been studying VPN & proxy lately (node offline bc of no Tor access).

-there's difference between VPN and proxies.

-there are lots of VPN tunnel protocols, among which OpenVPN is apparently blocked in China.

-there's Shadowsocks (SOCKS5) proxy initiated by a Chinese user to circumvent GFW and still widely used. Hero and legend, hope he's on nostr if not been jailed already.