urgently change something! Therefore, managers constantly pestered us and came up with something new that we should do!
The next thing they came up with to us was to take off our jackets and stand in white shirts. Ok, we did it. Then they said that we needed to be even more sexy, and they decided that it would be even better if we stood bare-chested, they say, muscles, white foreign models – and there would be more clients! 😀
Then they came up with the idea that you can wear swimming trunks and have a bow tie around your neck! to be downright sexy! We, of course, were indignant and told our agent, who was actually somewhere in another city, that this was not in the contract, but they were forcing us to work like this! She somehow tried to solve this. And it seems that we agreed that we will be paid more))
But the club bosses didn’t want to stop there either. Then they started to think that we would be waiters! And even that we will bring a bottle of wine to clients and open it with a corkscrew in their presence! They even came up with training courses for us…
In general, every day there were some kind of rehearsals and training! That is, we could be called to the club to practice opening a bottle of wine by 16:30.
All that I am now describing above very clearly emphasizes the advantages of freelance life, which for me came later, the next year. That is, when we didn’t like something, we talked about it, and if there was no compromise, we just could cancel work and leave.
But here, in contract work, when you have no other choice and no room for maneuver – everything is very clear. You either accept changing conditions and work, or you don’t, and then fly back home without earning anything! Therefore, we were forced to agree, although we were not happy.
But I only worked there for one month out of three. The club boss was unhappy with how things went and started firing everyone. But I earned some money, it was somewhere around $1000, and I found myself a contract for 3 months in another province, in another club. Wuhan Province, Huangshi city, also a “True Color” club. And I also worked there for only 1 month, and returned back to Guangzhou.
And this was precisely the club where they did not pay me the last 1/3 of the promised salary. That is, while we were working there, they paid us, and when they had to pay the rest, they said ok, you are flying, we will transfer the money to you later. We took off. But we never received the money. As we found out later, we were cheated by the agent through whom we flew to this job in Huangshi.
So, we returned back to Guangzhou. And it was already mid-February somewhere. Of all the people who worked with us initially at the “F276 club”, only one guy was still working there. He was always cheerful and a thug, which is probably why he wasn’t fired! But he had a flaw, he liked to smoke weed and drank a lot of alcohol. Therefore, some time later he was also fired.
But while he was working there, I lived in the same apartment, in the same room where I spent the first month while working here. But this was without the club’s consent. They did not give permission to live for the artists they fired. But we didn’t talk about it. And the cleaning lady, who came to the apartments every morning to clean up the mess, found out about this. She reported on me and another guy who also lived there like me. So the club gave our drug-addict friend a warning that if cleaning lady came again and saw us illegally living here, he would also be fired!
But by some miracle, I managed to live like this for a whole month or even a month and a half! Right up to April somewhere! 😀
One of the good and pleasant things I can remember is that I bought myself a bicycle through Taobao! It turned out to be complete bullshit and broke quickly. And I bought myself another bicycle, very simple, without any gears. A regular track bike with thin wheels. Used, and for only 230 yuan! And it turned out to be very cool!
During this entire month and a half I drove late at night in Guangzhou, and I traveled very far and a lot. I especially loved driving along the river and all the way to the “Canton Tower” itself – the main attraction of Guangzhou! I went in good weather and in rain! There was some kind of magic in it. I was just enjoying this alone time. When the city was calmer, and when you could travel along well-lit roads, along walking paths along the entire river, and you could think and rethink everything in your life, and decide what to do next…
There was a time for romance too. At the “True Color”club here in Guangzhou I met a very bright girl dancer from Kamchatka. She was working and I just came to hang out. And in dance mode I met her nicely ha-ha! 🙂 And then I came up to take her number, and she was very happy I did it. We met with her several times. We were constantly in touch with each other via Wechat… But things didn’t go far. She was tied to her contracts, and also constantly flew away somewhere.
So, when I was forced to leave my free housing in Guangzhou, an intermediate option appeared for 10 days in Dongguan (also Guangdong province), and then there was my beloved Shenzhen! And life began to get better! 🙂
Already as a freelancer, I often came here for photo and video shooting and made very good money! I remember the day in May 2018 when I earned 1500 euros in half a day of photography for a furniture advertisement!
The photos of me here above already the era of freelance life (2014-2020), when we traveled from Shenzhen to Gaungzhou by high-speed train, covering a distance of 200 km in just a 30 minutes!
