Chinese tourism in Thailand: 'Finally, we are seeing the world'

[Jonathan Fairfield]

Chinese tourism: 'Finally, we are seeing the world'

We have take off: Chinese tourists jump for a picture on Tawaen Beach, known locally as Chinese Beach on Koh Larn near Pattaya. Photograph: Nana Chen for the Observer

Chinese tourists now outspend holidaymakers from all other countries. But how will the superpower's taste for travel change the world of tourism and how can Britain cash in?

Abigail Haworth reports from the favourite hot spot 'Chinese Beach' in Thailand.

It's not the best afternoon to admire the view from the top of the observation tower in Pattaya, Thailand. The sky is thundery and the sea is a uniform shade of sludge. Shun-Wen Tong, a 22-year-old student from the Chinese city of Hangzhou, cranes his neck to look at the town 54 floors below: concrete hotel blocks, pulsating traffic and directly beneath him, half- hidden in the tropical gloom, an amusement park called Funny Land.

The off-season weather is just one of the dodgy things about Pattaya – a resort known to many as "Thailand's Blackpool", it is two hours outside Bangkok – but Tong is savouring every moment. "It's magical. I'm very happy," he says, holding his camera in one hand and a complimentary orange juice in the other. "Finally I am seeing the world."

Tong is on his first-ever overseas trip. For him it's a thrilling, life-changing experience. But to the rest of world he's not just any tourist. He's a Chinese tourist – that is, a global phenomenon, an unstoppable trend, a lucrative opportunity.

International travel has been growing among the Chinese over the past decade, with rising prosperity at home and the relaxation of Communist government travel restrictions. Now millions are on the move. "Chinese tourism," said CNN breathlessly in April, "might be the biggest phenomenon to hit the global travel industry since the invention of commercial flight."

In 2012 the Chinese overtook Americans and Germans as the world's top international tourism spenders, heading off on 83m foreign trips and spending $102bn. By early 2015, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organisation, Chinese globetrotters will take more than 100m overseas trips. By 2020 the figure will double to an incredible 200m. In Thailand, the number of Chinese tourists shot up by 107% this year, nudging Bangkok ahead of London to become the world's most visited city in Mastercard's latest survey.

A crowd of Chinese tourists cheer during the elephant show, where the animals perform stunts such as football and painting, at Nong Nooch Tropical Botanical Garden in Pattaya. Photograph: Nana Chen for the Observer

Everyone is scrambling for a share of the spoils. In October, the British government announced plans to simplify UK visa procedures for nationals from China, with the goal of trebling Chinese tourists to Britain by 2015. India has launched Chinese-language Life of Pi tours after the film was a box-office hit in China, while Greece is promoting "idyllic island honeymoons" to the Chinese market. Even the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe is currently trying to negotiate a "preferential tourism pact" with Beijing – despite diplomatic strains last year after police outside Harare arrested four Chinese migrant workers for allegedly killing and eating rare tortoises.

With the proliferating numbers has come the predictable but mostly misplaced sentiment that Chinese travellers have taken over from Americans as the world's new "ugly" tourists. The trend for independent travel is sharply on the rise, especially among the younger Chinese. But around half of all Chinese tourists still travel in organised groups – a factor that increases their collective visibility and amplifies stereotypes and cultural unfamiliarity on both sides.

Reports abound that Chinese tourists are loud and rude, or that they refuse to queue or give tips. Other complaints range from the practical to the surreal. In July, residents of the small Swiss city of Lucerne protested that up to 120 Chinese tour buses a day were paralysing local traffic, as they deposited tourists who wanted to buy luxury watches.

Then there were bizarre reports, picked up by the Chinese media, of competing Chinese honeymooners brawling in French lavender fields over the best spot for photos to capture a "Monet moment". A group travelling to North Korea drew scorn for throwing sweets to children as though they were "feeding ducks", while a number of Chinese tourists in the Maldives were reportedly caught giving fake marriage papers to upmarket resorts in order to get free dinners offered to newlyweds.

Still, the fact that such tales make headlines seems to reflect the current hypersensitivity towards Chinese behaviour abroad more than anything else. In a recent poll by lifestyle website LivingSocial, Americans were still ranked the least popular foreign tourists by five different countries, including, tellingly, by Americans themselves. Brits and Germans fared little better.

Read the full story from The Guardian here

[zydeco]

"Another tourist, 40-year-old property developer Min Liu from central Henan province, also says he'll have plenty to talk about when he returns. But most of it won't be positive. "This is the first and last time I will leave China," he says. He came overseas "out of curiosity" but thinks Thailand is inefficient and much more unsafe than China. "Also, the local food smells bad and the flavour is wrong. It's not suitable for Chinese people," says the burly bald-headed man."

--Hey, Min Liu, have you started posting on TV yet?

