Holidays in China

We understand that the majority of teachers coming to teach in China are not only looking to further their career but also want to take some time to explore China. As China is such a large country it can be difficult to have a weekend due to the distances away unless you fly which can be expensive so the holidays and time away from work is the best time to travel. One thing that you might find a little strange about China is that when you have a holiday you often don’t get a day off as such rather than a rearrangement of working days. For example this year Mid-Autumn day which is a national holiday fell on a Thursday so everybody had the day off work….however that meant that everyone had to go to work on Sunday so there were no more days off than in a normal working week. This is very common and will happen a number of times throughout the working year in China, the rearranging of days can sometimes give you four days off allowing time for a trip although previously I have had to work 9 consecutive days, so sometimes it can also be a real pain.

If you are working in a public school then no doubt you’ll be looking forward to spring festival in late January/February time where you can expect to have somewhere between 4-6 weeks off. China is such a large country so realistically a month is how long you’ll need to get a good flavour and visit the main attractions. With the new high speed rails in China getting around is actually quite fast and its less than 5 hours from Wuhan to Beijing on the train. Your other main chance to have a holiday is in the first week of October where whatever school you’re working (training or public) you’ll receive a week off. We have our largest intake of teachers each September so they will have only been working a couple of weeks when this holiday comes around. These are the main two holidays you’ll have and although there are various bank holidays and long weekends at other times in the year these are your two main opportunities for an extended holiday and travelling.

The first year I came to China I decided not to travel around China as many people opted to do and I actually took advantage of the multi-entry visa you’ll receive when teaching in China and went to Australia for 2 weeks. It was nice to have a change; as much as I love being in China a break from Chinese food for a few weeks was much needed. Over the past few years I have managed to get around various cities and national parks in China and have always found travelling around the country pretty easy. Trains are affordable and comfortable and with the high speed rail linking Beijing to Guangzhou near the Hong Kong border in south via Wuhan moving between cities is relatively trouble free. The one thing you might want to consider is that your main holidays from schools will be during national holidays which are the time of year that many Chinese people will also choose to travel. Many Chinese people use this holiday to travel back to their home towns to visit their families so trains can be very busy during these periods of the year. Buying tickets can also be a bit of a hassle as you can only buy tickets ten days before your journey. There are plenty of ticket offices for buying train tickets scattered around all cities in China so you won’t have any problems locating a place to buy tickets although you may need to queue for a while.

The national holiday begins in China for a week starting tomorrow but I will be avoiding the rush of travelling and the trains and relaxing at home. I hope everyone enjoys their travels.

 

 

Training schools and public schools

One thing we often get asked by our applicants is the differences between the two main types of jobs available to foreign teachers that want to work in China, those being training schools and public schools.

If you are to join our program to come out in September 2014 its likely you will be placed in a public school, either a primary school, middle school or university as they always employ their foreign staff at the start of the academic year with the contracts expiring at the end of the school year in the following June. However if you opt to arrive in China at any other time of the year you will probably be working in a training school. Training schools are language schools of which there are centres aimed at both adults and children. Training schools are privately owned companies so obviously the day to day running works slightly differently to that of public schools. Teachers working at training schools will have the majority of their classes on week day evenings and over the weekend as the lesson times cannot clash with those of public schools. It’s likely the students you’ll be teaching will be from relatively wealthy families as their family have decided to pay fees to give them extra tuition out of school.

Training schools usually offer higher wages than public schools with similar class teaching hours although training schools often incorporate office hours meaning your entire working week is likely to be a little longer in a training school.

Classes are usually a lot more relaxed in training schools as its unlikely you’ll have a class of more than 12 students at one time whereas in public primary schools 40 is the average number of students per class. However in training schools there can be more involvement from the students’ parents who will sometimes be invited to observe the class which is something that is rare in public schools so there can be different pressures.

If you work in a public school then you will receive longer holiday especially around Chinese New Year where you can expect around a month off, at training schools over the course of a 12 month contract teachers will only have around 3 to 4 weeks holiday but will have more freedom to choose when they want their holidays and won’t just be restricted to the public holidays.

