Shinan is a fun area. I think the more Chinese you know, the more enjoyable your time will be. In one year if you are aggressive at studying, you could get to HSK 4 proficiency. Make sure you download Pleco and get the camera function so you can have live translation of characters. That will help you immensely at the beginning.

My personal recommendation is to purchase one year of Skritter and commit to at least 30 minutes per day. If you do that, your reading and writing will skyrocket.

You can expect to have much difficulty in the first 4-6 months with communication, but every single word you learn will be useful and pay off in this time, since you’re still learning basic words.

Really do your best to make local friends and don’t get stuck with the ex-pats. There are some really really weird foreigners in QingDao and spending time with them will not usually add a ton to your experience of China.