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Hod
Joined: 28 Apr 2003
Posts: 1613
Location: Home
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 Posted: Thu May 12, 2011 9:22 pm Post subject: |
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| HLJHLJ wrote: |
| It would be a strange career choice for someone who feels a constant tug at the heartstrings. |
You're right. It's just some people, who have OK relationships with parents, consider teaching, students and the cultural experience to be a higher priority. It�s unfortunate and heartbreaking to hear some of them later look back on the missed years.
As I said, I�ll never regret my teaching years. However, I am no longer in contact with or much care about any former students. I also maintain contact with only a small handful of former colleagues. That is normal. Those happy years are fading memories, but my parents are fortunately still here. I didn�t make much effort to keep in touch back then, and if they had died, my TEFL memories would now be very different.
Last edited by Hod on Thu May 12, 2011 9:53 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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demitrescou
Joined: 25 Apr 2007
Posts: 122
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| Posted: Thu May 12, 2011 9:52 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| It's just some people, who have OK relationships with parents, consider teaching, students and the cultural experience to be a higher priority. |
Something that would likely end in immense regret. The heaviest of burdens. |
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artemisia
Joined: 04 Nov 2008
Posts: 875
Location: the world
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| Posted: Fri May 13, 2011 5:49 am Post subject: |
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Coming from an immigrant family where home was always another place I was probably destined to be a globetrotter! All my family are pretty far flung and well... I guess my parents should've thought differently if they'd wanted everyone close at hand.
I'm happy to do things for them but what about when you are close at hand but what you do is never enough? Interestingly friends of mine are now finding that their previously very independent parents are becoming more and more demanding - it's been something of a shock to them. I was always envious of their parents but nowadays when we discuss our parents our conversations have started sounding remarkably similar. However as mine have always been demanding it's all quite the norm for me!  |
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demitrescou
Joined: 25 Apr 2007
Posts: 122
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| Posted: Fri May 13, 2011 8:26 am Post subject: |
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| but what about when you are close at hand but what you do is never enough? |
Doesn't matter does it? Old people will always complain and moan. The point is to be there for them regardless if, on the surface, it may seem that they're are not satisfied with your efforts. Deep down they would be thankful to have you close by and you would presumably feel better for having been there. |
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nickpellatt
Joined: 08 Dec 2006
Posts: 1522
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| Posted: Fri May 13, 2011 9:48 am Post subject: |
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| demitrescou wrote: |
| Quote: |
| It's just some people, who have OK relationships with parents, consider teaching, students and the cultural experience to be a higher priority. |
Something that would likely end in immense regret. The heaviest of burdens. |
Hmmm, thanks for that. I kinda fall into that category. I am drawn home not only to my parents but also for my 19 year old son. I accept that I will have to live with regret though, you make your choices and you learn to live with the consequences.
I dont stay abroad for long contracts though, and cant commit to a country for any length of time TBH. Public school work in China was OK as I used the 10 week summer and 7 week winter to come home, but I wouldnt work in that environment again, and probably couldnt afford the frequent flights home nowadays.
My next job abroad is scheduled to run from October 11 - End of May 2012. I can justify that, and Ill probably follow that with a full year back home before going anywhere again. |
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Glenski
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
Posts: 12844
Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN
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| Posted: Fri May 13, 2011 11:43 am Post subject: |
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| demitrescou wrote: |
| Nice points Glenski. However, I was referring to the TEFL market outside of our native countries. Anyone with a degree can get in on it, and certainly if you have a MA then you're pretty much guaranteed a decent (or half decent) position. |
My remarks were specifically focused on Japan. While a degree in anything can allow one to get a work visa here, it in no way guarantees that one can "get in on it" easily. It's brutal here.
