Money

Currently 1 USD is equal to 6.3429 RMB.

RMB stands for 人民币 in pinyin - Renminbi. This literally translates to "The people's currency." 人民 means the people's and 币 means currency. So the people's republic of China also uses the characters 人民 .

The money is also called 元 pronounced yuan (not yen!). They also say "kuai" I think it's this character: 块, but I'm not sure if that's the right pinyin/ character.

RMB comes in many shapes and sizes...
The common bills are: 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 (there's also a strange on that's like 5 cents...)
For coins there's mostly just 1 rmb and then cent coins. I haven't paid much attention to the cent coins yet.

So, looking it up online...
1 RMB  is about 16 cents
5 RMB is about 79 cents
10 RMB is $1.58
20 RMB $ 3.16
50 RMB $7.89
100 RMB $15.77
500 RMB 79

So in my head I think


1 RMB  is like a quarter
5 RMB is a dollar
10 RMB is 2 dollars
20 RMB $5
50 RMB $10
100 RMB $20

And the usual amount I get out of an ATM is RMB 500 which is like $80

But now I'm starting to look at the money as a Chinese person would. And how much the money's worth - how much I can buy with it is much different.

Lunch is 5 RMB both in the Cafeteria on campus and buying street food. 3 to 5 RMB can get you a drink, bottled tea or coffee (cold). 1 yuan can get you bottled water (often not cold).

If they're asking you for more than (or close to) 100 yuan - you're paying too much. Most things here are really cheap. Haggling is a thing here, not in stores... But you can haggle with street venders for sure.

A lot of things still cost about the same as they would in the US. Electronics are expensive. My phone cost RMB 2,000 (a little of $300) but the service for my phone was really cheap - less than RMB 200.

The bus is 1 yuan in my city and a taxi is around 50 yuan. The trains and plans are expensive though. I looked at a plan ride to Hong Kong (grant it I looked at ticket for less than a month away) and the cost was RMB 2,000 each way. But I also saw some cheaper flights for about RMB 800. Then again I also looked up the rate for a ferry into Korea and it was less than $100 US (by a lot). So the prices seam all over the place to me.

American made goods are expensive here. In China (unlike in the US) they have a luxury tax on products that aren't made in China (aka American products). This tax makes them about the same price as they are in the US. Also, importing clothing into China is illegal. We were warned about this before we came here. We were told to not ship ourselves clothing because it's perfectly legal or the government to confiscate and even destroy them. Anyone wish America did stuff like this sometimes?! Maybe we wouldn't have so many people in the US hating China is we just had stricter import laws. Not trying to get political or anything but sometimes America just looks really dumb in comparison to China.

Want to learn more about Qinhuangdao? Checkout this website my friends made. (There are even some pictures of me on there!) http://qhdconnect.spruz.com/