Yep, your right about your visa (as far as I can tell, without actually looking at it!).

The authorities won't care if you leave for 10 minutes and then come back in, let alone a few days, so don't worry about that. However, they may require that you have a visa for your place of entry before letting you OUT of the country. This is necessary for citizens of most countries that go to Vietnam, but not for some going to Laos. Check your visa requirements for travelling on the passport you have.

I recommend Sapa in Vietnam for a reasonably cheap and easy place if you want to go somewhere to visit that's fairly nice. Its not that hard to get to (a bus ride to Hekou, cross the border, then a ride up the hill to Sapa) and fairly pleasant. You need to take USD with you when going there but they can be obtained before you go. Getting a visa at the Vietnam consulate in Kunming isn't that hard either and reasonably priced.

www.gokunming.com/en/blog/item/2818/getting_away_sapa
www.gokunming.com/[...]

There are various threads on GoKunming about this already, recommend you search.

Excelllllleeeentt laotou, may all your predictions come true! I forgive your mostly off topic satire for it was worth the chuckles.

That's a really good point actually. If the banks started offering savings account interest rates at a rate above inflation... that may help to stem the tide of investment in housing... particularly if housing values drop at the same time.

That would require, I suspect, one of my points - opening up banking to international competition.

I thought it would be good to start a thread about China wide problems, what we believe will happen to China in the future, to share ideas around the problems facing China in the next 5-10 years time. As Yunnan is part of China, I think its pretty relevant here. I aren't sure I are breaking any rules having such a conversation, but I don't believe so.

———
Personally, I am most worried about the Chinese property bubble. If it explodes, it will be massive for China. Unemployment will sky rocket as big construction companies and all associated services collapse. The government will be under severe pressure as the economy dramatically slows and people lose all the equity they believed they had locked up in their houses. Cars will be repossessed, credit cards will be withdrawn forcing a reduction in consumer spending. Wages will tighten and the government will probably put taxes up. At the same time basic goods will become more expensive. China's GDP growth will be slashed, crime will rise and social discontent will grow.

It will be just like America now and the past few years... but I believe it will be worse as the size of the bubble is so much larger.

Normally I am an optimist about such things, but it appears China has managed to combine the worst of capitalism with the worst of communism and created a beast the likes of which the world has never seen. And there are signs that the beast is teetering.

And the worst of it? China can no longer feed its own people and is now a food importer. If it was to close its doors there is a very real threat its people will starve (again).

What could be the trigger? America defaulting on its debt to China? (the result being a severe credit downgrade to America and hence all the credit China's construction etc being based on failing). Government intervention? (there is potential for the current capital gains tax to have the reverse effect and inflate property prices as people simply add the CGT amount onto house sale prices). Social discontent? America/WTO forcing China to actually float its currency properly?
————

But there is hope. China is a centrally run, by the government, which controls the economy and country. If the government can gently deflate the property bubble slowly, they SHOULD be able to escape the worst of it. At the same time they will need to make massive changes though. This includes things like:

Utilising its labour force better - increasing productivity wages and labour force utilisation. There is a potential that this will happen through opening its government owned businesses to much more competition (banks/telco's/construction etc).
Reducing wastage in businesses.
Getting serious about IP theft. This is more about theft of industry secrets from the west, which does dramatically more harm than good for China (as companies pull out of China/become less interested in doing business). At the same time they need to reform their education system to make young people CREATIVE, not just good at reading/writing and rote learning.
Getting businesses to adopt/learn more western practices so they can actually compete and win overseas. Its fine to do things the Chinese way in China, but elsewhere it just won't fly.
Graft/corruption/nepotism - needs to be dealt with SEVERELY. It is the main cause of pain for China both internally and externally for doing business.
Be peaceful to its neighbours, particularly Japan and the SE Asian ones, lest they get the most dangerous militarys in the world knocking on their doors. This means actually negotiating with neighbours around things like the cows tongue and diaoyu islands (which personally I think they should both compromise on and each take the half of the island facing each others mainlands!).
Weaning their economy off constant construction to one of consumption/spending. And hoping they can control it better than the west has managed.
And probably the hardest - fixing the pollution problems. With 90% of its waterways polluted in an increasingly hot and drought ridden world, that's not an enviable position to be in. They also need to stop using their coal plants and start using that massive desert in the west to generate electricity to cap global warming for their own long term interests.
Make farming cool again and increase their food production, while still controlling inputs (a very difficult but not impossible task).

If China can juggle all of these balls successfully, China will become a massively powerful juggernaut. If not, China won't be a nice place to be in. I think its a big crunch time in China's history, right now and over the next few years. We will either be lucky to be in it or lucky to be out of it if we escape. The newly elected leaders have one hell of a lot of work to do to take China to the next level. Not impossible, but certainly not easy.

What does everyone else think?

Start your own thread dude if you want to know info! Not that hard and long timers (I am more like a mid timer!) will respond!