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I taught chinese students how to fly in Phoenix, AZ before they went back to their respective airlines. Spoiler alert: you don't ever ever ever want to fly a chinese airline. The lack of critical thinking and rote answers (and cheating) was amazing. As was the total lack of work ethic, though being near death in an airplane a couple of times did usually get their attention, but they would just shut down entirely and freeze. All of this background information makes so much sense.
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Apr 14, 2017 03:41
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Last year, my physical science students bragged about how good they were at math and how the simple equations we used in class were too easy. This year, they poo poo the bed on the first trig problem in Physics and never recovered. Forget critical thinking problems, they were incapable of solving basic story problems. About seven or eight of them have learned in the mean time, and they were good students to begin with. As a teacher I'm comfortable with that proportion of the students making progress, especially in China.
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Apr 14, 2017 04:16
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Choco1980 posted:Reminded of the stories my best friend and her German born father tell about over in the Fatherland, where people just don't normally do ice cubes, and water is normally served room temperature. How people react weird if you ask for ice in your drink. I didn't bother asking for the most part. I can usually get by fine without. That being said, the in-laws went out of their way to make sure my American palate was satiated. The MiL always kept a supply of extremely sweet bread on hand and the sister-in-law brought freaking pull apart cheese strings back with her from the states. I didn't bring up wanting any of these, but I do appreciate the effort.
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Apr 14, 2017 04:37
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Grand Fromage posted:Students here are quiet good at standardized, multiple choice tests. If your testing requires no creative engagement with the material but just pure memorization of information, Chinese students are good at that. It's what the entire educational system is focused towards. Math is a good example, Let Us English can back me up on it. I don't do much math in my science classes because I am not a math person and you really don't need much for introductory astronomy, but there is a bit. The students are good at taking very clearly laid out, specific problems and solving them. If you ask them to create a problem, or to explain what the parts of the problem mean, they are completely incapable of it. Every student I have had in my classes has a worse understanding of math than me, which is impressive because I suck. This style (problem) also shows up a lot for study related to English, Finance, and Programming. People memorize an entire formula or set of phrases as opposed to learning individual parts and how they can fit together. So if you tell them "Use the ____ model and the values X, N, and T to calculate an answer" they can recall the formula and plug poo poo in, but if you provide values and a desired outcome they absolutely will not reason out "Oh, in this situation it seems like the _____ model would be applicable". I used to try and promote that being able to find and evaluate information was more important than being able to recall information, but it didn't really accomplish much. Edit: Regarding the first part of my post, there are sample topic and essay samples online for China english language exams that are semi-required in university (the TEM and the CET depending on your major), and the essay writing portion is always structured as: Write no more than 200 words about mobile phones in China, using all of the following criteria: A. In the last ten years, mobile phone usage has increased in China B 60% of internet usage in rural areas is via mobile phone C Mobile phones help families stay in contact So the essay result ends up just being those three prompts with a few padding words bookending each
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Apr 14, 2017 05:27
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The articles about how bad the American education system aren't necessarily wrong. There's a ton of things the United States needs to do to improve their education system. The system that was run in the United States was created for teaching people to get ready to work in factories in the early 1900s. It is 20fucking17. We are living in 2017 using a system that was developed to educate people to be successful in 1917. It's no wonder we are falling behind. But yes, China's educational system is far, far worse and is based on the civil service exam (keju) that people used to take literally CENTURIES ago to decide who could serve the imperial courts. If you think the American educational system is bad and couldn't be worse, China is the dude that says "yo check this out, hold my beer".
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Apr 14, 2017 06:20
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There's a lot of fair criticism to make, it's just that specific subgenre of "American education is failing, we should copy China and South Korea!" that have literally no loving idea what they're talking about.
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Apr 14, 2017 06:55
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Grand Fromage posted:There's a lot of fair criticism to make, it's just that specific subgenre of "American education is failing, we should copy China and South Korea!" that have literally no loving idea what they're talking about. Yeah; neither country has a stellar system in place, but I doubt that's going to change as long as China keeps lying and the USA continues making all the worst decisions possible. I do think the USA does a better job, but that's like winning a pants-pooping contest, soooo... The Slaughter posted:I taught chinese students how to fly in Phoenix, AZ before they went back to their respective airlines.  *whimper*
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Apr 14, 2017 06:58
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Summer has arrived all at once so now it's the time of year when the office is full of wasps because screens on windows are impossible technology.
