It's a Monday afternoon in March and a young lady is asking in one of the WeChat expat groups if anyone has time on Wednesday morning for a promotion. I give it a try and contact that lady. There are so many opportunities to make extra money in this city, it's just unbelievable! I assume it's the same in other, predominantly smaller cities. Whenever local people want to celebrate an opening of their business, a new cooperation, or whatever, they hire a few foreigners to show their faces and smile and perhaps say a few words. It's a common practice. Many foreigners are against it and don't want to do it, because they say we're being treated like monkeys and have to dance to their money, etc. Some others don't mind it. I belong to the latter ones. I'll refrain from analysing and won't bore you with my point of view. Tante (aunt) Tina, as the Germans call Tina Turner, shares her views in the song Private Dancer. The topic is a different one, but you'll get the picture.
This young lady is working for a language training school across the (fuck) building where I live and her school wants to start a cooperation with a public primary school in the heart of Guiyang. As the public school doesn't have a licence to hire a foreign teacher directly, they hire one through a language school that has a licence. For this, the language school needs a second foreign teacher to show up at the primary on Wednesday morning and speak to the kids for a few minutes.
Wednesday, early in the morning and I'm standing in front of the KFC in the Garland Mall opposite my building, waiting for the young lady to arrive. She comes and we introduce each other. A few minutes later the driver arrives to pick us up and drives us to the centre. We park in an underground car park and walk a few minutes to the school. The school is located by the Nanming river, very close to the Jianxi Pavilion, and is one of the best in the country in calligraphy. I knew this school because my Chinese teacher lives next to it and have often walked down that path.
We tell the guards who we are and what we want and they open the gate. As soon as we are inside, the children stare at the young lady from New Zealand and me. We ask for the principal's office and get directions. We go up two flights and enter the office. We are warmly greeted and tea is made for us. We sit there and talk a little and some teachers enter the room and introduce themselves.
Half an hour later we all stand up and go down a floor where the balcony is. There we stand on the balcony and before us are hundreds of pupils. They all stand there quietly and wait for something to happen. The principal, a lady in her thirties, takes the microphone and says something in Chinese. She passes the mic over to me and asks me to say a few words. I raise my hand and make a greeting gesture and say
'Hello, how are you?'
'Im fine, and you?' shout hundreds of voices and shivers run down my spine.
"I'm happy to be here this morning!' I say and continue by introducing myself and saying some more things. Then I pass on the mic to Ariana, and she introduces herself and plays a little game with them. They have to form letters with their arms, like the Village People in the video YMCA. The kids love it!
Five minutes later, we are done. We say 'thank you', greet again and leave. First we go to the principal's office and wait until the pupils are in their classrooms and then we leave the premisses. We walk back to the car park and are driven back to Huaguoyuan, where we live and where that language training school is. I'm invited to that school and I get to meet all the staff, then the owner of the language training school invites us to lunch and we go to a nearby restaurant. There I get 350 Yuan, roughly 40 pounds, in a red envelope, as it's custom in this country and get the offer to work for them. Unfortunately it's on a day I have classes at my school and therefore can't make it.
Ariana will start work at that primary school soon and with her possibly a second foreign teacher.
'Money for nothing and chicks for free' as Dire Straits used to sing. Indeed I got money for nothing, but didn't get the chicks.
This young lady is working for a language training school across the (fuck) building where I live and her school wants to start a cooperation with a public primary school in the heart of Guiyang. As the public school doesn't have a licence to hire a foreign teacher directly, they hire one through a language school that has a licence. For this, the language school needs a second foreign teacher to show up at the primary on Wednesday morning and speak to the kids for a few minutes.
Wednesday, early in the morning and I'm standing in front of the KFC in the Garland Mall opposite my building, waiting for the young lady to arrive. She comes and we introduce each other. A few minutes later the driver arrives to pick us up and drives us to the centre. We park in an underground car park and walk a few minutes to the school. The school is located by the Nanming river, very close to the Jianxi Pavilion, and is one of the best in the country in calligraphy. I knew this school because my Chinese teacher lives next to it and have often walked down that path.
We tell the guards who we are and what we want and they open the gate. As soon as we are inside, the children stare at the young lady from New Zealand and me. We ask for the principal's office and get directions. We go up two flights and enter the office. We are warmly greeted and tea is made for us. We sit there and talk a little and some teachers enter the room and introduce themselves.
Half an hour later we all stand up and go down a floor where the balcony is. There we stand on the balcony and before us are hundreds of pupils. They all stand there quietly and wait for something to happen. The principal, a lady in her thirties, takes the microphone and says something in Chinese. She passes the mic over to me and asks me to say a few words. I raise my hand and make a greeting gesture and say
'Hello, how are you?'
'Im fine, and you?' shout hundreds of voices and shivers run down my spine.
"I'm happy to be here this morning!' I say and continue by introducing myself and saying some more things. Then I pass on the mic to Ariana, and she introduces herself and plays a little game with them. They have to form letters with their arms, like the Village People in the video YMCA. The kids love it!
Five minutes later, we are done. We say 'thank you', greet again and leave. First we go to the principal's office and wait until the pupils are in their classrooms and then we leave the premisses. We walk back to the car park and are driven back to Huaguoyuan, where we live and where that language training school is. I'm invited to that school and I get to meet all the staff, then the owner of the language training school invites us to lunch and we go to a nearby restaurant. There I get 350 Yuan, roughly 40 pounds, in a red envelope, as it's custom in this country and get the offer to work for them. Unfortunately it's on a day I have classes at my school and therefore can't make it.
Ariana will start work at that primary school soon and with her possibly a second foreign teacher.
'Money for nothing and chicks for free' as Dire Straits used to sing. Indeed I got money for nothing, but didn't get the chicks.
Pupils gathering in the yard (view from the principal's office)
Taken from the balcony
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