Inside China’s Third-Tier City: Real Daily Life
About this video
A warm and honest look at daily life in Tai'an, a third-tier city in Shandong, starting with a bustling morning market and a traditional breakfast before visiting a local bathhouse and cruising the city on shared e-bikes. The video also breaks down average salaries, housing costs, and everyday expenses, offering a clear sense of what it's really like to live beyond China's biggest metropolises. It ends with a relaxing lakeside park visit and a late-night BBQ, capturing the simple, genuine rhythms of ordinary life in a smaller Chinese city.
Video transcript
how much money do you really need to live in China in my previous video I showed you Shenzhen China's most high tech city where housing prices can easily reach over 9 million RMB for a typical apartment but today I'm taking you somewhere completely different now I'm in a third tier city in northern China where a restaurant server earns only around 4500 RMB so what's life actually like here how much does housing cost let's spend a full day and find out if there's one place that tells you everything about the city is the morning market this is where locals
come every morning to buy breakfast and fresh groceries it's one of the best places to experience the local culture and see everyday life most morning markets open from around 5:00am to 10:00am you can find almost everything here and everything is incredibly affordable everything here looks so fresh and delicious most of these fruits and veggies are grown by the farmers themselves I can't even remember the last time I saw peaches with fresh green leaves still attached the taste so much better than the ones you usually find in supermarkets every morning
locals come here to shop for fresh ingredients for the day all the food here looks absolutely mouth watering and everything is made from scratch right in front of your eyes in big city like Shenzhen it's becoming harder and harder to find this kind of traditional breakfast experience everyone is starting their day in their own way and this is where you can find the rhythm of the city I come to try this very traditional breakfast soup called SA 好嘞 so this is a very local food called SA it's a rich and savory soup made with beef bones and wheat grains
and the interesting part is they pour a hot soup over rock egg turning it into silk egg ribbons and locals enjoy it with Chinese donut unlike Shenzhen's fast paced lifestyle life here feels a lot slower every morning you'll see lots of older people out and about they get together to chat enjoy music or even put on performances let's talk about the housing market let's take a look at how much people earn here you can see this restaurant is hiring right now the manager's salary is around $590 to $1,000 a server makes around $440 to $660 the head chef earns
more starting from $1,100 in China there's no tipping culture so this salary is basically their total monthly income there isn't extra money from tips like in some western countries now I'm walk inside a shopping mall this clothes store is also hiring the store manager can make around $490 to $830 most of the clothes here are actually pretty affordable it's all about $10 this jacket is about $24 getting a phone screen protector just about $1.5 now we are at a bigger shopping mall so the price probably a little higher let's also check out some daily
groceries another thing you'll see a lot in China is these self checkout machines simply just scan your items and pay with your phone now I'm heading to a bath house yes you heard me right but this is not just a place to take a shower it's more like a all in one spa and entertainment complex even though it's summer it's still super busy a lot of people come here to escape the heat I need to change my clothes now see you later just finish my body scrub and massage let's head to the resting area you've got places to relax play area for kids arcade games
claw machines there are unlimited drinks snacks and ice cream I love this saunas mahjong rooms a movie theater and they even have a gym I grew up in the southern China so this is actually my first bathhouse experience we don't really have this kind of culture where I'm from so it's definitely taking me a little time to get used to it but it's a huge part of life in northern China back in days many homes didn't have reliable hot water especially during the freezing winter so public bathhouses just become more important to get clean and also socialize the
most exciting part is the free buffet they have over 60 different dishes here you can eat as much as you want and there's no time limit the only rule is don't waste any food drinks and all kinds of fresh fruit are included and that includes the hot spring a body scrub massage all of these facilities plus unlimited fruits and buffet you can stay here for up to 24 hours they even have foot massage and hotel rooms if you are traveling in China and hotels are too expensive this is actually a great option you've got all these facilities and entertainment for
one price you will notice these electric scooters they are all over the city and different color represents different companies you could just scan the code and you ready to go and here's the helmet so it usually cost about $1 for one hour ride it has a top speed of 25 km per hour and one full charge can take you up to 50 km now we are by this beautiful lake this is one of the places that local come to relax and enjoy the fresh air compare to Shenzhen everything moves at a much slower pace so now I'm walking through this night market just beside this
beautiful lake most of these vendors they just drive a car here as their booth to sell their food, drinks, coffee just past a coffee car and I was taking a video the owner is making a coffee and he loves the video I took so he made a free drink for me as a gift people here is so warm it's 9 pm now and I just realized I didn't bring a bath towel with me but luckily we have Meituan here a food delivery app and I just ordered a disposable towel let's see how long it takes to arrive right on time it was delivered by a robot open the door thank you have a
Good Night I've seen a lot of comments saying that China is either futuristic or poor but after spending a day here I think the reality is somewhere in between this isn't luxury living but it's also not a struggling poverty it's simply the everyday life of millions of ordinary Chinese people do you think you could live on this salary let me know in the comments go fishing