Overall there are quite a few differences between public and training school jobs in China with both having pros and cons. Depending on who you speak to you might get different opinions, positiove and negative about working in both. I believe that different people are suited to one or the other so the best thing to do is ask as many questions as you can during your interview when you apply to the program to make sure you are placed in the most suitable job for you.

 

 

We very much look forward to receiving your application soon. G2C

(False) Praise

Recent numbers show that there are currently around 600,000 foreigners living in the whole of China, whilst in Wuhan the number is around 30,000. Whilst outwardly this may seem like a large number, when you consider that there are over 10,000,000 people living in Wuhan that means that for every 300 Chinese people there is one foreigner (and it feels like less). This figure should be further qualified by remembering that ‘foreigner’ merely means non-Chinese. The term ‘Foreigners’ then does not necessarily connote a naturally cohesive group, the nationalities in Wuhan alone consist of British, American, Canadian, Australian, Czech, Russian, Japanese, Korean, French, German, Congolese, Somalian, Ghanaian.. (I could go on).

This is not to say that there aren’t areas around the city with high concentrations of foreigners, nor that finding a group of foreign friends isn’t both easy and for many inevitable. What I am trying to highlight is how it looks from the other side; for Chinese people who don’t work at training schools or popular foreign bars, seeing any foreign people is a fairly rare occurrence. The result of all this is that for most foreigners, being stared at, and indeed pointed at becomes something of an everyday reality. While this can be frustrating, much of the time and (particularly) on nights out it is the opposite. For many foreign teachers, walking into their school for the first time is accompanied by hushed whispers and wide eyes – I can only assume this is something akin to how celebrities feel. The children quickly treat you like a pop star every time you walk into class, mobbing you at every opportunity. Nights out can be even more ridiculous, getting invited to tables (by both men and women) and plied with alcohol is more common than not, in fact on several occasions myself and some of my foreign friends have been given a free bottle of whiskey by the establishment in return for sitting in a centrally-located table and being visible.

The other side of it has less to do with being a foreigner though, and more to do with Chinese manners. Speak one word of Chinese and you will soon be hailed as a linguistic superstar, by the mere fact of not being horribly deformed you will be told frequently how handsome you are whilst the mastery of basic tasks elicit widespread praise of your all-conquering genius. It is clear of course that this a way of people showing their politeness and for thoroughly unspectacular looking people like myself, when someone tells you how handsome you are it’s a fair bet that it isn’t entirely genuine. Yet the problem with being here for a year (or more) is that after a while some of it starts to seep in. All of a sudden you begin to feel that the way you seamlessly move from teaching the alphabet to numbers in your kindergarten class IS a sign of your vast intellect, that maybe a steadily receding hairline and shapeless body IS the hallmark of rugged handsomeness and that because you know the Chinese for how to order a bowl of noodles Fortune 500 companies will be queuing up to hire you and make use of your peerless Chinese skills.

It is only upon returning home that you look around and realise that people are much taller than you remembered, that gyms must have taken off in a big way since you were last at home and hey, why is no-one commenting on your piercing foresight for managing to arrange a taxi to pick you up from the airport?

At that point the occasional stares in the street feel like less of an inconvenience and the lure of being a cherished rarity grows. A second year in China all of a sudden begins to look like a far more attractive prospect…

 

 

Keeping up with information from home

Living halfway around the world, a lot of people are worried not just about keeping in touch with friends and family, but also keeping abreast of news and developments from home. In reality though, it is not particularly difficult nor is it something many people experience problems with.

News – keeping up to date on news from home is important to many people, and as such many people will find themselves becoming way too familiar with the BBC website. Whilst the BBC website is quite good with keeping up to date, for comment pieces both the Guardian and the New Yorker have some interesting articles. In terms of newspapers, buying foreign newspapers in China is difficult at the best of times, though there are some English language Chinese papers such as The China Daily (it isn’t great though). Other than that there is a CCTV news channel that is in English which has both Chinese and world news.

Sport – CCTV5 is the Chinese sports channel, though whoever is in charge of programming needs to take a long hard look at himself. Despite having the rights for the French Open Final for example, they opted to play coverage of a friendly volleyball game between China and Turkey (the final was eventually aired once the volleyball game had finished). CCTV5 has quite good coverage of the NBA, shows the Bundesliga, will play SOME tennis matches (usually Grand Slams) as well as badminton and table tennis amongst others. Getting a VPN is definitely a good option for those intent on watching sport from Britain as it will allow you access to BBC Iplayer which has MOTD and the Football League Show.