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Apr 14, 2017 07:01
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Wasps can kill the cockroaches though
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Apr 14, 2017 07:34
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So, it sounds like critical thinking skills are being largely ignored in Chinese education (not that American education teaches enough of this, but better than nothing). Is there any point at which Chinese education brings in an element that isn't so memorization or multiple choice focused, such as in college or grad school? Never learning how to do anything but spit back answers would be a serious impediment to being competitive in business worldwide and also would make it hard to improve conditions in their country. I totally agree that American education is failing kids in its own way. I personally feel that my high school years were wasted, and this is coming from someone who took challenging classes. So, this isn't to rag on China by saying that the US system is great, but it sounds like China's way is notably worse.
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Apr 14, 2017 12:47
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Let us English posted:Q: Explain why scientists use the INternational System of Units (SI)
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Apr 14, 2017 16:46
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What is the standard of living for your kids? I know things aren't easy to compare across borders and continents, but are their basic needs and poo poo all being met? I ask because that seems to be a big problem re:American education. Lots of kids are just straight up hungry and don't have regular meals.
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Apr 14, 2017 18:06
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green chicken feet posted:So, it sounds like critical thinking skills are being largely ignored in Chinese education (not that American education teaches enough of this, but better than nothing). You should read "Catching Up or Leading the Way?" by Yong Zhao. He has an entire chapter on China and really does a good job of laying out what the American education system does well. Looking back, where I learned most in high school wasn't in the classroom. I was one of the senior captains on the hockey team, I did Student Government for four years (senior year I ran the pep rallies), I did drama and theatre for four years and I was in the Spanish and National Honor Societies. These activities taught me so much more than I can remember any class teaching me. I was a decent student (had a 3.6 on a 4.0 scale) but it was all of the extracurriculars that the school offered me that helped shape who I am as an individual. And it wasn't purely competition based. It wasn't always about being first or winning. In NHS we did all kinds of volunteer stuff. Working with the school to put on pep rallies was about working together. Playing hockey and helping to organize the team and stuff was about working with students from all grades. There is a large amount of a communal ethos that you are taught in school simply through osmosis that you 100% take for granted. Furthermore I had numerous part time jobs. Senior year I was night manager of a video store. Reffed soccer games for four years. Was a lifeguard in the summer for three years. China has none of this. Absolutely zero. It is focused on being number 1, the students are all ranked, literally every single thing the students do is with the goal of winning a competition or being 1st. They pit the students against each other and they spend 14 hours a day studying for exams to beat their classmates. Some students do have hobbies, like their parents make them practice the piano, but again it is to enter a competition to win to put on their resume. Some kids will try to play soccer but their parents will claim its a waste of time and make them go back to studying. I can not express how bad the rat race is in Chinese education. I'm speaking in generalities, of course there are individuals that are different and on the micro level you will find students who do not fit into the race at all, but the entire culture is toxic to the core. It is the Prisoner's Dilemma on a scale of 1.6 billion people that all deeply are obsessed with education. If everyone just took a step back and spent a little more time shaping who they were as individuals, the country and the world would be better off. But the .01% that did not would gain "an advantage" by having extra classes for stupid exams that do not mean a single poo poo, so no one will do it. China, as a culture, cares so deeply about education. And that's great. It really is. It's an amazing field to be in because it is just overflowing with money. The money never stops, which is great. It's much, much better being in education in China than in the United States from a financial point of view. I say that having hired American high school teachers to come to China that stay in China and do not go back to the United States, either with my former company or new jobs that they move on to in China. It's just that, by and large, what students are learning in Chinese schools is unhelpful and dumb and there is zero focus on trying to develop a well-rounded child. Again, I'm speaking in generalities, so apologizes if there is a Chinese individual here who takes this as an assault on who they are or who they have developed into. The Great Autismo! fucked around with this message at 02:02 on Apr 15, 2017 |
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Apr 15, 2017 02:00
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The Slaughter posted:I taught chinese students how to fly in Phoenix, AZ before they went back to their respective airlines. also, there is a book written by a few pilots called "Flying Upside Down" and it is about flying in China for a few years. It is supposedly a super harrowing read and I refuse to read it while I live in China. Here it is. https://www.scribd.com/doc/273231452/Flying-Upside-Down-pdf I will say that I will only fly Korean Air or Japan Airlines or Air Nippon or Hong Kong flight in China. And I'm usually flying them out of the country, mainly to Seoul, to catch a connection to Japan or the United States. Pretty much everyone says "DO. NOT. FLY. CHINESE. AIRLINES."
