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Jmbf
Joined: 29 Jun 2014
Posts: 663
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 Posted: Fri May 19, 2017 2:18 am Post subject: |
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| Thanks for the clarification. Again, I'm glad things worked out in the end. |
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getbehindthemule
Joined: 15 Oct 2015
Posts: 712
Location: Shanghai
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| Posted: Fri May 19, 2017 4:51 am Post subject: |
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| MsHoffman wrote: |
Sorry I can see where those two things are confusing.
I love teaching and when I first started out I did it for free. So any little disruption gets me super cranky. In the case of how this FAO conflict, I was meeting a couple times a month with some of the Chinese English teachers here to share methods, etc. All of the teachers here are very busy so scheduling these meetings usually took 1-2 weeks notice, which is fine except when I had to cancel many of them at the last minute because of this FAO conflict.
So did it affect my students and my day to day teaching? No. Did it keep me from these meetings? Yes. I think what made it more frustrating is I would tell the FAO, "I have a teachers' meeting, can we do this [conflict] another time?" And the answer was always, "No, we must do this now". No regard for me as a professional.
I forgot to mention - (this was all months ago and remember I'm trying not to give a lot of details), - that I have a good Chinese friend here who is local to the community and speaks fluent English. So he was giving me advice to deal with this conflict (although he never spoke to the FAO directly). I followed every bit of his advice and I think that helped a lot.
This could very well be a woman thing - after all China has a lot of sexism - but my Chinese friend told me to always be very vulnerable, kind, and patient, but also firm. Approaching strangers and professional associates with vulnerability is new for me, but honestly I like it. In general I'm learning so much this year  |
Well done! I've also gotten advice in the past similar to yourself. Sometimes you just have to accept that you are in a very different country with a very different culture. You need to adapt to make the most of your experience here. There are expats here for a decade that cannot get to grips with this and are living a very frustrating life in China (a few of which I know personally). You don't have to lose your identity or personality but you do need to adapt socially imo.
You will get on very well here I reckon, keep up the good work |
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