"It was like being locked in a cave. China is eight hours ahead of England so whenever I rang home I always seemed to wake up my friends and they’d say, ‘---- off, why are you waking me up?’
English footballer Paul Gascoigne describes his time at Gansu Tianma in northwest China. 
The Telegraph 

"We are going to employ more local staff, pay more attention to local community needs for better education, health and environmental protection and promote local infrastructure construction."
 Zhou Jiping, vice president of China’s largest oil group CNPC
Reuters

“China seems to be embracing state capitalism more strongly, rather than continuing to move toward the economic reform goals that originally drove its pursuit of WTO membership.”
U.S. Trade Representative’s office in its annual report on Chinese compliance with World Trade Organization rules
Bloomberg

“I don’t like Russia. First of all, it robbed us of our territories. (Just google ‘border skirmishes’) Secondly, it massacred my compatriots. Thirdly, its disastrous influence continues to this day!”
Journalist Chen Baocheng, whose Weibo post was quoted in the The New Yorker

"Business facilities are not sufficient in the communities and people do not have outlets to spend their money."
An unanamed expert telling Taiwan's China Times that Chinese consumption still has a long way to grow.