Job Discussion Forums

[jevon]

Hello forum. I'm a Uni grad with some teaching experience that intended to make my way to China for a year or two, starting this August. Before my Chinese professor hopped a jet back to Beijing, though, he left me the following advice: "Don't come. Stay away. Give us some time and hopefully we can contain or eradicate SARS."

While realizing the old saying that "if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans for the future", I am in a bit of a pickle. I still intend to head back to school after a while for an MA/JD in Chinese/E. Asian Law. With that in mind, getting some quality experience in China is imperative, yet with my professor's advice and the concerns of my friends and family, it seems sensible to re-evaluate my plans. So, I humbly turn to you for advice.

With some of you obviously choosing to stay in China, how grounded are my concerns? Even in a country of more than a billion, 6,000 cases of SARS is disconcerting.

Alternative locations to China in mind, the WHO seems a lot more optimistic about the situation in Singapore. Also considering Thailand and Japan, how rewarding would you consider these places as far absorbing "Asian values" or cross-cultural skills for China?

Any other comments or advice you could offer would be greatly appreciated.

All the best,
jevon

[Roger]

It is not foreseeable, to be sure, but if you have a job offer I can't see why you should not accept it!
If it is a SARS-free school you have little to fear. Travelling is another matter, of course, and we do not know how long the current status is going to be maintained (roadblocks, quarantining of travellers, often arbitrarily so).

I live in Guangdong, twenty kms from where the SARS struck first. Guangdong has been taken off the WHO list of dangerous areas. So has Hong Kong although they had to doctor their statistics (long-term SARS patients were discounted as having SARS as they clearly seem to be on the mend; the figure suddenly and magically dropped to 59, just one shy of the 60 threshold).

However, we are still faced with another major health hazard - and that is DENGUE FEVER. It has been around here since last autumn, and the authorities have not been quick enough to tackle this problem! Avoid Hong Kong and Macau - because in these parts dengue fever is most prevalent!

[Redfivestandingby]

Don't know what you mean by "Asian values". I hope you're not thinking of coming to China to get some type of philosophical "a-ha phenomenon" enlightnement from an old wise man with a long beard. Not in China!!!

Wait about mid-summer to see how the SARS situation is coming along. The chances of getting sick are low but many foreign teachers are confined to campus and required to do all kinds of useless things (daily thermometer readings for one).

It's just not a good time to get your first glimpse of this country.

I hope this has helped.

[jevon]

By "asian values" I mean cordial consensus-building, amongst other things. Not so much thought of as having a purely Confucian background, but very much along those lines. In short, nearly the opposite of us Westerners - therein lies the reason I'd like to see it in action.

Thanks for the advice. No, I hadn't given any firm commitment yet. I'm a bit concerned as far as time lines go, though. I need to have something starting in the earlier part of August so that I can complete an annual contract in time to get back to the States for grad school. That limitation is what pushes me to consider alternatives. Speaking of which, does anybody know of short-term opportunities? (Besides breaking contract) How rewarding of an option would you consider the other countries? (Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore)

[arioch36]

I don't think you will find much cordial consensus building China, though i wish you luck. if so inclined, you will have chances do drink the Chinese paint thinner known as Bai jiu, and get drunk with them, and tell each other that you are there best friend.

I would have no worries about actually getting SARS 10 times as many people died in the earthquake. But travel right now can be difficult, and not the best time to live here illegally.

[dractalks]

Lots of new in the past 2000 years!!!!

[dractalks]

Ecclesiastes..right 'Arioch'?
Lots of new in the past 2000 years!!!!

[chi-chi]

Try Taiwan.
Yup, there's SARS, but there's still a few hours here and there, around...for now.
Plus you'll get a mopeds-eye view of the things you are seeking.

[Count_Fathom]

I see SARS as particularly irrelevant in your situation. Your term and focus of study "cordial consensus-building" as a breed of Confucianism is best observed at the rural strata of Chinese society. The upper-echelons of the Chinese hierarchy are absorbed in the country's industrial, infra-structural, and technological game of catch-up with the west. This struggle has transformed the positive values of Confucianism into a monetary and economy obssesed ultra-capitalism. China lacks the western moral barriers of guilt, as her ingrained ethics are essentially shame-based, which therefore opens the doors of corruption for all-comers so long as they stay unseen in the shadows. Look not towards the cities and business structures for the fading embers of an once-upon-a-time universal standard of internal harmony.

At the rural level, you will find unparalelled communal co-operation. The ideal of conduct once held across the country, the appropriate ordering of human relationships serving to create the ideal social structure reamins in a slightly bastardized version, due to inequality of wealth, at the outskirts of smaller, less significant cities and beyond. The filial responsiblities are real and tangible, the neighborly concern and assistance are recognizable. (Whereas in wealthier families this is a vague concept of "I'm acheiving for the good of my family", the right idea, but wealth being the focus, the spirit is tarnished from beneath by the fires of greed with the ultimate goal of social ladder climbing)

So... For your purposes, I recommend: Damn the money, respond to emails of job offers from cities that you can't find on any map or in any atlas and catch a glimpse of what this country used to be. It will be of no use to you in a professional law career, as all those rules of conduct have been long forgotten in the emerging imperial China, but will perhaps convince you that your Uni courses on Chinese civilization were not a pack of lies.

As for Japan, Thailand, VietNam, and Singapore.... Those coutries have evolved along distinctly different paths. You will not find the ties for which you are searching. Many reasons for this, everything from size of the country to tourism to diet (stop laughing, it's true but I won't get into this here) being factors, and of course a heightened western influence compared to rural China.

Good Luck!

Oh yeah.. you won't find SARS out in the bounies, where nobody every comes and nobody ever leaves. That was the point....