TV/Film – There are one or two Chinese channels that show the occasional foreign film or show, but for the most part it is a no-go. Cinemas will usually be showing a couple of different foreign films at any time which tend to be blockbusters (art house fare gets pretty short shrift..). For those who prefer not to download things, Netflix can be a good option, though again you will need a VPN to use it.

Music – Visit baidu.com or music.google.cn and you will find that you can download songs through those platforms. I have no idea if this is illegal or whether China just does not care one bit about the copyright laws regarding music but one way or another –enjoy.

Whether it is news, sport, music or film there are a myriad of ways in which you can keep up to date. Whilst inevitably you will miss out on some things (what the hell is twerking?) for the most part it is not that hard to stay in the loop.

Bargaining

Having a conversation with someone preparing to come out to China recently, I was asked about bargaining. ‘Is it true that there is one price for Chinese people and one for foreigners?’ I was asked. In a nutshell – no (with some exceptions – I’ll get to them later). In fact more pointedly I was asked if the cost of food was a variable price that would vary depending on your haggling ability. Again – no.

When buying things like noodles or dumplings from small vendors you will be charged the same price as everyone else – it is written on the wall. In fact that goes for almost all food; in restaurants, street stalls and fast food joints all items will have a set price so you won’t need to worry about getting ripped off. In fact even things such as vegetable markets do not really involve haggling, the price is written on signs (if you can understand it that is), and like anywhere else you will be charged on weight. Larger expenses like hotel bookings, train tickets and flights are also things that have clear prices that are not subject to change. Taxis (licensed ones at least) all use a meter, so again the cost is non-negotiable and directly related to the length of your journey. In fact in general daily life you will probably not come across many situations where the price is variable and dependent on how much you are willing to bargain.

Having said that, there are times when bargaining is a necessary part of getting a reasonable price and these are usually fairly obvious. Small independently-run shops and market stalls are probably the most common arenas where the price told to you is probably not the price you should be paying. As a foreigner it is likely that you will be quoted an initial price higher than a Chinese person may, however if you are a willing haggler then this is no barrier to getting a fair price. My general rule with bargaining is that if I consider it a fair price then I’ll pay, though this does mean that I probably pay a higher price than I should be at times. As someone who is both uncomfortable with and poor at bargaining I am certainly in no position to be giving advice about tactics and tricks, though I thought I would give a few examples of times I have attempted to haggle down a price.

Buying a suit in Shanghai – Myself and a friend decided to go to Shanghai during the National Holiday, buy suits and do a tour of the swankiest bars we could find (we were broke after the first one). I settled on a grey suit from a less than reputable seller. She said it would cost 2500RMB. I said I’d pay no more than 2000RMB. She quickly agreed with a smile on her face. I think I lost that round.

Buying headphones – Needing a new pair of headphones I headed to Guangbutun where there is a mall full of vendors selling all manner of electrical goods. After looking at the items on show at one store and pretending like I had some idea of the quality of the goods I settled on a suitably shiny pair of headphones. The owner wanted 50RMB. I offered 20RMB. The owner maintained that it was 50RMB. I quickly assented and paid the money. Definitely lost that round.

Buying shoes – This one was actually a friend of mine who was searching for shoes to buy from a number of stalls. Finding the only pair that fit him he asked the owner and was told that the price was 400RMB. We made it clear that we only actually had 240RMB on us at that point. With a grumble the owner agreed. We may have won that round.

 

 

Travelling To Zhangjiajie Part 3

Rising from an uncomfortable night sleeping in a tent, we continued walking down the road. The dwellings soon disappeared and we were mostly surrounded by forest again, with good views of the surrounding pillars. Going off road slightly we hacked our way to the edge of a precipice upon which a large rock was scenically positioned. As a photo opportunity it was pretty impressive, though if I was on my own I would definitely not have done it – the drop was pretty far. Preferring to hide my pant-wetting fear I followed the others out there, staying well clear of the edges the whole time.

