Job Discussion Forums

bellejolie · Joined: 05 Jul 2004 Posts: 3

Please don't tell me to do a search. Been and done. I'm curious about living conditions: in a larger city are there cultural amenities available in English? *some* western food? lots of creepy-crawlies? decent attitudes toward foreigners? efficient public transportation?

And so on. Thanks for the help.

englishindian · Joined: 04 Apr 2003 Posts: 16 Location: Poland

Yes pretty Jolie,

I 've lived in India for a wee while and you can get by without too much trouble if you exercise normal precaution as expected in a big city or foreign land. I 've been there with friends from Holland and Singapore and we did not have any major problems except perhaps the crowds and heat. It would be better to first get an EFL job there and then explore the place.

You might like to visit the www.tefl.com website and explore the job options there for India. Quite a few posted recently. Also on Dave's cafe job board. I was really amazed by the diversity and beauty of India and wonder why I did not travel there earlier. Go there yourself and see what its like as about 3 million tourists went there last year and was no major mishap thus far.

Best of luck and do post your findings on the board.. Cheerio Smile

Ananda · Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 10

I'm curious about living conditions: in a larger city are there cultural amenities available in English?
Most Indian movies have English subtitles (along with about three other languages).

*some* western food?
There are McDonald's and Starbucks in many of the India's big cities. Some cities, like Bangalore and Chennai, have some western foods (restaurants), as well as western-style pubs. However, in general, don't expect to see too many French or Italian restaurants. Chinese restaurants (which are often very Indianized) are a more common sight in a lot of Indian cities. There is not a lot of western foods sold in Indian markets (you can get Ovaltine).

lots of creepy-crawlies?
Yes, a fair share of these exist. You will have lizards crawling on walls and ceilings.
decent attitudes toward foreigners?
Yes, especially towards Americans, and even towards the Brits. However, women should practice caution, especially if traveling alone (personally, I don't advise this).

efficient public transportation?
Buses are usually very crowded and not very timely. Also, many buses are privately owned and operated, and sometimes may not be available on many religious holidays. Trains are a great way for long distance travel. Although, if single women traveling alone is advised to travel in the "ladies only" car.

These are only general answers to your questions. India is so culturally diverse things may vary drastically from one city to the next.

Ananda · Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 10

I'm curious about living conditions: in a larger city are there cultural amenities available in English?
Most Indian movies have English subtitles (along with about three other languages).

*some* western food?
There are McDonald's and Starbucks in many of the India's big cities. Some cities, like Bangalore and Chennai, have some western foods (restaurants), as well as western-style pubs. However, in general, don't expect to see too many French or Italian restaurants. Chinese restaurants (which are often very Indianized) are a more common sight in a lot of Indian cities. There is not a lot of western foods sold in Indian markets (you can get Ovaltine).

lots of creepy-crawlies?
Yes, a fair share of these exist. You will have lizards crawling on walls and ceilings.
decent attitudes toward foreigners?
Yes, especially towards Americans, and even towards the Brits. However, women should practice caution, especially if traveling alone (personally, I don't advise this).

efficient public transportation?
Buses are usually very crowded and not very timely. Also, many buses are privately owned and operated, and sometimes may not be available on many religious holidays. Trains are a great way for long distance travel. Although, if single women traveling alone is advised to travel in the "ladies only" car.

These are only general answers to your questions. India is so culturally diverse things may vary drastically from one city to the next.

cheekygal · Joined: 04 Mar 2003 Posts: 1987 Location: China, Zhuhai

If you wish for more or less comfortable life in India, Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore are your cities to be in. There are plenty of Western places as well as the various Indian restaurants which offer food from all over India. The life style is more *liberal* and there are plenty of places for leisure and night life. As well as the sight-seeing (Bangalore which is in Karnataka is close to Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Goa, Delhi is close to Agra and Rajastan and Mumbai is close to Goa as well as the whole of Maharashtra is a very interesting state).
If you need more information on cheap but decent places to stay, you can PM me Smile

AsiaTraveller · Posted: Mon Aug 23, 2004 9:39 pm Post subject:

Unfortunately, most of the available positions for native English speakers in India are currently called "English Specialist", especially in Bangalore, Hyderabad and Bombay.

