China: Adopting a Second Hometown

Teach in China, now! If you’re considering a move to the Far East, don’t think too much, go and go now! Adopt some of that, you’ll-figure-out-as-you-go attitude and do it. Everything will fall into place once you’re there, by that time, it kind of has to. My program took me to Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. Shenzhen has been described as the ‘biggest city you’ve never heard of.’ Officially, it has nearly eight million people, and unofficially, upwards of 18 million people.

 

Everything in China is done on a grand scale and even a regular city block (a ‘Chinese block’) seems right out of Vegas, deceptively large. If you’ve ever seen the ‘Made in China’ label, chances are good it’s ‘Made in Shenzhen.’ Shenzhen is China’s first ‘Special Economic Zone’ and is primarily a business city with lots of migrant workers. It also borders Hong Kong.

 

We went to Shenzhen after completing a certificate program and classes at Beijing University. I learned a lot about myself and matured greatly that year. I also got to develop my Chinese Mandarin language skills, travel, and personally determine what things were worth to me, while making some wonderful friends along the way.

 

We all go abroad for different reasons and I was convinced my decision to go originated with the desire to learn the language and, when it comes to Chinese Mandarin, two billion people can’t be wrong. Despite five semesters of Mandarin study stateside, I had never made the language my own. After a month of studying Chinese in Beijing, I was well on my way to speaking sufficient Mandarin to live on my own in Shenzhen.

 

The stateside learning, primarily with Heather Ding of Laney College in Oakland, California, had given me strong fundamentals on which to build a language that could be made my own. Though it seems you can get quite far with simply knowing ‘this one, that one, good, no good, and don’t,’ my Mandarin had developed into something much more useful than that and something I could be proud of. As I’ll describe later, I was able to guide people on tours that were completely set up and executed by me, in China!

 

China has as many people learning English as America has people – period. Very soon, half of the content on the web will be in Chinese, and the fastest growing Advanced Placement test category in the United States is Chinese. The trend is clear; learning Chinese will be helpful, even a little is better than none. It’s also fun, I love learning how to say and read the brand names of various companies like Coca-Cola, Pepsi-Cola (both of which use a different prefix to describe the diet version), Nokia, Dell, HP, 7-Up, Sprite, and so on. It’s fun, and when it comes to learning another language, the experience of living in another country is unparalleled.

 

Fast forward. Nearly a hundred of us hopped on a train together and 23.5 arduous hours later, we arrived in Shenzhen, our home for the next 12 months. I went on to travel the country by air, land, and sea including trains, cars, rickshaws, a lot of walking, and all sorts of busses. If traveling is your reason for working in China, you won’t be disappointed.

 

Before I moved to China, I was very poorly-traveled, I had an amazing friend in Chicago who often invited me to visit and I never did. All the excuses in the world seemed to be all too readily available: it’s too expensive, bad timing, and logistics, whatever. In hindsight, it was simply a lack of courage and drive to make things possible.

 

In China, and initially with the help of some really good friends, itineraries were set, followed, and enjoyed. I never imagined how incredibly easy it could be. By the end of my first semester of teaching, I took it upon myself to make all the arrangements for a trip to Thailand. I got to shop in Bangkok, experience the culture in the north, and enjoy the beaches in the south.

 

Within 10 hours of returning from an amazing trip to the Philippines filled with great friends, food, and beaches, I was back at the Hong Kong International Airport awaiting my family. Though initially, they didn’t recognize the much more bronzed me, I was their tour guide through Hong Kong, Macau, Shenzhen, and Beijing. We had a wonderful time and all this, coordinated by someone who previously couldn’t seem to make it to Chicago and back by himself.

 

Another learning experience for me was how to find out what things are worth? Nearly every price is negotiable in China. Many of us would simply like to be offered a fair price for a reasonable product and when I’m in that mood, I’ll find a Wal-Mart [(with Chinese operations headquartered in Shenzhen)], 7-11, or any store that scans bar codes. Bargaining, however, really teaches you take stock of an item’s value and the more you do it, the better you become.

 

One of our first experiences in the market in Beijing was to watch a tourist buy 10 polo shirts at 250 RMB apiece while we were paying 25. The shirts were worth 250 RMB to her and she gladly bought in bulk and went about her day. Every time you shop in such a market, you are forced to make such a decision, what is this worth to me? For someone who likes fair pricing, and had previously never haggled for more than a few pesos in inland Mexico, once, it became quite fun and almost a sport.

 

As a local, you also become aware of the price for which retailers are willing to let go of the product and you can later confidently insist on that price. After paying the equivalent of US$1.25 for neckties, we learned, to our chagrin that we could buy them for US$1.00 and so we did. When I returned to Beijing for a third time, while watching me shop, the retailers would ask where I was from and I would reply ‘Shenzhen’ to which they would say ‘No wonder you’re so good at negotiating.’ I even taught some vendors a little bit of Spanish on top of the numbers and basics they already knew. It was fun.