Back on the road we soon came upon the coach drop-off point as well as the cable car terminal and were once again surrounded by hordes of tourists. Looking for a little more peace and quiet we walked further down the road, and decided that it might be a good time to descend to the valley floor. Preferring not to use the cable car (or continue on the road) we cut into the forest and started down a fairly steep ravine. The path we were following was little more than a track, and one not used, I suspected, in quite some time. Making our way down in single file I was somewhat worried to see Bobby leap in panic in front of me: finding out that it was a large yellow and black snake did little to soothe my nerves. Times like that make me realise how much I appreciate the lack of dangerous animals in the UK.

Somewhat more hurriedly than before, we finished our descent and got back on the road. Deciding that this time we would actually camp in the woods, rather than in front of someone’s restaurant, we thought it might make more sense to look for a campsite earlier than 8pm. Cutting through a field and over a small river we found a fairly secluded spot and set about clearing a place for the tent. At that point we realised that clearing a campsite is a massive pain in the arse, and took a break to go exploring. Exploring may be too grand a word for it; most of the time was spent laughing at Sean taking a dump behind a large rock and taking pictures with a dead frog – the Discovery Channel it was not.

The benefit of buying such a cheap and low-quality tent was that we were not at all worried about leaving it for a while to stock up on food and drink. Not wanting to saddle ourselves up with copious amounts of beer, we opted to go for a more readily-transportable drink. We ended up purchasing a spirit that I’m pretty sure you could run a car engine on, of which the only thing that could be said in its favour is that it was cheap. With not much else to do, we returned to the campsite and relaxed for the remainder of the evening.

This was the last night of our short trip, with us making the journey back to Wuhan the next day. While it had been somewhat slapdash in its inception, the trip had been pretty much everything I’d wanted. The last thing to be done was have a decent night’s sleep before we were travelling again the next day. Something that sadly was denied to me, Bobby and Sean by the bellowing snores of Rich – to be honest I was more impressed than annoyed.*

*not a feeling shared by Sean. He spent the night kicking and cursing Rich who remained deeply asleep the whole time.

KTV - Karaoke

Before I arrived in China I had no idea how popular karaoke is, but more importantly how seriously some people take it. I never realised that by getting up and having a sing song for a laugh with my friends or colleagues I could receive such comments as “You’re not very good at singing” and “I didn’t like that”….it’s fair to say the Chinese can be a little blunt.

My first visit to one of the many KTV’s located around Wuhan was whilst I was at my first school to celebrate Teacher’s day (One of the many arbitrary holidays out here). Our party included me and about 20 Chinese women. I thought…well its karaoke, we’ll probably get a few drinks down us and then all get up and have a go. No such luck, the room was deadly silent as I was handed the microphone and told to choose a song, as their guest it would be rude of me not to sing first. Nobody was talking waiting in anticipation; I rushed through the computer trying to find a song….I settled on Michael Buble – Home, best of a bad bunch. Everyone stared at me as I started to sing…now fortunately for me my dulcet tones won over the crowd before the first chorus and everyone was on their feet applauding. But for you guys out there not quite as talented as me, be worried as they can be a tough crowd. Before I knew it I was rapping Eminem, imitating the rat pack and working the crowd Freddie Mercury style. Some people still talk about that night, but mainly because I got too drunk and was sick in the corner, not really anything to do with the singing.

KTV is extremely popular here amongst all age groups so I’d be surprised if you managed to spend any length of time in China without going a few times. It’s best to not get embarrassed as Chinese people don’t have the same attitude, getting up and singing in front of people doesn’t seem to bother them one bit. KTV can be a great night especially before heading to a bar. Each party gets their own room fully equipped with microphones and a plasma screen to follow the lyrics of your chosen song as well as table service for ordering food and drink, although be careful because the bill can really add up. Some of my best nights out in China have been in a big group of about 20-30 people at KTV, everyone can have a go at singing but it’s not the focal point and has a similar feel to a house party. Although I have been with just 3 or 4 other people before and it’s not quite the same, many Chinese people like going in small groups so they can get more singing time…work on their pitch, needless to say that’s a straight red from me.