Job Discussion Forums

Amanda.Jayne.Howard · Joined: 14 Dec 2009 Posts: 4

Good luck to all looking for a job or already teaching abroad!

ttorriel · Joined: 13 Oct 2008 Posts: 193

Your entire experience falls on the fact that you CHOSE to work illegally with a visitor/travel visa - nobody made you do it.

Thanks for the warning though.

therock · Joined: 31 Jul 2005 Posts: 1266 Location: China

If there were problems in the first month, why did you continue working for them for another 3 months? Rolling Eyes

In a situation like you describe, it would be better after the first month to get the hell out of there, even if they threaten not to pay you for that month just cut your losses and move on. Wink

Amanda.Jayne.Howard · Joined: 14 Dec 2009 Posts: 4

Deleted

tomstone · Joined: 09 Dec 2009 Posts: 293

Yes, hindsight is too often 20-20. "Shoulda, coulda, woulda." We've all done it, we'll all probably do it again.

Hansen · Joined: 13 Oct 2008 Posts: 737 Location: central China

What Amanda has described is exactly what I have repeatedly tried to warn newcomers about. There is no reason she should be blamed. Her only mistake was to think that she was dealing with honorable people. She wasn't. "Lying," "sneaky," "conniving," "fundamentally dishonest" are the correct terms to describe the kind of people for whom she worked.

Most foreigners, unless they have a background in criminal psychology, corrections, or administration of justice, are unable to even conceive of people as devious and unprincipled as what she has described. Some of these people typically exhibit traits which are normally reserved for sociopathic types in countries of the western world.

As she correctly pointed out, a"Z" visa can help prevent situations like this. A "Z" visa, however, doesn't assure anyone that the people they deal with are competent, honest, or intelligent.

A native English speaker with an upper intermediate level of Chinese would be a treasure for any school which was not run by mobster types. Their stupidity and treachery is not her fault.

nickpellatt · Joined: 08 Dec 2006 Posts: 1522

Amanda.Jayne.Howard · Joined: 14 Dec 2009 Posts: 4

Deleted.

brsmith15 · Joined: 12 May 2003 Posts: 1142 Location: New Hampshire USA

Amanda,

It's often truly said that we learn more from our failures than our successes. Why? We rarely learn what made us successful but we sure know why we failed. I know from some real and past experiences including turning a milion dollars into a shoestring after a crook of a partner stole out business patent and sold it out to the highest bidder.

Think of it this way: A failure is just something turning out differently from the way we thought it would. When I came here in '99 I watched a school -- Telfort -- go from a well-run enterprise into a predatory, animalistic disgrace thanks to a bunch of grasping, greedy, self-serving Chinese and cowardly, dishonest Candians. I hung on much too long, but again, learned. Heck, I'm married to a Chinese and am Candian by birth.

My next gig became an absolute joy: wonderful (Chinese) boss, highest pay in the area, more-than-adequate facilities, attentive and intelligent students, supportive and caring administration. Everything Telfort/Delter didn't have. Karma? maybe.

Except....."Tell your dogma to stop chasing my karma."

Anyway, long may you wave. I wish you the best of the holidays and the best of good fortune in the coming year(s): 2010 and Rooster.