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This is my second time in Hohhot/Huhhot/Huhehaote, the capital of Inner Mongolia, China. I've been here one week this time.

But despite many scouting missions I seem to be unable to find what I think of as a regular Internet cafe or cafe with free Wi-Fi.

A place that provides somewhere to sit, power sockets, and a Wi-Fi signal you can connect to. Typically you pay for coffees and snacks but not for online time or megabytes.

Now that I know the characters I have been able to find many "Internet bars" 网吧. But they never have Wi-Fi and their computers only ever have a very limited version of Windows with a very limited version of Internet Explorer 6. The majority of modern websites, including Stack Exchange are not usable from them.

I'd prefer a cosy place that has food as well as hot drinks, but really I'm interested to know if there's any place at all with Wi-Fi and electricity. I'm right near the University where things like this would usually be.

(For comparison, such places are trivially easy to find in Seoul, and even common in Ulaanbaatar!)

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  • I've asked a related question about how to find such places generally in China, but this question is specifically about finding one in this provincial capital city.
    – hippietrail
    Jan 3, 2014 at 7:34
  • I wonder if it made sense to ask how to find something like this by entering the correct Chinese search term into a search engine?
    – uncovery
    Jan 3, 2014 at 9:22
  • The only search term I have been able to find is "网吧", which leads to the places full of smoking network gamers on PCs with only IE6 and no Wi-Fi...
    – hippietrail
    Jan 3, 2014 at 9:25
  • That's why I am suggesting you to ask a question somewhere what to enter into google to find the right thing :)
    – uncovery
    Jan 3, 2014 at 9:28
  • Well I got 网吧 from Wiktionary as the only term offered for "Internet cafe". I guess because it's the cultural equivlanet. But I'm holding out that they also have some "western style" ones too which may also get called 网吧. I just went on another scouting mision and found two cute cosy looking place, both closed probably on a New Year's break. One was called "Maggie's Kitchen". There's at least one large pub/bar called "Friday" which you can't see into from outside, and a big expensive-looking chain called Ming Tien Coffee Language, which I'm trying to find out more about on the the net.
    – hippietrail
    Jan 3, 2014 at 9:31

1 Answer 1

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Chinese Yelp is called Dianping -- the Hohhot section is here:

http://www.dianping.com/huhehaote

  1. Search for 咖啡 ("coffee")

  2. Click the button that says 总体评价 ("overall rating") to sort the highest rated shops to the top

  3. Click the first location, a cafe called 艾乐咖啡屋 ("Ai Le Coffee") on 赛罕区万达广场东区底商26-67号(近万达东巷) ("26-27 East Dishang Rd (cross road: East Wanda Rd) inside Saihan Wanda Plaza")

  4. Click the double chevron next to the text 营业时间、餐厅简介、特色等其他信息 ("additional information about this location")

  5. Find that 3 people have indicated this place has Wi-Fi: 分类标签：无线上网 (3) ("Tags: Wireless Internet")

Enjoy!

And if this place doesn't suit your fancy, try another on the list :)

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