Could you suggest how to use Alipay or WechatPay as a foreigner without a local bank account?
Things like city bikes are great and very convenient. In Kaohsiung it used docking stations and a metro card. From what I hear, in China they are dockless, and use mobile apps (which means an expensive roaming data plan) and Chinese payments. These may be convenient for locals, but very user-unfriendly to foreigners. Locals probably have their routine figured out, whereas foreigners are probably going to visit new places, and will therefore use bicycles more.
I was able to link my foreign amex to wechatpay a year or two ago. I couldn't deposit money into it, but it let me at least open a wechatpay wallet. Then I could use red envelopes from acquaintances and give them the cash equivalent.
This may not work for more than street-food-level expenses though.
Alipay actually has expanded across the world - you can register an account with a normal EU credit card or bank account, and even pay with AliPay at many stores in Europe (even in cash-loving Germany DM is accepting it)
Things like city bikes are great and very convenient. In Kaohsiung it used docking stations and a metro card. From what I hear, in China they are dockless, and use mobile apps (which means an expensive roaming data plan) and Chinese payments. These may be convenient for locals, but very user-unfriendly to foreigners. Locals probably have their routine figured out, whereas foreigners are probably going to visit new places, and will therefore use bicycles more.