Job Discussion Forums

[kungfucowboy83]

as a rule i accept all gifts but then continue to treat them the same as they treated me before. hey if they say it's a gift then by definition there must be no strings attached. I mean how am i an american suposed to know that a gift is given with an expectation of a return, i'm just a laowai i'll never really understand chinese culture
Offers to eat with them or otherwise spend time i reject if it is from people i don't like and accept if i think the person is interesting.

[therock]

Jeff,

You only got dinner!!! That dinner probably cost 50RMB, remember she is rich so mama and baba are basically throwing money at her. I thought you were after more than just dinner. I am very disappointed that you didn't get off first base.

[jeffinflorida]

Actually it was 113 rmb for our dinner...

And to tell you the truth I gained a little respect for the girl because I got to know her a little and found that she is actually a decent person - if even a spoiled rich kid whose parents give her a MONTHLY allowance of 5000 rmb to piss away - and she does.

[Shan-Shan]

[Lorean]

I am puzzled. The forum community has a strong opinion against Chinese corruption; however, when it comes to your own shady exploits you pat yourselves on the back.

Disgusting.

[arioch36]

Humour???

[roadwalker]

I agree that we shouldn't be joking about helping cheaters. If the jokes are obvious enough for a student of English to understand, fine. If we aren't joking, this is really sad. I am jaded about a lot of things but education means a lot in China and some of these students bust their pigus to get a decent grade. It would be nice if they believed they were getting a fair shake from the foreign teachers, at least.

I recently was giving oral exams and encountered a student that wasn't on my roster and hadn't been in my oral conversation class so far as I know. She wanted to take the exam and get a grade. I've heard of this before, but she wasn't even on the roster! Her oral skills were a bit rusty too. Now stop that! She couldn't speak English very fluently, ming bai ma? I won't give her a grade of course, but I would be interested to see if she gets one anyway.

[jeffinflorida]

[vikuk]

[Mydnight]

Back when I taught "UNI" here, I had a girl try to bribe me, I think. It wasn't so clear if it was bribery or if she just wanted to sleep with me for fun. Regardless, I had only met her once during the first half of the first class and she was sleeping.

Yeah, she still got the 0 points I promised her.

[arioch36]

it's so pathetic sometimes that you have to either laugh or cry.

Life is too serious to be taken seriously all the time

[Ahchoo]

[beck's]

I'm not sure that Nemises' students were offering a bribe when they invited him out for a meal and some beer. If these are the same students that constituted part of his "uni class from hell," that he described a few threads back, then I think that maybe they were just trying to mend fences and hold out an olive branch, so to speak.

Obviously, teachers who accept bribes are acting unprofessionally. This would be especially true of western teachers who are taught that there are very clear boundries on this subject. I think we would all agree on this point. However, the tradition of giving teachers gifts at Christmas or during other holidays is often accepted both in the west and in China. This Christmas, my students gave me flowers, chocolates and tea. I didn't think of these gifts as bribes and I accepted them with good will and good wishes.

Nemisis is a young teacher and in my opinion his students simply wanted to take him out for a good time. These kids often don't have much experience with foreigners. We are rare birds in this country and therefore there is a lot of healthy curiosity about us. I can see why his students would want to get him a little drunk considering how fractious his relationship with them was during the course of the term. Maybe they simply wanted to see another side of their teacher.

[Nemesis]

Hiya Beck's,

No, this "invite" didn't come from my "class from hell" (these days, that class is actually rounding into form quite nicely -- they've learned something, it seems, and so have I...).

I've got two other classes that are top notch, but of course, there are a handful of useless ones in each.

I've established a nice "arrangement" with those deadbeats: they don't disrupt my teaching, and I'll leave them be.

* * *

Well, it is a collective of boobs in one of my "good" classes who've been pressing for a meal with me.

I blew them off once (as described in my OP). On Monday, a couple jumped me in the toilet (WTF?) and tried to press the issue again.

Saying "no" for me is awkward, so I basically blew them off (while zipping up) with something like: "During exams is not good, because I am very busy. After exams is better."

Well, it's so weird: the lead boob called me this morning, pressing the issue again: "Teacher, we don't want to ask for something. Only we want to enjoy together."

It's the fact that it's a group of pure boobs -- banded together in some sort of Trailer Park Boys-type scheme -- that's making it seem dubious to me. They showed ZERO interest in communicating with me for four months, yet now they're singing a different -- somewhat panicky -- tune.

* * *

Anyhoo, I nipped it in the bud: "I don't want. I don't like. No thank you. Goodbye."

I'm glad my "final hammer" in this episode went down on the phone, and not in person. Like I said, saying "no" for me is awkward.

[Shan-Shan]