First Post, a history...

So this is my first blog entry ever!

Just a disclaimer: I warn you this will probably be the most scatterbrained, random thing you've ever read, if you choose to do so. I will probably talk shit about certain people, but you know none of them so all is fine :D I shall begin now...

With this post I'll give you a background on my coming to China and my first weeks here.

I decided to come to China after having been here twice. I love the Chinese people because in all of my experiences with them they are warm and inviting. They seem to just be open and friendly, something I think we have lost in the west in our quest to better ourselves without regard to others. Having studied in Beijing last summer and experiencing the earthquake, I knew I needed to come back.

I knew teaching English would be an easy job to find, and in the economic climate we live in, I wanted to make sure I had a job. I don't know what I'm going to do with my life, as far as graduate school is concerned, so I figured a year in China would be great fun and maybe I could discover what life has for me.

While at UF, I took an Introduction to TESL course. This made me realize I was ignorant of education methods and something I thought was going to be really easy was actually going to be quite hard. I posted a resume on daveseslcafe.com which my teacher suggested and is one of the best sites for teaching in East Asia. I received an overwhelming number of replies, 30+. I attribute this to me having studied at 清华大学(Tsinghua University) last Summer in Beijing, this is the #1 university in China and when you say you studied there people think you're a fucking genius, even though I definitely am not :).

With all of these offers I was looking at a variety of factors. The size of the city, where it was in China, the type of school, and lastly money. I wasn't really worried about money, unlike my family haha, but I do have some loans I need to pay off. I knew I wanted to be in a big city that had convenient public transport, that is one of the best things about China. I also wanted to be around the center of the country that way travel would be easier, the trains take forever and I didn't want to be stuck in some far off area that took days to reach other interesting sites. I also was really torn between teaching at a public school, university, or one of the private for profit English schools. I was warned that the private schools didn't really teach and they were there just to make money from the new middle class Chinese. As for money, some jobs only offered 3500RMB which is less than $500 a month, granted the city the job was in wasn't huge and the cost of living was ridiculously cheap. This was just not enough for me to live life and save :D

So I decided on a job at a *gasp* private school in Shanghai. The job pays 8000RMB a month for 24 hours, apartment included. I figured I couldn't pass this job up. Getting a teaching job in Shanghai is not easy, especially with no teaching experience and a degree that doesn't really correlate. The job is with DD Long or 迪迪龙英语. They were really appealing to me because the co-owner is a young Canadian guy who has been teaching here for 3 years and the fact that they provided lesson plans so I didn't have to worry about course development.

Being here, I am so glad I took this job. Ben, the Canadian, and his partner Andy are both super nice and help me with anything I need. Andy's wife(老婆) Jessica on the other hand is a bit of a concern for me. She is Shanghainese and they are known for being witty, I don't like that hehe too much like me. She is one of those people that smile to your face and stab you in the back. Well thats just what I think so far. At least she is nice to my face ;) I don't think I have anything to worry about though since they are amazed at the fact that I was teaching classes within a week. Should I have been? Probably not, but they just threw me in there and said the best way to learn is through teaching. So the first 5 or 6 classes I was a mess, not knowing what to do next, how long to spend on certain things, but Ben was in the class and he helped steer me in the right direction.

I have begun to go in about an hour before my classes and write out what I'm going to do, what games will be played, how much I want to cover etc. This is working out really well for me and I really love teaching now. Right now I have 6 classes, I have a 7th starting today and an 8th will follow shortly. I teach in two different schools. The DD Long branch in Hongkou and the one in Pudong. The Hongkou branch is about a 10 min walk from my apartment through a preserved historic part of the city that is beautiful and has the old time charm that modern bustling districts of Shanghai lack. The Pudong school is a 10 min bus ride then a 20 min subway ride away. Its interesting to teach in both areas because I get to see the contrasts of Shanghai.
Last thing for this post, my apartment is amazing. It is a two bedroom my roommate comes in a week and hes a Canadian. Its huge, I don't know the actual square meters but I could probably ask. We are the first people to live in it since it was totally renovated because it was a business for years. Its on the 4th floor so I have to climb up all those stairs but hey its good for my fat ass :P

I'll put up some more posts tonight starting from 2 days ago. Let me know if there is anything you're dying to know about and I'll try and post about it :D