Gam Bei !!

It's been nearly a month since the last update (again) and things here are still pretty rosy:

• the weather's on the turn but we're still getting the odd scorcher;
  
• my classes are progressing well through their respective programs;
  
• I'm seeing some variation in the classes that I am getting to teach;
  
• I'm finding my feet now with the local area;
  
• the Chinese language skills are developing (slowly);
  
• I've managed to get my ex-Vodafone BlackBerry unlocked and it's almost back to full functionality (still haven't cracked the data services on China Mobile yet); and
• we've just had a three day holiday in honour of my sister's birthday.

Yes, that's right, my sister's birthday on 1 October is Chinese National Day - it's probably the biggest event in the Chinese calendar - and there's a three-day national holiday to celebrate.

Most people get a longer break than three days but our employer likes to get his pound of flesh. After all, it's not like any of us have given anything up to come to China and teach in the school. Native English-speaking teachers grow on trees over here, thus we are easily replaceable, so why treat your staff to any more days off than is absolutely necessary?

If all of the students are on holiday with their parents because of National Day, make the teachers come in to work anyway and find pointless, time-consuming things to occupy them. This will make the teachers feel valued and respected and it definitely won't send them trawling through the Cathay Teacher website for new jobs at the next given opportunity.

Fortunately for the school though there are very few places crying out for for native English-speaking teachers in China. Hardly any jobs to be found. So we'll just count our blessings.

What makes it all the more astounding is that in the last six months or so, the school has lost three teachers, with a fourth on the way out in just under a week. This has cut the number of available, remaining, foreign teachers to just five. And the school currently has its highest ever levels of in-house students, which means that the available human resources for the far-more-lucrative, external business and university classes has been drastically reduced.

So why haven't the rest of us headed for the hills? Well... the remainder of us all get on very well, we all take our teaching very seriously (there are no holidaying, gap-year students here, just old men!), there's a fantastic beach which is great in the summer and sometimes... it's just better the devil you know. I read far too many scare stories about schools in China before I settled upon this one and, to be fair, if that's my only gripe then I'm just whingeing like a teacher.

Once we've started the Chinese branch of the the overseas teachers' union things will be different. Just you wait and see what happens after the revolution...

So, what else has happened this month?

We were invited as guests of honour to the 20th anniversary celebrations at Rizhao Polytechnic a week or so back. The show was truly amazing, with huge dancing dragons, performers, acrobats and martial arts displays. And the speeches, too, were... well, actually I'm not sure because, in all honesty, I dozed off. Sat outside, in the sunshine, listening to tens of dozens of speeches, in a language of which I know only a few words, I succumbed to my body's overriding desire for rest.

It was a wonderful morning though and we were the centre of attention for the 20,000 students. People wanted to take our photos, we received a round of applause when we turned up from a stand with, at least, a few thousand of the student population, we were ushered to the front half-way through the proceedings, there were official photographs taken and then after the whole thing finished we were taken to a different part of the university and presented with beautiful gifts to thank us for coming. And what's more, I don't even teach there!

I start business classes this week. It's about an hour's drive from the school to get to the company where I will be teaching but these are the classes where I will get to use the knowledge gained from working with large corporates in London that the school is able to charge a premium for. I'm looking forward to dusting off those sections of my brain that have been harbouring all of the Siebel training for so many years.

Although the colder weather cannot be too far away now, it's going to be another beautiful day here by the looks of it. It's 9.20 am and the sun is already streaming through the curtains. What makes that so much the better is that today is my day off, so I think that I will pop down to the beach for a swim.

I hope that the weather in England is also great... *snigger*

Benny Laoshi