Also, a vanilla MA degree (no language skills, no publications, no teaching experience) will not guarantee anything here. |
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riverboat
Joined: 22 May 2009
Posts: 117
Location: Paris, France
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| Posted: Fri May 13, 2011 8:06 pm Post subject: |
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| demitrescou wrote: |
| Quote: |
| whatever options you may be cutting off for yourself by returning home instead of continuing with your current life. |
Current life? I'm a TEFLer. It's not much of a sacrifice. It's not like there's some huge career progression to be had in this gig. Any job you leave you could probably come back to without too much difficulty. The same can't be said for leaving careers back home. |
I wasn't talking about just the career, but rather whatever life you have built for yourself around that...friends, boy/girlfriends or whatever. But if you feel like all the important emotional ties for you are back where your parents are, and you don't have so many where you're working, I guess it's different. |
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artemisia
Joined: 04 Nov 2008
Posts: 875
Location: the world
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| Posted: Fri May 13, 2011 10:45 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| Old people will always complain and moan |
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My parents have considered themselves to be "elderly" since about their forties! However, they do have a few saving graces such as they both can be very funny despite all the moaning and groaning. |
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wiganer
Joined: 22 Sep 2010
Posts: 189
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| Posted: Sat May 14, 2011 1:25 pm Post subject: |
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I had to laugh at this 'In Greek culture...' Greeks have been emigrating as far
as Australia and America for the past 100 years or so - and a lot of them didn't return back to the homeland to look after ageing relatives. Same with the Italians - in the days before modern flight - the day you left your hometown or village was the last time you saw the place and when you ended up in Buenos Aires, New York or Sydney - that is where you stayed, and these weren't places for the old (as Kirsty MacColl sung in the 'Fairytale of New York') so sons and daughters left the family home as soon as they were old enough to find their place in the new world and a lot of them never went back.
I have ageing parents who I love, but I also come from a depressed part of the country - my parents love me but they have never ever asked me to come back, never told me they 'missed me' or suggested that I get a 'real job and come home' They know the realities of travelling to find work because they have both done it, they are both wise enough to know that life doesn�t deal with �ideal situations� where I can live next door and earn a thousand pounds a week and my sisters and brothers live across the road like it is on �Everybody Loves Raymond� Life is about compromises.
I think this would be more to do with the fact that with an unrelated degree and no MA that would get you the better jobs � you have found your salary level and you are not progressing. You are another English teacher who has just found out that in this game � experience counts for squat! You need to get that MA in linguistics or TESOL to get the better paid jobs � so you are going home to retrain � that�s OK! But don�t come out with this sob story and feed us some line about your parents (who are not that old) and your respect towards Filelal Duty because you are English with Greek blood � not Chinese!
Lastly, I am a parent, and the last thing I would want is my two children to be beholden to me, I want them to live their life and be happy � I brought my children into the world and they owe me nothing! Whereas I owe them everything. If you are not a parent then you won�t understand this but the parents on here will know exactly what I am on about it. |
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gaijinalways
Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279
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| Posted: Sat May 14, 2011 1:48 pm Post subject: |
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I've found the comments to be interesting on this topic.
I have been discussing with my wife what to do in our case as my parents have now reached their late 70s. My Japanese wife's parents are older though, and have already reached that critical stage where their independence is ebbing away. They currently need our help more as my parents are still relatively independent (still both driving, both pretty physically and mentally 100% functional).
I am not sure if I wish to move back to look after my parents, and to be honest, I'm not sure if they would want that either. I am fortunate in that 2 of my siblings (my brother is like myself, living overseas) live closer to my parents, though at the moment still 90 minutes and 2 plus hours away respectively.
I do wish I could see my parents more often though, and wish sometimes that our vacation plans could be a little more flexible on my wife's end (she enjoys going to Europe more than the US).
Life though is a series of trade-offs, and we often have to decide, which is better. One suit isn't going to fit all in these matters.
As to whether working in this industry makes it more likely that one may be living at a distance from their parents, most likely as often the better jobs are not available in our home countries. The people in the UK do have an advantage in this respect as they may be able to work in another country and be able to visit their parents in the UK on weekends by Easy Jet or Ryan Air (one of our friends visits his partner in Italy this way). |
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markcmc
Joined: 18 Jan 2010
Posts: 262
Location: Taiwan
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| Posted: Sat May 14, 2011 2:56 pm Post subject: |
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I also have old parents. I see them about once, sometimes twice a year. I thought that was a lot, but from this thread I can see not everyone would think so.
Skype works well for keeping in contact. If I'd been born a 100 years earlier then I'd probably only see them a few times every decade. |
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demitrescou
Joined: 25 Apr 2007
Posts: 122
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| Posted: Sat May 14, 2011 3:14 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| I had to laugh at this 'In Greek culture...' |
Wiganer, what are you so angry about? If you're not Greek how can you so easily suggest I don't know what I'm talking about? I was born into a Greek family with very Greek ways. There's little about my family that is English, yet you're quick to label me as English with Greek blood. You don't really know what you're talking about. Everyone who has known me and my family classes me as Greek before English. Off topic anyway.
