East Asia: What Links Its Countries, What Divides Them, and Basics for Visitors

East Asia, home to 1.6 billion people, is held together by Chinese influence and pulled apart by very different modern histories. China gave the whole region its writing system (Chinese characters), Mahayana Buddhism and Confucian philosophy, yet Japan's skyscrapers and consumer culture have little in common with North Korea's austerity or with Mongolia's traditional nomadic life. This overview paraphrases Wikivoyage's region guide and leaves out its lists of hotels, shops and sights.

Map of East Asia's cities, regions and countries (photo: Cacahuate, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikivoyage).

Who is in it

Places the guide covers include China, Japan, North and South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and Mongolia, with the Russian Far East also geographically part of it but covered with Russia. Vietnam shares cultural ties but is usually placed in Southeast Asia, and Mongolia, though classed here, has strong ties to Central Asia. The geography runs from Mongolia's arid steppes and northwestern China's deserts to south central China's rice paddies and Okinawa's subtropical beaches.

Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet (photo: Coolmanjackey, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikivoyage).

A short history

China developed its first civilizations about when Egypt, Babylonia and India did, and stood out for thousands of years. The Han and Tang dynasties are seen as golden ages. The Mongol conquest under Kublai Khan was absorbed into Chinese culture as the Yuan dynasty, which moved the capital to Beijing. The Great Wall, built against nomad raids, mostly failed as a deterrent, and Chinese courts and nomads had a symbiotic relationship in which silk, iron and princesses bought promises of peace and good horses. The Yuan and Qing dynasties were both founded by invaders from beyond the wall. Tibet was relatively independent of China for most of history, and Xinjiang has more in common culturally with Central Asia.

Main stupa of Erdene Zuu, built on the ruins of Karakorum, the Mongol Empire's capital under Chinggis Khan (photo: Chongkian, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikivoyage).

Chinese dominance ended in the 19th century as Western powers forced unequal treaties on the region. Commodore Matthew Perry's Black Ships forced isolationist Japan open in 1853, leading to the Meiji Restoration of 1868, after which Japan modernized quickly and built a colonial empire that took Taiwan and Korea. China lost territory and control of tributaries, and the imperial system collapsed with the Republic of China, founded by Sun Yat-sen in 1912. World War II was disastrous for the region. The Communists won the Chinese Civil War in 1949 and the Nationalists withdrew to Taiwan. Korea split into a communist north and a capitalist south; the Korean War lasted three years and ended with an armistice in 1953 but no peace treaty, so the two Koreas remain officially at war.

Japan rose first from the war, followed by the Asian Tigers (South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong). After Mao Zedong's death ended the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping introduced market reforms that the guide says lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty, and China overtook Japan as the second largest economy in 2009. Hong Kong and Macau returned to Chinese rule in the 1990s with special status. North Korea has refused market reforms.

Languages and writing

Japanese, Korean and Mongolian are distinct languages, and Japanese and Korean are unrelated to Chinese though full of Chinese loan words. In China Mandarin is the official language and lingua franca, with mutually unintelligible dialects such as Cantonese and Minnan; most people who are not elderly understand at least basic Mandarin. Cantonese is the main language in Hong Kong and Macau. Written Chinese is more or less the same across varieties, so a written message can sometimes cross language barriers, but meanings drift: the characters 手紙 mean “letter” in Japan and would be taken as “toilet paper” in China. Mainland China and Singapore use simplified characters, and traditional characters are used elsewhere. English is taught in school but is rarely spoken confidently, mostly out of fear of mistakes.

Chinese calligraphy (photo: Felix Andrews (Floybix), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikivoyage).

Getting there and around

Citizens of most Western countries need no visa for Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and Mongolia, but need one in advance for mainland China and North Korea, which can be visited only on a guided tour. Chinese embassies issue visas only to citizens and residents of their host country, so apply at home. The main air gateways are Hong Kong, Tokyo, Seoul, Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou and Taipei. By land, the Trans-Siberian Railway links Russia to Mongolia and China, and a train from Vientiane, Laos to Kunming, China began in 2023.

Within the region, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan have modern rail networks that do not connect to other countries. Japan's Shinkansen is fast and reliable but pricey, and China's high-speed network is the longest in the world. Mongolia has a single railway line, through Ulaanbaatar. Traffic drives on the left in Hong Kong, Macau and Japan and on the right elsewhere. Big cities have jams and costly parking, and their public transport is among the best anywhere, so the guide advises against driving in them.

The Trans-Mongolian train crossing the Gobi (photo: Clay Gilliland, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikivoyage).

Doing, eating, drinking

Baseball is hugely popular in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, hot springs are part of the culture in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, and Go, Chinese xiangqi, Korean janggi and Japanese shogi are widely played. Karaoke began in Japan, and Korean pop and television have a following across Asia and, since the 2020s, the West. Tipping is very rare. Costs are low in Mongolia and rural China, on par with Western countries in Japan, and a little lower in South Korea, Taiwan, Macau, Hong Kong and big Chinese cities.

East Asian cuisines are extremely varied. Chopsticks are the main utensil, rice is the staple (wheat in northern China and Mongolia), and tea is the quintessential drink, usually taken without milk or sugar. Many “Chinese” dishes served in North America do not exist in mainland China, Taiwan or Hong Kong. Vegetarians fare best in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and the Han Chinese heartland, but should ask about oyster sauce and lard. Legal drinking ages are 20 in Japan and 18 in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea.

Street food in Beijing (photo: Benreis, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikivoyage).

Respect and safety

The guide asks visitors not to treat East Asians as a single “Asian” race, since Chinese, Japanese and Koreans value the unique aspects of their own cultures. Political status (Taiwan, the two Koreas, Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang) and colonial and war history are touchy subjects. Elders are respected and people tend to communicate indirectly. East Asia is one of the safest regions for violent crime. The main hazards named are earthquakes in China, Japan and Taiwan, summer typhoons on the coasts, harsh winters, heavy air pollution in northern Chinese industrial cities, and unrest in Tibet and Xinjiang.

Sources

• Wikivoyage contributors, East Asia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Photos credited in their captions, each under its own licence (CC BY-SA 2.0, 3.0 and 4.0). Changed here: rewritten in hubnx's own words and shortened; listings, edit links and travel details that go stale are left out. Our version stays CC BY-SA 4.0; rewritten in hubnx's own words.