In how many restaurants in India would you find staff who speak Mandarin? These types of incidents are part of the joy of travelling, and if you look at it in another way, your attempts at getting a glass of cold water are actually quite amusing. In China, people drink warm water. Its the standard thing. Cold water, if its straight from the tap might be unsafe, so they boil it. If you dont want hot water, you buy mineral water. It does kind of make sense. Chinese vegetarian restaurants around the world usually serve imitation meat dishes. Some people love it, some people hate it. Again, its pretty standard. Complaining about it is kind of like western vegans complaining about the ghee and curd that comes in almost every single Indian dish.