Phone home
I don't know what direct dial calls home cost, because nobody makes them. International calling cards, or
IP Cards
are a much cheaper and equally efficent way of calling home. They're available in 50Y or 100Y
units from small shops and newspaper stands, and usually have instructions on the back in both Chinese and English. You have to
dial a huge sequence of access numbers, card numbers, pin numbers and the actual number you want to dial before you get through.
I find a 100Y card gets me 15-20 minutes of time to the UK in the evenings. It's quite easy to find IP cards at significant
discounts, I get 100Y cards at half-price. Note that IP cards often only work in the city in which they are purchased.
Phone round the corner
Local calls in China are cheap. So cheap I have no idea what they cost.
Phones on the corner
If you haven't yet equipped yourself with a mobile phone you are not completely lost when out on the town.
There are numerous public phones which take IC Cards
, which is basically what we call a phone card,
dotted about the city. IC cards themselves are available from small shops and newspaper stands in 30Y, 50Y and 100Y flavours.
Unless you are planning on phoning home or making long calls to mobiles, 30Y will last you for months. Unlike IP cards, these work China-wide.
Many shops also have a metered telephone for public use, with a minimum charge of 0.5Y, and local calls are so cheap that any
bar or cafe will be happy to let you use their own phone if you ask nicely, especially if you are inviting other people to
come along (just don't start the phone-call with the words 'Mum, so great to hear your voice")