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Apr 15, 2017 02:12
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I had to scratch a lesson on the Physics of Music because the students didn't have the foundation knowledge the textbook assumed they would. What's a note, what's a chord, what's a reed, a woodwind instrument, a brass instrument, etc. It's a bummer too, because the AP exam is going to have music questions on it, but I simply didn't have the time to teach them the basics. It would have been weeks of class time just to have the appropriate background for one lesson.green chicken feet posted:Is there any point at which Chinese education brings in an element that isn't so memorization or multiple choice focused, such as in college or grad school? Never learning how to do anything but spit back answers would be a serious impediment to being competitive in business worldwide and also would make it hard to improve conditions in their country. There are those who recognize this exact problem, and every few years some business leader gets famous for talking about this problem, but no change results from it. Any change to the high-stakes tests that are the cornerstone of this system results in massive populist backlash. Businesses have learned to work around the system. I knew a few Hyundai engineers in Korea and they always said the foreigners did anything involving design, creativity, or innovation, and the lower-paid Korean engineers were basically used for lower level work. Reportedly, Samsung does the same thing. hi liter posted:What is the standard of living for your kids? I know things aren't easy to compare across borders and continents, but are their basic needs and poo poo all being met? These kids come form families rich beyond reckoning. Let us English fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Apr 15, 2017 |
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Apr 15, 2017 02:50
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For those interested: This book details the history of, and the numerous problems with the Chinese education system in more depth than we could do in the thread. https://www.amazon.com/Whos-Afraid-...+big+bad+dragon Let us English fucked around with this message at 03:02 on Apr 15, 2017 |
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Apr 15, 2017 02:51
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hi liter posted:What is the standard of living for your kids? I know things aren't easy to compare across borders and continents, but are their basic needs and poo poo all being met? Some of our students are so rich that parents literally visit the school in a private helicopter because cars are for poor people. None of them are in this sort of situation. It'd be cool if someone else teaches in a poorer school to give that perspective but me/Let us English/Fleta Mcgurn have no experience with it.
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Apr 15, 2017 11:42
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Let us English posted:For those interested: This book details the history of, and the numerous problems with the Chinese education system in more depth than we could do in the thread. I didn't get this one signed the first time I met Yong (didn't have it with me) but I did get World Class Learners signed. All of his stuff is really good.
