Job Discussion Forums

[scot47]

So Romania is in a mess because of these evil foreigners ?

Mmmmh.

[Bebsi]

Well, of course, everyone in Romania knows that!

It's just a question now of making the rest of the world believe it.

[jonniboy]

Interesting thread. I love Romania, a few years ago I worked my way through one of those teach yourself Romanian books and had a ball travelling round the country for a month. I really wanted to TEFL there but the pitifully low wages on offer just ruled it out in the end unfortunately.

So I know exactly where you�re coming from on this but I don�t think it�s a Romanian problem more an Eastern European problem in general. A lot of Eastern Europeans just don�t get the idea that people in the West are not fantastically rich with loads of disposable income. When I first came to Latvia and was in search of flats I went to many of the agencies who automatically showed me the �flats for foreigners� and then gave me incredulous stares when I told them that 350-500 euro a month was way out of my budget range for a flat . I could almost read it in their eyes � ��you�re a rich westerner, so what�s 500 euro a month to you?�� (Almost half my Teaching salary actually!)

One other big symptom of that mentality that I�ve noticed is the lack of budget hotels throughout E.Europe. No one seems to have tumbled to the fact that there are a lot of people who don�t want to pay 100 euro a night for a place to crash but also don�t want to share a dorm room with 10 strangers. When my friend came to visit me in Latvia I hunted around in vain for a cheap hotel with all of them offering me 70 euro a night or more. Finally I found one for 45 euro a night. Christ even in Dublin you can get a B+B or cheap guesthouse for 40 euro a night! In Madrid, not the cheapest of cities, I got my own room in a pension (no brekkie though) for 22 euro a night.

This all reached its nadir last Spring with the World Ice Hockey Championships held in Riga. Faced with the choice of presenting a positive image to many first time tourists in the hope of attracting repeat visitors versus shamelessly fleecing them, the bulk of those in the tourist industry went for the latter option. Bars and restaurants doubled their food and drinks prices, some hotels tripled their prices and one hostel in the old town even tried to charge 60 euro a night for a dorm bed!! Needless to say people aren�t stupid. The tourists, (who included many from poorer central European countries like Slovakia and the Czech Republic) voted with their feet and headlines started appearing throughout the tournament from hotel owners advertising cheaper rooms as they were half empty. At the end of the tournament many businesses declared their disappointment, stating that while they�d profited it was by much less than they expected. Post-event, many of them were forced to put out announcements stating that their prices had returned to normal as regular local customers had continued avoiding them after the tournament.

A couple of months after that farce I was in Berlin during the football world cup and the contrast couldn�t have been greater. Being there on average 3 times a year I know what to expect price wise. Most restaurants and bars had kept the same prices and increases where they had occurred were modest and not of a level to frighten people away.

None of this though explains why Romania has lagged so far behind other East European states even before many of them gained accession to the EU. Latvia and Estonia especially had an entrepreneur culture starting to spring up at least 5 years ago. Romania on superficial impressions just didn�t have that. This is one reason why the EU haven�t shown a great deal of enthusiasm on welcoming them aboard. The hugely negative image created in the West by Romanian criminal gangs hasn�t helped matters either. It�s all a culture thing and until Romania manages to alter that culture it will remain a dead loss on the economic and consequently TEFL scenes. A big shame since it�s an amazing place with lots to offer.

[naturegirl321]

You could try SOL www.sol.org.uk you don't have to pay to do the programme.