Understanding Chinese Tourists

Understanding Chinese Tourists | Quite frequently you hear European tourist resorts complaining about weird behavior from Chinese travelers, being rude, uncivilized and awful. These unlucky tourists from the Far East simply can’t get rid of false prejudice.

Let’s start with a quote from Mark Twain: “They talked loudly and coarsely and laughed boisterously when all others were so quiet and well behaved.” Twain referred to American tourists in Europe back in the 1860s. By then America was already seen as the new money. They did not have the class and refinery of Europeans, and in part they even don’t have it today. Only today the focus did change. This quote seems now ring true for Westerners concerning Chinese tourists. But wait for it. Things will get better with time.

China’s outbound tourism is actually a thing of pure beauty – if you focus on statistics only. Between 1990 and 2017 the annual number of Chinese tourists traveling abroad went up from almost zero to 230 million per year. And now be ready for this: only 6% of all Chinese citizens are currently in possession of a passport. SIX … PER … CENT! You better make room for the Chinese because there will be more coming your way, many more. And your local economy will love it.

Last year Chinese travelers spent US$104.5 billion in the United States alone, and that’s not even their major target. They first go to Japan, then to South Korea, then to Germany. Neither France nor the US nor Italy is their number 3 pick, but Germany. Why that: The simple reason behind it: Germany’s very easy visa policies for Chinese citizens. GlobalBlue at Frankfurt Airport is busy around the clock because of this welcomed influx of money. Too bad for Germany: Chinese Honeymooners have no such option. They need to pick Paris over Berlin, no matter how complicated the entry into France will be.

Why do Chinese tourists spend so much money on their trips abroad?

China has become an economically stable country with a high ratio of flexible income. The government has lifted up its sanctions on traveling abroad. More and more Chinese utilize their money by traveling to far-away places and experiencing something new. It kind of goes hand in hand with their philosophy: ‘You must go far away to see the whole picture.’ That’s why you can wait for it. Once a Chinese has enough money in his wallet he will travel your way. And this is what happens now: Since they travel to faraway lands and learn new things they try to improve their own practices, culture, traditions, industries, society and every other aspect of life inside China. It is the main reason behind their huge success since 1990. In return China makes its own country more attractive for others (and for their own people). This snowball effect boosts the European tourist industry and it improves China’s economic condition, allowing the creation of more cultural diversity which is crucial to surviving in the changing world.

So far so good. Still this does not make your ruined vacation in Italy look any better after you met Chinese tourists at every turn, skipping lines mobbing and pushing into entrances and exits, taking pictures where they are not supposed to, destroying bathrooms and being as noisy as possible. It’s worth a second look. There is a difference between Chinese tourist groups and individual travelers from China. Chinese tourists traveling individually are well-educated and good in adopting to the rules of their hosts. But those bus loads of Chinese tourists on the other hand are comparable to British football tourists appearing in groups at a Champions League match or German tourists at Ballermann 6 in Mallorca. The fuck-others mentality is 100% real for all those groups mentioned.

Particularly in China there are so many people that you have to push to get what you want. That’s true for pretty much everything in life. If you don’t push or make noise you literally get left behind. And it’s been like this for many generations. At some point it becomes part of a society’s DNA. To paraphrase Chris Rock: “I don’t agree with what they do, but I understand.” For years the clash of culture has been well documented on social media when it comes to Chinese tourists abroad. But Social Media – as usual – does not show the whole picture. So let’s watch a short documentary about Chinese tourists …

Understanding Chinese Tourists

Need another proof of evidence for the economic of Chinese tourists? While ticket sales for the 2018 Football World Cup in Russia didn’t go well at all in Western Europe, Chinese tourists happily picked up the scrapes. According to the South China Morning Post 100,000 Chinese football fans die descend on Russia to watch the Football World Cup live, even though the Chinese National Football team had missed out on a place.

China might have failed to make it through to the 2018 FIFA World Cup, but thanks to a purposely relaxed visa policy in Russia there was no shortage of Chinese football fans for the big event. Now this is what we are talking about! Let each of them have spent just US$100 in Putin’s glorious Rossiskaya, the Russian economy felt a pleasant boost of some 10 million US Dollars just like that.