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Apr 15, 2017 12:09
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The people with no known title and no recognizable function at the school is a pretty common thing. When I worked in Zhengzhou at a college there was a guy who had the title of director who did nothing but drink baijiu and sit at a desk, staring off into space as he nursed his last hangover. All he did was drink in a dining room made specifically for him, his assistants, and the Communist Party apparatus at the campus. He would also try to get us all black out drunk at the mandatory banquets we had to go to for every Chinese and American holiday. We also had a useless office assistant who was supposed to help us do things, go to the bank, order things online, etc. because most the teachers spoke very little Chinese and couldn't do it for themselves. She was goony as gently caress and just browsed the computer all day or napped. She was the daughter of a former dean or something and since he died she got the iron rice bowl. We had an assistant who did help us, usually an intern who was rarely paid*, as is the custom in China, and they were always awesome. At an international school in Shanghai I taught at, a notable school where some of those "great" test scores come from, there was a librarian who was a complete and incompetent goon. He just smoked cigarettes and talked about motorcycles all the time and was mean to everyone in an entitled manchild way. His dad was the dean before the current dean or something and he got to sit in the library all day and smoke out on the side of the building instead of the designated smoke lounge. It was a well to do international school too so it wasn't the standard, smoke in any hallway you want situation. All the kids hated him too because he was always an rear end in a top hat to them as well. I just thought it was because we were foreign or because a couple of the teachers were serious alcoholics, drug addicts, or physically abusive with their girlfriends but the kids just told me he's just mean and useless. Not to self diagnose but I wouldn't be surprised if both of them were on the spectrum because they didn't seem to get social cues in either Chinese or English and Chinese people would just rip them apart in public or private for their behavior. It's more likely they were just spoiled and never had to develop socially because their parents did everything for them and they never developed during the brief period of quasi-independence they get in college. *It's super common for people to never get paid on time in China in the education sector. Assistants and teachers at state schools would go months without a paycheck. RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 04:31 on Apr 16, 2017 |
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Apr 15, 2017 16:56
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That director with nothing to do sounds like Sarnsung
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Apr 15, 2017 17:11
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:The people with no known title and no recognizable function at the school is a pretty common thing. When I worked in Zhengzhou at a college there was a guy who had the title of director who did nothing but drink baijiu and sit at a desk, staring off into space as he nursed his last hangover. All he did was drink in a dining room made specifically for him, his assistants, and the Communist Party apparatus at the campus. He would also try to get us all black out drunk at the mandatory banquets we had to go to for every Chinese and American holiday. We also had a useless office assistant who was supposed to help us do things, go to the bank, order things online, etc. because most the teachers spoke very little Chinese and couldn't do it for themselves. She was goony as gently caress and just browsed the computer all day or napped. She was the daughter of a former dean or something and since he died she got the iron rice bowl. We had an assistant who did help us, usually an intern who was rarely paid*, as is the custom in China, and they were always awesome. Thanks for the information; this was an illuminating read! "Bob" is the first example we have at our school of this kind of pointless guangxi position. The thing I don't understand is why none of the teachers seemed to pick up on it. When Nancy told me the details, I asked her point-blank if this was a guangxi thing, and she said she didn't know. What else could it be? She's not very concerned with saving face or promoting the company- she was ranting to me in the first place, after all- but she didn't seem to want to say why she thought Bob had been hired. I am lucky to always be paid on time here, and I doubt my boss would allow us to e paid late without some warning, if at all. I wasn't as lucky in Korea, where I was dutifully paid on time for my regular classes, but frequently late for my overtime classes (for which I was also forced to pay a "room rental fee" even though I had tried to refuse the classes and I was using my regular classroom, which was also the only room I was allowed in.) Grand Fromage posted:Summer has arrived all at once so now it's the time of year when the office is full of wasps because screens on windows are impossible technology. Probably bad for healthy. Incidentally, the AC units being out of commission means we'll have fewer "If you leave the windows open, the cold air will go out." "But it's not healthy to have all the windows closed!" conversations this year. Hopefully. green chicken feet posted:So, it sounds like critical thinking skills are being largely ignored in Chinese education (not that American education teaches enough of this, but better than nothing). Chinese university is a four-year party, just as in Korea or Japan. After killing yourself to get in, you coast. When we tell the students that Western universities are usually a lot more demanding than high schools, they don't believe us. Hard lessons await. Also, I bolded part of your entry because that's exactly what happens. hi liter posted:What is the standard of living for your kids? I know things aren't easy to compare across borders and continents, but are their basic needs and poo poo all being met? Extremely