High tech

Paying for everything with a phone移动支付

China skipped the card era almost entirely and went from cash to QR codes. Everything takes a phone: a taxi, a bowl of noodles, a temple donation box, a busker's amplifier, a street vendor selling four sweet potatoes. For years this was genuinely hard for visitors because the wallets required a Chinese bank account; that changed, and both major wallets now accept foreign credit cards directly, with a spending cap and a small fee above a threshold. Set it up before you fly, because it is the difference between moving through the country easily and being the only person in the queue holding notes.