I have to agree wholeheartedly with everything Dragonized said about foreigners in China. After the experience I had at 2 different Uni's, my best mate was a Chinese student and a non-teacher fellow countryman. The other teachers (with one exception) were all very difficult to get along with and had various issues that affected their personalities. (But don't we all right? it's called being human).
My experience underlines the 'diverse nature' of foreigners in China I suspect. Being relatively quiet, friendly and easy going and a non-drinker, didn't make it any easier to find good foreign friends. Location played a big part too because 2nd and 3rd tier cities have so few foreign teachers to make friends with to choose from in the first place.
Having said all that (not to mention the crap salary) I'm nutty enough to do it all over again. There was something surreal about the whole experience. Action adventure and excitement spring to mind! Just watch out for the low moods however, 'cos they WILL hit you.

When i first arrived in China years ago, I avoided other FT's, not because there was anything wrong with them but I'd decided to get the language under my belt first, so, instead of going out with the blokes i would study hard. However, since then I think I've been most fortunate after reading other posters experiences with fellow FT's- nearly all the FT's I've worked with and have bumped into have been far more interesting than the folks at home.. and nicer to boot. Some of them have been odd-balls but as you suggest we all have our strange ways.

I'm not so sure about the criticism steeped on some FT's that they wouldn't be able to get a job in their own countries so have to work in China. This may be true, but it is also possible that this is a sad reflection on their own societies which maintain that if you don't tow the line and act the same as everybody else we'll reject you. Also we have to be careful about decrying others who look and act a bit different. Whenever the police arrest somebody and it's subsequently proven he's committed terrible crimes like mass murders and or child killing they always look deceptively normal. There's been a recent case in England of a strange sounding and looking bloke arrested on suspicion of murder- I said straight away, he's innocent cos he looks and sounds too normal. The police did release him and arrested another chap-a more normal and nice looking bloke he appeared to be to everybody, he was loved by all; however, he has since admitted to killing a woman.(her body was found dumped in the snow on Christmas Day) Book, judge and cover come to mind.

You say you don't drink, well I know a chap who goes to all the FT shindigs and just drinky orange juice- nobody else cares.

We do have to be careful sometimes when we call people strange, it might be that we need to make changes ourselves sometime. I like other FT's around, they are fun.