high at home (parents pick them up in Mercedes SUVs and Porsches, international travel is common, everyone has multiple iPhones, etc.) and extremely lovely on campus. Their basic needs are being met in the sense that they have free food at appointed mealtimes, a place to sleep, bottled water to drink, and a place to wash, but if you actually look at how they live, it's pretty crap: - The food is rotten sometimes and disgusting all the time. Even the rice is bad. Everyone hates school lunch, but if you look at countries like France, you can see it's not impossible to provide schoolchildren with a healthy, filling lunch. Considering Sichuan is the breadbasket of China, it's doubly shameful. When our kids are lucky, a teacher will look the other way while they order food for delivery, which has to be handed over through the fence. They can get passes to leave campus, but usually not just to get food. - There is no heat or A/C in their dormitories. - They sleep four to a room. - There is no electricity, even in the bathrooms and common spaces. I'm not sure if there's never any or if it's just off between certain hours, but the kids don't ever seem to be in their dorms except during appointed sleeping times, so it might not really matter. - There is no school store or anywhere to buy snacks, drinks, etc. This would matter less if the kids weren't squirreling food away in all their possessions and eating constantly in the classrooms. - There is no student space, like a lounge or a kitchenette or anything. Kids therefore spend a lot of time seeking out empty rooms, bathrooms, etc. - There is no health support of any kind. - The school facilities are very nice, but not maintained. As you may have gathered from my previous posts, things are very dirty and usually broken. This isn't particularly unusual by Chinese standards- I think- but when you consider the cost of the school and the luxury to which these kids are accustomed, it's kind of odd. The Great Autismo! posted:You should read "Catching Up or Leading the Way?" by Yong Zhao. He has an entire chapter on China and really does a good job of laying out what the American education system does well. This post rules. Yeah, the lack of extracurriculars sucks. We've been trying to have clubs and stuff for years; the kids haaaaaaaaate it and get annoyed with us, even if it's something they like. I was in charge of the Drama Club last year and the kids never once stopped complaining that I was making them do awful stuff like play improv games and read lines and poo poo. They ASKED for a Drama Club. That's what a lot of stuff here feels like: "We want XXX! It's so important! We bought all the stuff! We are so excited! Oh, wait, I have to do something? UGGGHHH WHY. Why are you making the students do something, I don't understand." So dumb. So much time wasted.
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Apr 17, 2017 06:41
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Last year, Florp and I both read a speech at graduation. The kids did a musical performance; they learned how to play the ukulele just for the event. There were proud parents everywhere. I cried like a four-year-old and had to force myself to leave the room so that I would stop hugging everyone. This year? No graduation. Nobody wants one. None of the teachers are happy with the graduating class and none of the kids give a poo poo. Tomorrow is their last day and I'm guessing half of the kids won't even show up. This kind of apathy is why I'm happy to be leaving. I can't believe that we've ALL given up on these kids. Even me, and I never give up on anyone. It's just so depressing to have worked this hard for two years and have nobody give the tiniest poo poo. Ugh. Ten more weeks.
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Apr 19, 2017 04:21
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Fleta Mcgurn posted:Ugh. Ten more weeks. what sort of fire bomb mic drop poo poo do you have planned?
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Apr 19, 2017 05:36
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Fleta Mcgurn posted:Last year, Florp and I both read a speech at graduation. The kids did a musical performance; they learned how to play the ukulele just for the event. There were proud parents everywhere. I cried like a four-year-old and had to force myself to leave the room so that I would stop hugging everyone. this is what happened to my company when i was on my way out this past winter. it means it's time to leave your job and find a new one
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Apr 19, 2017 05:48
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The Great Autismo! posted:this is what happened to my company when i was on my way out this past winter. it means it's time to leave your job and find a new one YUP. We're all leaving this year except for one foreign teacher, and I think they would leave if they thought they could get a similar job easily. ladron posted:what sort of fire bomb mic drop poo poo do you have planned? I plan on reporting the American partner schools to NAIS. It probably won't matter because this program brings in so much money for them, and as an alumna of an independent school, I know how desperate they are for money. However, Rihanna told me today that students are planning to leave because they've realized they can just pay money and get their US diploma, and apparently there is a good chance this program will not exist next year. I don't know if that's true, but it wouldn't really surprise me at this point. Oh, they offered my husband the position of principal next year. I think they were looking for a way out, themselves.
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Apr 19, 2017 05:56
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I'm hoping to come through Chengdu before y'all bounce would be cool to meet y'all before you go. Might be late May if people are around.
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Apr 19, 2017 05:57
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The Great Autismo! posted:I'm hoping to come through Chengdu before y'all bounce would be cool to meet y'all before you go. Might be late May if people are around. We'll still be around. Come on by, we know where to buy unleaded beer.
