Know what you're drinking: Wherever you go, whatever your reasons for visiting, you'll be offered baijiu or, if you're lucky, a high-end distilled wine called mao-tai. Baijiu is a grain alcohol, like rough grappa but stronger, that throws even the die-hard Sinophiles quoted in this story for a loop. A few descriptions they've offered: "moonshine," "firewater," "vile," "tastes like grass clippings," "you'll taste it for a week." Increasingly, red wine is being drunk in the bigger cities and is quite trendy, but some Chinese will mix it with Coke. Mao-tai with green tea is also popular.

Know how to get out of drinking it: Claim an illness or an allergy: The Chinese will always understand, as many are allergic themselves.

Start Weak, Finish Strong: It's best to abstain early in the evening rather than to refuse shots later on. Just make sure you have a few drinks at some point with the most important colleagues or hosts. It'll come off as a polite concession, where an early cutoff might seem like weakness or distrust.

Reach for the beer: For obvious reasons, this will go down smoother in short drafts.

Be a Woman: They're not expected to drink, or to drink as much. Peer pressure on women to keep pace will not be nearly as strong.

Have a drinking buddy: The two of you can probably split the shots between you. "When someone tries to give both of you a shot," says Hessler, "you can try to take turns to minimize the damage."

Have a drinking stand-in: "I bring along a young person who can drink like a fish, and make him my designated drinker," says McGregor.

PART IV: The Impending Rise of the Dinner Party

By the time you read this, dinner parties may be far more common. Kathryn Scott, wife of the noted artist Wenda Gu, is an interior designer who just opened an office in Shanghai. She finds that the Chinese closed-door policy is starting to break down—at least at the top. "People are building big, expensive homes," she says. "They have a huge amount of money, and they want everyone to see it." But even the dinners that take place today are hardly the standard Western affair, according to Klein:

"There's not a cocktail hour beforehand. You either sit at the table immediately or it's buffet style and you arrive and the food's out."

"There's usually some beer on the table. People do get trashed in certain circumstances, but at most of the private dinner parties I've been to, it's a couple of beers and that's it."

"People try to have as many dishes as possible, the widest variety"—in essence, to re-create a banquet. "They want to show bounty, they want to show that they have meat. I love noodles and dumplings, but that's peasant food to them. When they have you over, it's pork dishes and a beautiful, elaborate fish with the head still on."