[Sunisalom]

Shun-wen..... be careful. Especially if you go for a beer! Strange things happen to visitors who are on high floor balconies in Thailand, but the BIB usually find a legitimate accidental death when they do.

-m.

[NongKhaiKid]

Shun-wen..... be careful. Especially if you go for a beer! Strange things happen to visitors who are on high floor balconies in Thailand, but the BIB usually find a legitimate accidental death when they do.

-m.

Having a Thai wife or GF helps the ' strange things ' to happen.

[Prbkk]

They have a lot to learn from farang: steal the batteries from the tv remote control, ask for upgrade because 'on honeymoon' , steal the toilet paper, bargain with a vendor over 2 baht, etc etc etc

[JeremyBowskill]

Most people I know who work in tourism detest Chinese tourists. Where as they want the customers, they would prefer folk from other countries.

[Bender]

In 2012 the Chinese overtook Americans and Germans as the world's top international tourism spenders, heading off on 83m foreign trips and spending $102bn

yes but this silly journalist forget to add, that per per capita, western people do spend still more than chinese tourist group.

She also forget to add, that the rich chinese tourist are holidaying in Paris, Roma or Monaco certainly not on koh larn beach...

[Asiantravel]

Pattaya – a resort known to many as "Thailand's Blackpool"

[garyk]

Kinda strange reading this. I was in a small town trying to get a boat to the Similan island to see the Nicobar Pigeon. Ran into a huge group of Russians that rented the WHOLE boat! I asked the tour operator what was up and general questions about the tourists that come to visit and use his service.

He LOVED the Russians. Eat allot, spend allot, Not so much the Chinese this year. He said the Chinese government was making it very hard for them to travel and taxing them on items bought in Thailand. He said ( which could be BS ) that his Chinese customers have declined this year to a point it he is not catering to them and taking care of them like the Russians. Which surprised me.

He said the Chinese government was starting to really crack down on international travel? They wanted the money to stay in China.

Bottom line after talking to a few guys there. I take this kind of article with a grain of salt.

[trainman34014]

The rich ones have been helping the European economy's for some years already. Talking to a manager in Harrods, Knightsbridge, back in 2009 and he told me then that as much as 65% of the spending in Knightsbridge's upmarket shops was from Chinese customers. The Americans, who used to be the biggest spenders there had become smaller in number and spend since 9/11, and of course the credit crunch.

The Chinese that visit Thailand are the less well off lower order of tourists looking for bargains and deals. Yet Thailand continues to profess it only wants 'upmarket tourists'.

[chainarong]

Chinese tourists have been voted the worlds worst for manners and noise , ever stayed in a hotel when a mob of Chinese tourists arrive, they are noisy , rude and most don't even know how to work a lift , this caused some laughter at the hotel I lived at in HK couple years back.

[Prbkk]

Much the same thing was said about Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese just 20 years ago. Now they are very highly sought after. The Chinese deserve a break...often this is the first overseas trip for them, of course they are unfamiliar with things. Their 'odd' cultural habits are not meant to offend anyone, they do not realise that some things are best not done in public.

[northernjohn]

They have a lot to learn from farang: steal the batteries from the tv remote control, ask for upgrade because 'on honeymoon' , steal the toilet paper, bargain with a vendor over 2 baht, etc etc etc

Most of it I would have never thought of them. Bargain over price with street venders Yes but really 2 baht.Maybe in my past life when 2 baht was a lot of money.

You give a new dimension to Cheap Charlie.

On another note the Chinese have such a bad reputation as tourists that the Chinese government has put out a book on how to behave in other countries.

I wonder if it mentions not stealing the batteries out of the remotes?

[thomash]

A Chines tourist going to Pattaya and saying "finally I am seeing the world." Oh my God Pattaya is not the real world as for the most it is the adult Disney world for sex. Also I cannot believe in the photo they are actually in the polluted water by a Pattaya but maybe compared to China's polluted water it seems clean!

[NongKhaiKid]

They have a lot to learn from farang: steal the batteries from the tv remote control, ask for upgrade because 'on honeymoon' , steal the toilet paper, bargain with a vendor over 2 baht, etc etc etc

Most of it I would have never thought of them. Bargain over price with street venders Yes but really 2 baht.Maybe in my past life when 2 baht was a lot of money.

You give a new dimension to Cheap Charlie.

On another note the Chinese have such a bad reputation as tourists that the Chinese government has put out a book on how to behave in other countries.

I wonder if it mentions not stealing the batteries out of the remotes?

Or more recently a standoff between the aircrew on a Singapore Airlines flight and 30 plus Chinese tourists who had pocketed all the cutlery and wouldn't give them up until their tour guide convinced them they were embarrassing the homeland.

[Somtamnication]

If they claim that coming to Thailand is "seeing the world", they have a huge surprise coming.