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Apr 19, 2017 06:40
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The Great Autismo! posted:I'm hoping to come through Chengdu before y'all bounce would be cool to meet y'all before you go. Might be late May if people are around. Yeah!! That would be very cool! Unless our program folds so spectacularly that we're already gone....I am joking but maybe not 100% joking. 
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Apr 19, 2017 07:40
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I'm really enjoying the thread, thanks for making it.  I'm interviewing with a company based in Beijing for English teaching either in the summer or fall this year.That said, I have a few questions: 1.) With how prevalent smoking is in China, do you ever have issues with underage students using tobacco/alcohol? What do you do if you catch them with possession in school? Is there a different cultural approach to underage smoking/drinking in China versus America (ex: that PSA ad with Grandpa Zhou passing alcohol to junior)? 2.) What do you do to remember students' names as a newer teacher? I'm a visual memory-kind of person, so it can be a struggle for me with remembering names.  3.) If you had to choose, is there any one thing you really wish you should have known in preparing before coming to China? Or to expect after getting there? Thanks! Appreciate the stories and responses. Teriyaki Koinku fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Apr 21, 2017 |
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Apr 21, 2017 21:51
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Teriyaki Koinku posted:I'm really enjoying the thread, thanks for making it. smoking is pretty prevalent and the idea of "underage" doesn't really compute. like 7-11 will sell middle school kids alcohol all the time. i taught a "fun with literature" class in 2012 and it was a group of 7th graders, and three of the girls went and each bought two Rio drinks, they are like mix fruity drinks. they drank one before class and i saw they each had another one so i took them away. the girls were super chatty and actually did a really good job in class though. i didn't know what to do with the alcohol after class so i gave it to the receptionist and she just gave it back to the girls on the way out. most students pick english names so learning names isn't too difficult. even then learning their chinese names isn't that difficult, but i've been here for a while, so maybe it actually is and i'm just used to it. come with an open mind. don't look up pictures on the internet or expect it to be a certain way. you'll find everything interesting and fascinating then. (ideally) if you don't mind me asking what company are you applying for in beijing?
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Apr 22, 2017 00:11
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The Great Autismo! posted:most students pick english names so learning names isn't too difficult. even then learning their chinese names isn't that difficult, but i've been here for a while, so maybe it actually is and i'm just used to it. I've heard that many Chinese people prefer English speakers to use their chosen English name, because the odds of a non-Mandarin-speaker actually pronouncing their name correctly is next to nil. Is that true in general, or just with some of the people I've dealt with? (I had a professor say, "my name is such-and-such, but you'll probably pronounce it wrong, so just call me Steve").
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Apr 22, 2017 00:47
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PT6A posted:I've heard that many Chinese people prefer English speakers to use their chosen English name, because the odds of a non-Mandarin-speaker actually pronouncing their name correctly is next to nil. Is that true in general, or just with some of the people I've dealt with? (I had a professor say, "my name is such-and-such, but you'll probably pronounce it wrong, so just call me Steve"). i think when people are learning English, not having to code-switch when using their names makes it easier for them. there's probably some data or theory about this but i don't know it. i do think some people do have really difficult names for english people to pronounce (like this girl Xie Derui that i work with now, she chose the name Bella, which is infinitely easier). so i'd guess it's true in general. chinese names are difficult to pronounce correctly if you aren't a pretty high level speaker imo. i'm only a decent speaker and i muck them up a fair amount of the time.
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Apr 22, 2017 01:34
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I've known my share of Chinese grad students, and many told me they were assigned/chose their "English" names as kids. About half resented it, about half liked it. I also know someone whose name sounds like a bad word if you mess up the tone just right.
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Apr 22, 2017 04:18
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Balqis posted:I've known my share of Chinese grad students, and many told me they were assigned/chose their "English" names as kids. About half resented it, about half liked it. I also know someone whose name sounds like a bad word if you mess up the tone just right. That's not too uncommon, Cao and Gan are two common surnames that can also mean gently caress in the correct tone.