Talking about Greeks who have emigrated over the last 100 years and not gone back to look after ageing parents is neither here nor there. I'm not an immigrant who fled poverty/war and am struggling to survive and make ends meet like my parents were when they left their home. It wasn't a realistic possibility for my mother to return and aid her ageing mother as she had me and my sister and was struggling to get by in London. The circumstances of our generation are different.
The tone of your message sounds like you're really bitter/pissed about something. Don't take it out on me mate.
| Quote: |
| If you are not a parent then you won�t understand this but the parents on here will know exactly what I am on about it. |
Presumably you're not Greek but you seem to think you understand our cultural differences. |
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wiganer
Joined: 22 Sep 2010
Posts: 189
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| Posted: Sat May 14, 2011 10:11 pm Post subject: |
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| demitrescou wrote: |
| Quote: |
| I had to laugh at this 'In Greek culture...' |
Wiganer, what are you so angry about? If you're not Greek how can you so easily suggest I don't know what I'm talking about? I was born into a Greek family with very Greek ways. There's little about my family that is English, yet you're quick to label me as English with Greek blood. You don't really know what you're talking about. Everyone who has known me and my family classes me as Greek before English. Off topic anyway.
Talking about Greeks who have emigrated over the last 100 years and not gone back to look after ageing parents is neither here nor there. I'm not an immigrant who fled poverty/war and am struggling to survive and make ends meet like my parents were when they left their home. It wasn't a realistic possibility for my mother to return and aid her ageing mother as she had me and my sister and was struggling to get by in London. The circumstances of our generation are different.
The tone of your message sounds like you're really bitter/pissed about something. Don't take it out on me mate.
| Quote: |
| If you are not a parent then you won�t understand this but the parents on here will know exactly what I am on about it. |
Presumably you're not Greek but you seem to think you understand our cultural differences. |
Oh sorry - was I being all judgmental, assumptive and condescending just like you have been to others on this thread? I am not bitter nor am I pissed off - you do what you want with your life mate, I am just making a rather rough guess on why you are wanting to go back home and the truth would probably centre somewhere more near on the earning potential maxing out in TEFL rather than wanting to be near your parents, (who even by your own admission have not asked you to come back).
I am not Greek, but one half of my family come from a Mediterranean culture just like the Greeks and I know all about 'family' and 'duty' and basically, it is a rather flexible concept, you say Greeks fled because of poverty and war but we both know that Greeks had emigrated out of the country as late as the 1980s early 1990s when there was no war and no real poverty. Like the Irish - the Greeks emigrated because they had better opportunities elsewhere - the numbers who emigrated to Australia
and Canada in their millions started as late as the early 1960s. The United States - a lot earlier - if it was part of Greek culture to not abandon parents in old age then they would never had left for these places in their millions.
| Quote: |
| Presumably you're not Greek but you seem to think you understand our cultural differences. |
I am a parent and you are not. So I understand better than you what your parents are going to think when you trill 'I am coming home to be near you' they are not going to want that burden, especially when you are struggling to find a job or you miss the old life of living in Thailand or wherever you went to.
I have known teachers to quit jobs and a life they have loved because of meddling parents putting unnecessary pressure on them to come home, when you have parents like these, you eventually break and go back home and I have to say - I have always felt sorry for these folk even though they must get lot's of hugs and kisses and being told 'I love you'
every single day.  That is not your situation by the sounds of it.
I am sure your parents are going to be happy that you are coming back for the right reasons - you have had enough of life on the road, you are missing England, you want to retrain, you want to earn more money - but don't hang the reason for going home on them! What a completely selfish thing to do! One day you might be a parent and you will want your child to be happy doing want they want - you would be horrified if your child started to live their life out of some obligation to you. Trust me on that one! |
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gaijinalways
Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279
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| Posted: Sun May 15, 2011 4:10 am Post subject: |
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wiganer posted
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Like the Irish - the Greeks emigrated because they had better opportunities elsewhere - the numbers who emigrated to Australia
and Canada in their millions started as late as the early 1960s. The United States - a lot earlier - if it was part of Greek culture to not abandon parents in old age then they would never had left for these places in their millions. |
I think perhaps it is a bit of both, so that both you and demitrescou are correct.
