Hi,

The opportunity to practice spoken Chinese here in South Africa rarely present themselves. Considering that China is South-Africa's biggest trading partner and the demand for people with business/law knowledge that speak Chinese is huge, this is very frustrating. For example: a couple of weeks ago, a mine called me and ask if I could receive a delegation from China, travel with them, be their translator and host, order food etc ...o yea!... and translate all the negotiations with the mine...@#$%. I could have done it, if it were not for the last part. And that is exactly the kind of work I want to do!

Therefore, I am considering finish the last part of my degree part-time and go to China and teach English. Or any other job for that matter - preferably something to do with business. I really need to get more practice in speaking.

Any Skritterers our there, teaching/working in China? I would like to get some on the ground info and advice. My email is aharlekyn at gmail.com

Any help on where to start or what to look for would be appreciated!

Cheers

PS: my wife-to-be would come with me and might also teach depending on the situation.

If you want to learn Chinese I would suggest studying at a Chinese language school or University over teaching English in China, but I have only done the latter and thus can't compare the two from firsthand experience, yet. If you do teach English you should be able to get airfare, so that's one benefit, though speaking English all day as part of your job can cut into study time.

Having initially taught English and later worked in business in China, I agree with ibperry; the English teacher route is a good one to dip your toes in and see how China suites you lifestyle wise, but not an optimal arrangement for learning Chinese. There are stories of people doing well with it (Chinese wise), but I think it requires a lot of self-discipline with what remaining free time you have, including avoiding other English teachers on campus.

I'd vote for saving for a few months of work in SA and then doing 1-2 intensive terms of formal study in China.

I teach English in Japan but before coming here I was able to study much more Japanese. My time teaching is spent emerged in English. After work I often don't have much energy left for studying. In college I studied almost all day except for when I had classes, or slept. Now most of my studying is done on the train, in the car, and between classes using my GALAXY Tab then on my days off I make mnemonics on my desktop. If it weren't for my GALAXY Tab and Skritter I wouldn't get any studying done. Be careful.

I teach English at Haikou People's Hospital in Hainan, feel free to email me or connect via my blog or google plus - check my profile for all that. Honestly, teaching English tends to mean most of my Chinese friends speak English (that's how I met them) and that slows my progress, but just living in China does provide daily speaking challenges so that is useful.

I'm a kindergarten English teacher in Wuhan, and just living here and being around the language is a great teacher, but my English progress is nowhere near the level of my friend in Shanghai who has worked a couple jobs in which he has had to speak Chinese almost exclusively for days at a time. He came into these jobs with good Chinese, but most importantly, he was thrown into the deep end each time - the interview for his current job was spot-translating a fifteen minute presentation on the ins and outs of the green packaging industry. He bombed it big time, but after a couple months his bosses admitted that they wanted him to fail because it would motivate him to study harder and learn more.

So while I love the lifestyle of being an English teacher in China, I would recommend getting a job that's out of your league at first. If it's sink or swim, you've got a ton of motivation to learn. Next time you're asked to translate for a delegation from China, don't hesitate to take the job. Even if you bomb at a few points, you'll make huge gains as a Chinese learner.

I agree and disagree with the statements above about teaching English in China to learn Chinese. From my limited experience and observations of other foreign teachers around me it seems to just be an accepted excuse. "I try to study Chinese, but always have to speak English because that's my job."

I'm also guilty of using this excuse on more than one occasion. It's true, for the most part, at work everybody will try to engage and respond using English . To avoid that avoid talking with students in your free time and try talking to teachers that teach different subjects (history and PE are always good bets haha).

The foreign teachers who speak the best Chinese have two distinct lives in China. One that involves school and then another that is with Chinese people who have limited of no English speaking ability. So I agree with icebear, if you can motivate yourself out of the comfort of an English speaking environment then teaching is a great way to support yourself and learn Chinese. If not, then perhaps another job or structured learning environment would be best.

Wow! Thanks for all the advice. Even though most of it was not what I hoped to hear ;). It is better that I know what I am getting into, than to be disappointed later.

I have heard about immersion schools, but why not make your daily life an immersion? Decide to only speak English in your class, and the rest of the time force yourself to speak Chinese or shut-up? Is it just a question of self discipline or are there other factors at play and I am oversimplifying this?

