I really mean this. Most of the time its embarrassing as fuck what they thought going in. Literally, "I thought it would be a dystopian totalitarian nightmare where everyone walked around like zombies." It's just amazing to me to see how much people buy into the propaganda they are told. You didn't have a single nugget of skepticism on that nonsense, homey?
Or, "OMG I did not expect to see [restaurant] here!" Yeah, it's a modern, thriving economy which by most measures that actually try and compare it fairly to the west puts it well ahead of America. You think some western companies would try and break into that market?
Another good one is, "I can't believe how nice everyone was!" This one is wild to me because it's an accidental admission to racism. "I thought the Chinese man would be duplicitous and suspicious of me as is the nature of his ilk!" Fuck off. I would suspect that almost anywhere in the world you go as a tourist most people either won't pay you much mind or be kind to you as the average person is generally fairly kind and welcoming. Or they want to sell you something because they make a living off tourists. There are exceptions, like the French who will treat you like shit and also try to sell you something while doing it, but otherwise this is true almost anywhere.
Oh and don't forget the final thoughts segment where they have to add in a caveat that of course you can't really trust anything any of the people from China say about their country or it's political situation because obviously they must be frightened that secret CCP agents will jump out of the shadows as soon as the travel vlogger walks away and take the poor Chinese citizen to a political re-education camp. Though, I admit that this sentiment is at least dying down and you don't see it as much.
Obviously these are the extremes but in all seriousness the travel videos of white people going to China and being blown away by it's progress are overall pretty based and it's nice to see the bubble of western propaganda being popped even if it's the most ridiculous liberals who are doing it.
if china were going to reincorporate chinese taipei they would run an intelligence campaign there to promote the standard of living in mainland china vs the island and promote the already present political party that is open to reincoporation to just sweep an election or two thus forcing the west's hand to do a messy and bloody coup which then would provide justification for violent intervention by china to liberate the island