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Apr 22, 2017 04:36
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Teriyaki Koinku posted:I'm really enjoying the thread, thanks for making it. 1. Yes, all the time. If we catch them, we take their poo poo away and give them a detention. They'll just go smoke in a different bathroom. I'm more worried about the lighters than the actual smoking; they're going to smoke anyways, but the lighters are a dangerous thing for a bored teenager to have. I saw a toddler buying cigs once. They obviously weren't for herself, but it was still a very wtf moment. The sophomores brought an assload of alcohol to school for their Christmas party. I caught them because they were keeping it IN THEIR CLASSROOM. The school ultimately decided to punish the three girls who admitted to bringing some, even though they were not the ringleaders and it was definitely a group effort. They learned that being honest gets you in trouble. I learned that it's better to ignore certain things so that kids don't get arbitrarily punished. If that happened again, I'd probably just take it and throw it out of school property without telling anyone. 2. It'll be easier than you think. Also, if you have multiple classes of 50+ kids, you're not expected to remember everyone's names. The Chinese teachers sure don't. What I used to do when I had very large classes was to have the kids make nametags for their desks (fold a piece of white paper in a triangle shape so it stands on its own) and keep them in their classroom in a bucket or a large folder. After a while, they'll jump up and start handing them out when they see you, and you probably won't need to them after a month or so. 3. Most of the things I've wished I'd known before coming are specific to my job and area. The thing I wish I'd known the most was that the level of English is so low. This probably would not be a problem in Beijing, however. PT6A posted:I've heard that many Chinese people prefer English speakers to use their chosen English name, because the odds of a non-Mandarin-speaker actually pronouncing their name correctly is next to nil. Is that true in general, or just with some of the people I've dealt with? (I had a professor say, "my name is such-and-such, but you'll probably pronounce it wrong, so just call me Steve"). Yeah, I hosed up and called my student Mr. gently caress by accident because they didn't write his name in pinyin and I didn't know the tones. He took it pretty well, though. I usually call him Toilet King these days because he always has to pee right as class is starting.
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Apr 22, 2017 04:43
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I once saw an 8 year old kid walking down the street with a teddy bear in one hand and taking a drag on a cigarette with the other. The other kids with him were smoking too. That's about the extent of underaged smoking I saw but that was in Zhengzhou. I don't think most Chinese people realize that Rios are alcohol because of how weak they are. They're wine coolers with ≤4% alc. I've seen young girls drinking them in Shanghai but usually only one so they're maybe getting buzzed. You probably won't see much of that in Beijing other than the Rios because it's practically a model city. Go to the countryside or a tier 3 and you see more of young kids drinking and smoking, although it's rare. It's more like the 60's in America in terms of alcohol, cigarettes, and social awareness. Underaged drinking isn't really a problem among kids in school because it's not a social taboo like in America and kids don't mythologize it. Getting a nip during Spring Festival is not that much different than the type of poo poo that goes on in Western nations during the holidays. Usually hardcore drinking doesn't start until people are in a career and there's a social expectation to drink jet fuel until you pass out. Even then, that's mostly in the North. People in the South don't have the same drinking culture. Most school kids are too busy studying and having their individuality stripped away to keep up a drinking habit. Their life is pretty much over if they don't pass or do well on the tests they have to take so they focus on those instead of having a good time or whatever. In ZZ it's common to get sold off by your parents to a dangerous factory like a fireworks factory if you don't make it into high school. It's crazy how much is on the line even before the gaokao. The same goes for cigarettes because there are more campaigns to cut down on smoking and people know they're bad for them now. They also often have a 20's outlook on smoking too so girls won't usually smoke because it's equated to looseness. I've heard that outlook is changing so  . I never had a female college student that smoked other than the cool, club singer Shuai T lesbian I taught who was tougher than all the guys. I never had a HS student who smoked or drank. They all just wanted to play DoTA or LoL.There are posters about model behavior that include drinking and smoking but people just seem to ignore them. The big campaigns to stomp out abuse were against meth and ketamine when I was there. Even then, I never witnessed use of those drugs. Your mileage will vary but you probably won't see anything that would shock or disgust puritanical Americans who pray at the alter of Nancy Reagan. RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 04:57 on Apr 22, 2017 |
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Apr 22, 2017 04:53
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Grand Fromage posted:That's not too uncommon, Cao and Gan are two common surnames that can also mean gently caress in the correct tone. Does Chinese have actual curse words (for example words that children generally aren't allowed to say)? Because I know that Japanese doesn't really (it has words that are crass sorta, but not treated in the same way English speakers treat "gently caress", "poo poo", etc), though Japanese is obviously a dramatically different language from Chinese.