Of course people emigrated because of better opportunities (I'm a 4th generation Polish=American myself), but that doesn't mean they necessarily decided to not raise their kids with traditional ethnic values. My parents did that for some things, and some were perhaps because of being raised in the Great Depression of the 30s (and what do we call now?), but in my case, the independence streak that they also raised us to have seems to be stronger.
My parents always talked about family being important, and ashamedly, I used to not really care nor think about it that much until I perhaps reached my early 30s. Now with my wife and her Japanese family, I get banged over the head with it every week as my wife's parents struggle with some common elderly issues (actually, my wife brings this issue up about family even in issues related to me not backing her up/agreeing with her opinions, but dealing with spouses of different nationalities could easily be a giant thread of its own).
My parents already have insurance policies that cover them going into a private nursing home when the need arises. They have talked recently about selling the family home up North and moving into a condominium or a senior regulated condo-community, but at the moment they like their old neighborhood.
So in some sense they value their own independence. Now it is true also in my case (and probably in most TEFLers'), I doubt many of our parents would want us to go back 'home' if they knew we might struggle economically and actually end up having to be supported financially by our parents upon our return to our respective native countries (I have a sister already financially leaning on my parents, though she didn't leave the country).
wiganer posted
| Quote: |
| I am a parent and you are not. So I understand better than you what your parents are going to think when you trill 'I am coming home to be near you' they are not going to want that burden, especially when you are struggling to find a job or you miss the old life of living in Thailand or wherever you went to. |
I don't know if you better understand this issue, but certainly that is an issue to think about if demitrescou (or any of us) does decide to go back.
wiganer posted
| Quote: |
I have known teachers to quit jobs and a life they have loved because of meddling parents putting unnecessary pressure on them to come home, when you have parents like these, you eventually break and go back home and I have to say - I have always felt sorry for these folk even though they must get lot's of hugs and kisses and being told 'I love you'
every single day. |
Yes, a kind of bitter-sweet situation. Some of us in Japan recently have been exposed to this very issue with relatives exhorting us to flee the 'radiation dangers' (which are minimal except in the cases of young children if you're in Tokyo) here when of course we would be heading right into financial danger if we were to return to the UK or the US with few job opportunities (especially at the current wage levels we're already making here). |
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Insubordination
Joined: 07 Nov 2007
Posts: 394
Location: Sydney
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| Posted: Sun May 15, 2011 4:44 am Post subject: |
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Such an interesting issue. I'm glad the OP brought it up.
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I am fortunate in that 2 of my siblings (my brother is like myself, living overseas) live closer to my parents, though at the moment still 90 minutes and 2 plus hours away respectively.
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Just wanted to pipe in and say that this kind of situation can be a horrible burden on the sibling who lives the closest.
My mother is in this situation with her elderly mother. My mother's other siblings live far away or don't care. She has to fill in the forms, choose the nursing home, visit, have the house cleaned, painted and find an agent to sell it, arrange toe-nail cuts and haircuts, buy suitable shoes for the season and other daily necessities, find a financial planner. My grandmother is in an expensive nursing home, but you just can't leave them alone there. The staff might clean up their accidents and administer the medication, but there are still plenty of things they need, which the staff does not provide. I've only scratched the surface here.
The other siblings barely call their own mother or my mother, and if they do, it's to be critical of the process and the decisions made. I can see what a strain it has been on my 58 year old divorced working mother, so I do my best to help by listening to her, doing a task for her, and calling my grandmother once a week, even though she's in the early stages of dementia and doesn't know who I am most of the time. She still enjoys the phone call.
This post is not directed at you, it just touched a nerve. I would recommend that, if this happens, you do what you can from afar. Call this sibling on a regular basis. Ask them what kind of things they have been doing and if they want any advice, thank them for what they have dones, and offer any kind of support you can. Maybe a weekly letter to your elderly mother/dad, with an interesting photo inside. Even filling in a form your sibling has attached through email can be a tremendous help because it represents that the sibling is not alone in making all the tough decisions. |
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