[cneurotic]

Lived in China for a while. Us (admittedly, extremely white) American ex-pats had a very fratty attitude toward "the baij."

Maybe it's because we could only afford the cheap stuff — but any baijiu we got our hands on was really, really nasty. Only palatable with a 1:25 Sprite solution.

[darawk]

I've tasted expensive Baijiu. It's also pretty nasty, possibly even moreso to my taste than the cheap stuff. I think it's one of those machismo things where everyone pretends they like something that is objectively terrible to prove their manhood, or something. Comparable to ultra-bitter IPAs in the west.

[meddlepal]

My roommate brought some of this stuff back with him when he went out to China a year ago. He told me it gave him the most terrifying nightmares ever, so I've kept it on my shelf and avoided it so far.