Currently all the conversation I get in Chinese is with the Chinese takeout waiter once a week or so.

The cost involved in only studying in a Chinese university is way over my head. So my options are very limited.

孟志书's comment reminds me that I actually do know a couple foreigners who have made really good progress on their Chinese as English teachers at universities. This goes mostly for people whose Chinese level was halfway decent to start with. They never turned down an invitation to spend time with their students, but only on the condition that class time was English time and anything extracurricular was in Chinese. It's like having an instant pool of 200-300 friends to hang out with and speak Chinese with. That often carries the added benefit that you run into fewer of the walls that sometimes come up when you don't know how to say something in Chinese and your conversation partner doesn't know any English.

I came to China having already majored in Chinese at University and worked as an English teacher. I have a few hints if you plan to use your English teaching to support you while you learn/practice. Firstly, try and get a job where you are not teaching English major students. Students who are non-English major students are more likely to speak Chinese with you outside of class. My first job I was teaching English to medicine majors. It is also much easier to plan lessons. Also, if you have a choice, try and choose a city that doesn't have a really strong dialect and where there are not many foreigners. The city I currently teach in only has about 15 foreigners in total. This means that you have to spend more time with Chinese people, which is definitely a good thing for Chinese practice. Currently, I also have a 'Chinese family' - one that I got to know that treat me as a daughter. They don't speak any English. I go there for meals a couple of times a week. Often students will invite you to their homes for a holiday - another good chance to improve you Chinese. The more I write, the more I realise that there are many opportunities, you just have to take them.

Hope that is all a little helpful.

Following Cheryl's comments, I'd add that from what I observed is those foreigners that already had a solid grounding in Chinese (i.e. able to maintain social relationships purely in Chinese - on the day of arrival) were able to establish a habit of essentially shunning anyone that spoke English with them without feeling like a social pariah. Most English teachers arrive with little to no Chinese abilities, so cutting themselves off from the few English speakers available (who constitutive the only group they can have a high-level discussion with initially) is a pretty hard move from a social point of view and perhaps a very un-stimulating first few months while you talk with every taxi driver about your wage and every server about where is the bathroom.

Ultimately I think this is the most important point of getting a lot [of Chinese] out of teaching English - not only the discipline to focus on your Chinese, but the base to build on without putting yourself in a social depression for a year. I lacked that base (and discipline at that time!), as do most, so your mileage may vary.

I would not recommend teaching English if your goal is to learn Chinese. Many Chinese will speak English to you anyways, and if they find out that you are a teacher....then you basically are f@cked. They will tell their friends families relatives etc that they know a foreigner that teaches English, and no one will speak Chinese to you.

And about the translation line of work. I actually did guide a delegation of Swedes once in China and did some easy translating, helping them get around in factories etc...but then, the negotiations started. They had booked what they referred to as a "round table meeting", and there were like 20-ish people sitting around the table and 1 translator...me.

And when the negotiations are about to begin, they start to pull out freakin prewritten speeches that were extremely advanced and complicated, and they expected me to translate that shit on spot. I had a huge brainfart, and my mind totally froze up. I got as red in the face as a tomatoe and didn't know what the hell to do. Luckily, one of the Chinese negotiators used to live in hongkong and was able to translate all that technical mumbo jumbo...I just sat quietly and wanted to sink through the ground..that was a day I would like to forget.

I just read this very grim article: http://middlekingdomlife.com/guide/teaching-english-china.htm

I saw something similar once at a Chinese-Foreign Wedding, and the volunteer translator (who didn't realize how nuanced the vows and speeches could be throughout the night!) was looking pretty regretful for his hubris by the end of it. Careful when volunteering to 'translate' - it might not mean just shootin' the shit!

@Daxia & @icebear

I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times a client has given me an interpreting job that actually ended up at the difficulty level described.

What's funny to me is that some of the interpreters who I get a nice commission off of by giving them those nasty jobs I don't want, hate doing written translation as much as I hate interpreting.

Always make sure you know before you start working what the client is going to expect from you. Otherwise you might find out that what you thought was 10 days of reception and banquet interpretation is actually 10 days of on water translation between the Chinese National Sailing Team and their guest coach from the US.