Job Discussion Forums

[yankeechemist]

1) Cost of living (rough estimates) for Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadilarja.

2) I am talking to a school in Senora. Opinions?

3) Scorpions: Do you see them inside and have you been nailed.

4) Students: Behavior (in terms of being respectful and polite)

[Samantha]

1) It will depend on your lifestyle, how you live and what you consume. (Did you mean Guadalajara?)

2) Did you mean Sonora? It's a State.

3) Yes/No.

From http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/travel/diseases/scorpions_and_spiders.htm

[El Gallo]

I have found most Mexican students to be very well mannered and motivated to learn. The exceptions are rich kids in private schools. Parents sometimes intimidate the administration to ignore discipline problems and change grades by threating to move their darlings to other schools. Like anywhere in the world, the rich kids sometimes think that they are better than others and are entitled to special treatment. My best experiences have been with poor or middle class students in private schools without these "fresas". Do not expect Mexican students to be on time. The anglo obsession with punctuality is not a part of Mexican life.

[hlamb]

[quote="yankeechemist"]

3) Scorpions: Do you see them inside and have you been nailed. quote]

Yes, I was bitten at Christmas. I went to the hospital, got some meds and felt better after a few days. Check your bed before you get in!

[Gary Denness]

[TheLongWayHome]

[ls650]

[J Sevigny]

The cost of living varies widely here and there are a thousand and one previous posts to attest to this.

Guadalajara, Monterrey and Mexico City tend to be on the expensive side as do beach resorts. Small towns tend to be cheaper.

In four years here, divided between Guadalajara and Monterrey, I've never seen a scorpion. I'm sure they're here. I've just never seen one.

Students here are respectful although I think secondary school students are crazy the world over.

[yankeechemist]

[quote="J Sevigny"]The cost of living varies widely here and there are a thousand and one previous posts to attest to this.

Guadalajara, Monterrey and Mexico City tend to be on the expensive side as do beach resorts. Small towns tend to be cheaper.

In four years here, divided between Guadalajara and Monterrey, I've never seen a scorpion. I'm sure they're here. I've just never seen one.

Students here are respectful although I think secondary school students are crazy the world over.[/quote]

Thanks: I am curious what a small apartment (efficiency would be fine) would cost in Guadalajara, or monterrey

[tagastelum]

Here in Monterrey, 1BR apartments in middle class neighborhoods range from $3000-$5000 per month. For an up-to-the-minute picture, why don't you try browing the "avisos de ocasi�n" at www.elnorte.com, then check "departamentos" for rent in the "bienes ra�ces" section.

Mural is El Norte's sister newspaper in Guadalajara and it also has avisos with aparment listings. Check it out at www.mural.com

Good luck!

[yankeechemist]

[quote="tagastelum"]Here in Monterrey, 1BR apartments in middle class neighborhoods range from $3000-$5000 per month. For an up-to-the-minute picture, why don't you try browing the "avisos de ocasi�n" at [url]www.elnorte.com[/url], then check "departamentos" for rent in the "bienes ra�ces" section.

Mural is El Norte's sister newspaper in Guadalajara and it also has avisos with aparment listings. Check it out at [url]www.mural.com[/url]

Good luck![/quote]

You mean 3000 to 5000 pesos a month I am assuming

[MELEE]

My favorite thread was the one where we established that you needed to earn between 6000 and 35,000 pesos a month to live comfortably!
Obviously comfortable means different things to different people.

I can't help you with a school in Senora, Sonora? what city? Name of school?

Scorpions, I killed three in our house this weekend. One was inside my daughter's toybox. I've never ever seen one in a shoe, I gave up on checking my shoes, but I only wear closed shoes Nov-Feb, the rest of the year is sandal time. I have had four teachers get stung, two stepped on one when walking barefoot in their apartment in the middle of the night--USE FLIP FLOPS!!!- the other two where in their bed! The sting is like a bee sting, deadly for some people others, no problem. If you have any allergies, you are more likely to be on the deadly side.

My uni students are the most respectful and polite students I can imagine, more so than the students I had in Japan. They do like to chat however, so keeping them all focused on the lesson is a challenge.
One thing to look out for when teaching in any foriegn country, is that the students idea of what is disrespectful and yours might be different. In Mexico the arriving late is a good example. You might think it is disresptful, but they have no idea that you are thinking that!

[Pocho Libre]

[MELEE]

It depends on the teaching context I think. I work in a place where I'm on campus 8 hours a day and pop down to the classroom block to give classes, the admin expects me to be on time, but the students would actually perfer me to be late! If I'm in a meeting that runs over and I run down to class, the students might kid me about being late, but they wouldn't be angry/annoyed.
I'm not sure about those business classes where you travel around the city to different companies as I've never done them, but I imagine if you breezed in 10 minutes late and said something about the nightmare traffic, it'd be no big deal at all, as long as you didn't do that everytime.
And actually if you did do that everytime, the students would probably just start expecting you at 10 past and adjust their schedules rather than be annoyed. The managers who arranged for the classes might be annoyed though, seems like managers are always the most "gringofied" people in a company.
Like in terms of meeting friends for lunch and stuff, people (gross generalization coming) are really understanding and not at all bothered by lateness.

[yankeechemist]

You guys are a wealth of information: Thank you!

So in other words if class starts at 9am , no big deal starting it at 9:05 and it's probably prefered?

What about tests, if you give a test starting at 9am, and someone walks in at 9:30, what do you do?

Is Oaxaca infested with scorpions? Are there sprays which deal with the problem?