Job Discussion Forums

[canucktechie]

[maruss]

Apart from a few people like BELS and Rusmeister,how many foreigners would go to Russia and plan to stay there long-term,get married etc etc?
It's not exactly a desirable country for a westerner to live in and it is not a democracy by any stretch of the imagination!
So these big firms know that the vast majority of applicants for jobs are likely to be younger people 'passing through' or who have a special interest such as the language and history etc and do not envisage staying long there.Supply and demand are the rule and as long as there are students and people willing to work for them for a while,why should they care about offering good wages etc?Their aim is short-term-i.e. profit and as long as this keeps coming in,nothing will change!
There are a million reasons why Russia is not a good place to settle down in,especially if you come from a western country and have other options,but that's something else.

[mdk]

Maruss - Did you say settle down? Please stop talking dirty.

We are EFL teachers = houses, wives, children - those are not for us.

There isn't any place I would ever want to "settle down" Russia is a great place to spend a year or so.

Places like BKC are like - that hotel in Ekaterienburg - decent enough for a short stay. One would never want to live there.

[BELS]

Looking at this site for the moment, most of us appear to be married or settled with a girlfriend. I'm just beginning to wonder what has happened to all the back-packing teachers. Have they finally got the message ?

[123go]

The reason I decided to work for BKC was that I at least had a place to move in to when I arrived. Sure, it's pot luck what condition it will be in (and if there's a washing machine!) and who you live with but it's not a permanent arrangement. You've got time to settle in, take stock and know you've got a roof over your head. I also wanted to have someone at home to have a beer and a chat with.

I've met a few freelance teachers recently and if they didn't start off the same with BKC they did it with LL.

My other alternative was a company who offered to put me up in a hostel for a week when I arrived. That would be a bed in a shared dorm - surely not better than a BKC flat.

Plus, in that week I'd start work and have to use my spare time running around trying to find a flat. I wouldn't like to do that in my home country, never mind Moscow - not knowing the city, the language or any comparative idea of the standard and price of flats.

BKC isn't perfect of course but you're not committing to a 5 year contract - leave if you don't like it. As someone arriving in Moscow for the first time it's done OK for me.

[BELS]

[maruss]

Maybe Bels because Moscow(and Russia) has a kind of mysterious allure for foreigners-well at least some of them?Curiosity can kill cats of course,but it can also teach you a lot,even if it is the hard way!
For example,Warsaw and other places also have plenty of e.f.l. jobs but it doesn't have the same attraction....

[maruss]

I would definitely agree that Russian women over this age are a safer bet and the two experiences I had were positive!Mind you,the fact that I am 55 in a couple of months no doubt played a part?
By the way,who has read about the former U.K. ambassador to Uzbekistans experiences with his muse of half his age?Apparently they are still together,but as she openly admits,its for as long as it lasts!
Visit his site:craigmurray.co.uk for full details and some interesting links about his voluptuous Nadira!He sacrificed everything for her....

[mdk]

I had already worked three winters in Tomsk before I came to Moscow to work. Certainly Moscow is a great city and I don't know much about Warsaw or Poland for that matter.

The truth is I have been a Russophile since I first took a Russian course when I was a teenager. It pleases God for some of us to become Francophiles and others Germanophiles...some are even Anglophiles - although I can't imagine why - and so I have always been a Russophile -although I haven't a drop of slavic ancestry.

I think that if you don't have a bit of that in you Russia is going to seem like an awful place - at least until you have had time to settle in and give it a chance. I think a lot of that goes to explain why people are so disgruntled working at BKC and they have such a high turnover. Certainly, if you listen to the popular press in America then you will assume Russia is a terrible place. My brother warned me that I would probably have my ear cut off and sent to him for ransom when I first went there back in 2002.

[Sashadroogie]

News just in! BKC have dropped the petty washing machine charges!! Might they have been embarrassed by the bad press posted on this site?

[mdk]

Shucks! Wish I could remember the metro stop for the laundromat (only one in Moscow) I stayed in a "senior teacher" place for an extra hundred and had to shlep my laundry over there on Saturday mornings. (The stuff I didn't wash in the bathtub like I used to do back in Tomsk)

It was the one before Leninsky Prospekt metro. You could take a tram from the Leninsky Prospekt metro, but the laundromat is just around the corner from this one ... wait a minute it WAS Leninsky prospekt, I remember now because it was the one after Shabalovskaya. The Tram goes out of Universitet.

It's right around the corner from the metro station and there is an auto service place next to it with a nice cafe where you can get something nice to eat.

DARN those bosses at BKC! I could have stayed home in my apartment and washed my clothes instead, but here I had to go all the way to Leninsky Prospekt metro and eat raspberry crepes in that cafe... I don't get no respect! No respect at all!

[BELS]

Have you found a suitable employment in Moscow or anywhere in Moscw. As I don't want to put you off. An experience in travelling to a different place such as Moscow might be good for you. But don't take the hype that you will be treated like a professional, because you won't. You will be teaching professionals much richer than yourself. Take it as fun. like a camping holiday, or in disguise, basically it is voluntary work. just , come and enjoy, and don't worry about the contracts, as that's the way it is.

You might well find a lovely woman, like I did, and want to settle down seriously here, and bocome more experienced in Russia with that lovely girl, and perhaps you will learn to say get lost to any school, as we can do it ourselves with much more money. These schools thrive on your lack of knowledge of Russsian, and the knowledge of the heavy demand of Englis, f which Russia as. So come and enjoy , that's what I rcommend, as there are lovley people to meet. Join the social side of Expat.ru and we will soon fix you up, and living here.

Sorry, and i'm very sorry, as I really do wish we were treated as professionals. Bu for the moment I can only recommend the McD schools for newbies. That is Language Link and BKC. Pressure from BKC, as they expect you to have their CELTA, and it's not cheap in time or money.

But you can have a telephone interview from your own country, you will be provided with flight and visa support, and you will have some rough somewhat shared accomadation. Yes very professional. Sorry !! no facilities for your wife or partner, or educational expenses to the British International school for your kids. So being young and single, you will do fine

[RQRose]

Hey BELS,

one of the difficulties newbies have when trying to choose a school that doesn't offer a paid apartment but does offer a higher salary is knowing what the apartments in the area are going to cost.

We don't really have that much of a choice other than to take a job at a McSchool like BKC for the simple fact that they include an apartment on top of your salary, or risk getting a salary that is cut in HALF by your Rent and then cut into quarters by food, utilities, ect, leaving you with nothing left at the end of the month....except for the bits of Russian you've picked up and the experience of living in Russia.

[mdk]

leaving you with nothing left at the end of the month....except for the bits of Russian you've picked up and the experience of living in Russia. [darn this quote gizmo isn't working!]

I think part of the problem is that people come to Russia to extract money from the Russians. You should do that at home from your own people. For instance, I took my savings from working in the US to supplement and defray my expense there in Russia.

Russian teachers make Bubkhes. That includes Ph.D professors. It's asinine to me to hear non-Russians bemoaning the cruel fate that prevents them from dropping in and earning half again as much as a Russian teacher.

If you can't make a living back home (wherever that is) you ought to deal with it there and not come to Russia looking to avoid that fight. Russians have their own problems and don't need yours as well.

[canucktechie]