Can you explain what you mean by safety issues? Having traveled to China a lot I've always been under the impression that it's quite safe so I'm assuming since you've bundled it with the firewall and surveillance that you refer to something to do with the government making one unsafe.
2. Crazy car drivers. I almost got killed twice during my short stay.
3. Laws. If something happened to you, you can never fight a case against them. It's always Chinese first vs foreigners.
4. Air quality isn't the best. That's a health issue, but just want to add it here.
4. Drunk people roaming at odd times. But this varies from city to city.
5. Food hygiene. (Also a health issue).
Just a few from the top of my head.
Other things include food safety. Most Chinese people buy infant formula outside China because they dont trust what China has to offer.
Is that really true? Considering there must be hundreds of millions of parents I seriously doubt most of them buy outside of China.
i heard stories from some places that they had to ration the selling of formula lest a few chinese students would swoop in and buy up everything in order to send it home and sell it there at a profit.
but i agree, it's probably not most of them. most shops do stock formula, and they wouldn't if no-one would buy the stuff locally (which may also be imported).
greetings, eMBee.
as for surveillance, at this point i don't know a country on this planet where surveillance is not a concern.
for safety, you need to learn how to keep yourself safe. but that applies to china as well as eg. downtown los angeles. i have been warned not to go there as it would not be safe. but i never had any issues. china is very safe. yes, you hear horror stories. but you need to scale those in relation to the size of the country. for every horror story about china, you can find you 10 such stories about the US.
greetings, eMBee.
Last year I stayed in China for quite some time. I traveled across various provinces and cities and I found I was in love with Hangzhou. I wanted to settle down there. After all, it seemed perfect.
A month later, I flew back to my home. Days passed and I realized how much of a blunder I would've made if I had settled down there. Especially don't under-estimate the firewall, surveillance and safety issues. If these attributes don't matter, you'll be fine, but, if you're a developer, VPN isn't sustainable and will get frustrating after a while.
However, this is all my personal experience. Just my $0.02.