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Apr 22, 2017 07:14
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When I first arrived here I was out drinking one night an a girl came up and started hitting on me, she looked a bit young but I figured she must be at least 18 if she's in a club. After a while her friend came to join us and told me they were dancers and showed me some pictures of them at dance practice on her phone, they were wearing the blue/white tracksuit school uniforms in them so I asked how old they were, turns out they were 14.
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Apr 22, 2017 12:19
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The Great Autismo! posted:if you don't mind me asking what company are you applying for in beijing? MindXplorer. An alumni friend from college referred me to them and recommended it. They seem like a good outfit. Grand Fromage posted:That's not too uncommon, Cao and Gan are two common surnames that can also mean gently caress in the correct tone. One of my favorite 'naughty words' phrases in Chinese I learned in the past from roommates was that 'da feiji/打飞机' literally means "to hit the airplane" which is slang for male masturbation.   Fleta Mcgurn posted:Chinese university is a four-year party, just as in Korea or Japan. After killing yourself to get in, you coast. When we tell the students that Western universities are usually a lot more demanding than high schools, they don't believe us. Hard lessons await. Also, haha holy poo poo if this isn't the truth. East Asian educational/career standards are practically Calvinist in pre-determining the 'winners' and 'losers' in society for the rest of your life after picking the right college (and the feeder high school/middle schools that fed you to them) and everyone knows it. I know this was definitely the case in Korea when I did a spring break scholarship cultural exchange-esque program with college kids at Yonsei University in Seoul, and one of the Korean guys I hung out with at a neighboring uni admitted that "we party so hard for four years because we know we'll be slaves for the company for the rest of our lives." That was certainly illuminating/horrifying to hear! 
Teriyaki Koinku fucked around with this message at 13:27 on Apr 22, 2017 |
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Apr 22, 2017 13:12
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Ytlaya posted:Does Chinese have actual curse words (for example words that children generally aren't allowed to say)? Because I know that Japanese doesn't really (it has words that are crass sorta, but not treated in the same way English speakers treat "gently caress", "poo poo", etc), though Japanese is obviously a dramatically different language from Chinese. Oh, Chinese definitely has swear words! Sometimes things that aren't even actually naughty phrases take on worse meanings. Kim Jong-Eun, for example (yeah, I spelled it that way. It's a girl's name lol). They started calling him Fatty III online and the phrase actually got banned. Buzzfeed has a surprisingly coherent article about it: https://www.buzzfeed.com/beimengfu/china-doesnt-allow-kim-jong-un-to-be-ridiculed-but-on-social?utm_term=.chx3r5A8G#.asQ3ykR0b Teriyaki Koinku posted:MindXplorer. An alumni friend from college referred me to them and recommended it. They seem like a good outfit. I almost cried laughing at this; thank you. I didn't know that. If flat girls are "airports" and dicks are "airplanes," there's a weird implication there... Anyways, taking a midterm here sure is fun: - One girl sleeping (she was very embarrassed when I woke her up, but she'll probably do fine) - One boy caught cheating. - One boy picking his nose and eating it with such intensity that he's sucking on his fingers and gnawing the goop out from underneath his nails. For 90 straight minutes. This is better than his popping zits and eating the contents, which is what he was doing in class on Wednesday. - The water delivery guy who not only interrupted the class, but then interrupted my student by asking HIM to sign for the water. I was so mad I literally hit his rear end with the door after kicking him out. - A teacher from the Chinese side, who shoulder-checked the door open and started quackyammering at supersonic speeds as loud as humanly possible and who could not understand why I told her to get out immediately. I JUST WANTED THEM TO BE ABLE TO CONCENTRATE. Every time there was an interruption, it took everyone five minutes to settle.
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Apr 24, 2017 05:33
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