Whatever happened to the laonei and halfpats?

I remember some years ago, after the 2008 Beijing Olympics but before covid, of people trying to push this "halfpat" trend. The idea was that Chinese companies could employ Mandarin-speaking foreigners at Chinese wages. They finished Chinese university, passed CET 4, 5 6 or whatever and got regular jobs. 

There was also the laonei, 老内, which instead of being a good old outsider, was an insider, because they were so Chinese.  

Whatever happened to this cohort? Did they flee for the doors at the beginning of covid like so many others?  Or did they get locked out because they were teaching on 30 day tourist visas? I know a girl this happened to. Spoke Chinese, used to be married to a Chinese man, the whole deal. She was getting "stay" visas, whatever those were. I think those are if you break your leg or something and can't travel. They finally got tired of reissuing them and gave her the stamp of death[tm] in her passport.  Must leave China within 10 days.  Last I heard she was in California married to this European man she'd met here. 

Anyone know any of these who briefly called themselves laonei and halfpats?  

Where are they now? 

Good topic. In fact I'm a big "whatever happened to ..." nerd haha. For example I used to love the show "A Bright World" / 世界青年说 and sometimes I still check what the guests are up to, those of them on social media anyway. Some of them also have entertaining YT channels, such as (ordered from more to less entertaining IMO):

https://www.youtube.com/@wildhomestead - James Alofs

https://www.youtube.com/@PatrickinChina - Patrick Köllmer

https://www.youtube.com/@ThomasAfu - Thomas Derksen

https://www.youtube.com/@Ychinamedia - Raz Galor

https://www.youtube.com/@MYBY (inactive) - Blair Sugarman / Martin Wiley Woods

In general, my vague impression is that not many westerners stay in China for long unless they've built very strong ties there (family, work, etc).

I think there are plenty of people like this left. What mainly changes is that there are not as many new ones coming anymore these days. Has improved compared to just after COVID, but still far from the number of foreigners who came to China 15 years ago.

On 1/9/2026 at 5:51 PM, zhouhaochen said:

think there are plenty of people like this left.

Where are these halfpats?   Can they be  found online, on another site?  Or far away on some Chinese social media, having forgotten most of their English?

From those I know who were once in China and fully invested in their Chineseness, I gather most had their hand forced by covid, returning home to be with family and then forced to get a job as the China situation played out at a different speed to their own country.