[hughben]

I assume they will be staying away should the elections take place at the start of the week of Chinese New Year (possibly followed by droves of street protests and riots).

[moe666]

Much the same thing was said about Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese just 20 years ago. Now they are very highly sought after. The Chinese deserve a break...often this is the first overseas trip for them, of course they are unfamiliar with things. Their 'odd' cultural habits are not meant to offend anyone, they do not realise that some things are best not done in public.

I often wonder, do they walk down the middle of the road and then stop to chat blocking traffic back home, then there is the motorbike fiasco with Chinese, holding the map in front of the driver so he cannot see, again stopping in the middle of the road to look at the map. You can put lipstick on a pig but it is still a Chinese tourist.

[hughben]

Looking at the photos from the original page (in pictures section) it's kind of ironic they visit tigers and elephants. If it could help put a halt to said creatures extinction on the planet, then great, but it wouldn't have any effect on these tourist types.

There are some pictures of men touching fed up looking ladyboys up there too.

[NongKhaiKid]

If they claim that coming to Thailand is "seeing the world", they have a huge surprise coming.

Seeing Pattays is hardly seeing Thailand so the world ... !

[rfukata]

Much the same thing was said about Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese just 20 years ago. Now they are very highly sought after. The Chinese deserve a break...often this is the first overseas trip for them, of course they are unfamiliar with things. Their 'odd' cultural habits are not meant to offend anyone, they do not realise that some things are best not done in public.

true but there are 1.3 billion Chinese compared to i.e. Japan with a population of 130 million. It'll take 10x times longer for the

Chinese to be accepted worldwide in my opinion as most Chinese tourists are first time travelers and not repeat travelers like the

Japanese, South Koreans, & Taiwanese.

[bigbamboo]

Pattaya – a resort known to many as "Thailand's Blackpool"

And to many more as "Thailand's Cesspool".

[patayayaya]

A Chines tourist going to Pattaya and saying "finally I am seeing the world." Oh my God Pattaya is not the real world as for the most it is the adult Disney world for sex. Also I cannot believe in the photo they are actually in the polluted water by a Pattaya but maybe compared to China's polluted water it seems clean!

these are sub-humans sub standards like dirty polluted water are the norm

[Thai at Heart]

They have a lot to learn from farang: steal the batteries from the tv remote control, ask for upgrade because 'on honeymoon' , steal the toilet paper, bargain with a vendor over 2 baht, etc etc etc

Most of it I would have never thought of them. Bargain over price with street venders Yes but really 2 baht.Maybe in my past life when 2 baht was a lot of money.

You give a new dimension to Cheap Charlie.

On another note the Chinese have such a bad reputation as tourists that the Chinese government has put out a book on how to behave in other countries.

I wonder if it mentions not stealing the batteries out of the remotes?

Or more recently a standoff between the aircrew on a Singapore Airlines flight and 30 plus Chinese tourists who had pocketed all the cutlery and wouldn't give them up until their tour guide convinced them they were embarrassing the homeland.

Brilliant.

[FangFerang]

My friends in hospitality do not like Chinese tourists. They say the Chinese are demanding, cheap, and loud.

I have not seen Chinese acting like that, so I take it with a grain of salt. Then again, I take everything with a grain of salt, including my own assumptions.

[FangFerang]

"Americans were still ranked the least popular foreign tourists by five different countries, including, tellingly, by Americans themselves. Brits and Germans fared little better."

I LOVE this.

[FangFerang]

Much the same thing was said about Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese just 20 years ago. Now they are very highly sought after. The Chinese deserve a break...often this is the first overseas trip for them, of course they are unfamiliar with things. Their 'odd' cultural habits are not meant to offend anyone, they do not realise that some things are best not done in public.

Well said. We are seeing Asian cultures emerging in a wide variety of ways. I think they will figure it out... But that takes time.

[bangkokrick]

A Chines tourist going to Pattaya and saying "finally I am seeing the world." Oh my God Pattaya is not the real world as for the most it is the adult Disney world for sex. Also I cannot believe in the photo they are actually in the polluted water by a Pattaya but maybe compared to China's polluted water it seems clean!

The Chinese tourist groups are hardly taken to Walking street or Soi 6. The are transported around the restaurants and the sight seeing areas like the floating market and the elephant/dolphin shows etc. Pattaya has a lot more to offer than the an 'Adult Disney world: as you put it.

[LuckyLew]

Are these hi-so tourists from China contributing to the Isaan economy by nailing walking street bar girls?

Or are they just tour groups being herded around in buses from stop to stop for a quick photo op?

[jalansanitwong]

Visiting Pattaya....... is seeing the world ? The Chinese have alot to learn.

Pattaya is the Wigan Pier of SEAsia . Lousy beach populated with retired plumbers , boilermakers and hobos from UK/Europe holding hands with Issan village hookers.

Being fair to the Chinese it is their first trip overseas.