These are positions with the hi-tech "call centres", which outsource telephone support for large computer and financial companies (and others) in the U.S. and elsewhere.

The English Specialist is primarily there to teach "accent reduction" so that the call centre tech support staffers will sound less "Indian" and more "Western" on the telephone. The Specialists are also expected to provide information on American culture and pop media, so that the telephone support staffers are knowledgeable about current events.

The telephone staffers even choose new "American" names like Bruce or Sally, so that customers might think they are really in the U.S.

Because the call centres are often busiest at night (when it's daytime in the U.S.), the English Specialist will have to put in many hours from midnight to 6 a.m.

These "Specialist" positions pay low wages and don't often require TEFL certification, much less teaching experience. I wouldn't call them "teaching" jobs. But there are definitely going to be more and more of these positions.

dervish · Joined: 01 May 2004 Posts: 46

AsiaTraveller,

those call center training positions, don't they require one to have some call center experience in addition to teaching the english/accent reducation classes?

AsiaTraveller · Posted: Wed Aug 25, 2004 10:19 pm Post subject:

Some jobs do require a BA and some experience. But my impression is that they'll hire just about any native speaker who's young enough and inexperienced enough to work long hours, put together happy corporate newsletters and do some accent training with a youngish staff at the call centre.

Here's a typical job posting:

North American native English speaker for Bangalore, India, to teach clear communication skills. Night shifts frequently required. Send cover letter, resume to given ID.

(approx) USD1000/month.

Deliver formal, prepared pronunciation classes to local staff (50%)
Quality monitoring of phonecalls to identify job-related issues (25%)
Coach individuals on 1-to-1 with pronunciation feedback
Conduct weekly conversation club sessions
Create a weekly newsletter
Movie night
Holiday activities
Coaching activities
BA required
TEFL preferred
2+ yrs experience

Furnished accommodation, two round-trip airfares, medical insurance, meals during work hrs, transport, office equipment, vacation, etc.

khong muon · Joined: 02 Sep 2004 Posts: 5 Location: Ho Chi Minh City

Don't forget that English is one of India's two official languages, so official documents and signs etc are nearly always in English (as well as the official language of the state you're in - eg Hindi or Tamil). There are also plenty of English language newspapers and of course plenty of people in India speak English to a greater or lesser degree.

guangho · Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 476 Location: in transit

I loved Goa when I was there but don't know about call centres- I mean, face it, I would be paid peanuts to work for the continued nickel and diming of America. Are there any other, better opportunities?

memorabilis · Joined: 04 Feb 2005 Posts: 54 Location: Seoul, South Korea

1000 USD is a lot of money in India. When you consider that the average indian makes about 100 rupees a day, and 1000 USD is equivalent to 47 000 rupees, you can certainly live quite well and even send some home.

Also, you need to also consider that 2 roundtrip flights is a basically unheard of benefit in overseas ESL teaching. Add that to provided accomodations that are very nice by both Indian and north american standards, and you could do a whole lot worse than working for a high-tech company in India.

If you are looking for other types of ESL jobs here, they are few and far between (everyone here already speaks English). The ones that there are pay around 300 USD a month, and certainly won't include airfare, benefits, and might have shared housing.

AsiaTraveller · Posted: Thu Feb 17, 2005 12:08 am Post subject:

If you don't think that all the I.T. companies in Bangalore, Pune, Hyderabad, and elsewhere are willing to hire competent native speakers to teach their employees how to write and speak better English, then you're not being creative enough.

Such companies will pay top dollar (far more than US$1,000/month) to those who can successfully teach corporate communications. I'm not talking about the call centres. I'm talking about real software and hardware companies.