Teaching in Yangshuo

[quanxie]

I am currently helping a friend to recruit a few foreign teachers for an English summer camp and possible 6 months contract extensions... Guilin, Yangshuo is IMHO one of the best places to live, work and study in all of China...

Send me a PM if you are interested in further info-details...

Phil

[gersteinrb]

Hey Phil, I know this is coming a little late--ok, a lot late, but do you still have a friend in Yangshuo in need of teachers? I would be very, very interested. I have experience teaching ESL in Beijing and additional teaching experience from the states. Please email me with any help you may be able to provide me. Thank you very much.

Robert

[njoy78]

Hello Phil!

My name is Neil Joy.I`m a 30yr old male from Perth,Australia.I recently visited Zhengzhuo for 5 days in what was my first trip to mainland China.I had an amazing time and am intrested in returning to teach english and learn Mandarin.Do you still have the contacts in Yangshou for the teaching position?I have no former qualifications in teaching English.

Regards Neil.J

[liuzhou]

Are there any legal jobs in Yangshuo? Seems hightly unlikely.

[njoy78]

Having read some of the posts in this forum.I`ve decided it would be in my best intrest to do a term at a language course learning Mandarin before even considering teaching English.I would still like to be based in Yangshuo since the place sounds beautiful and i enjoy my rockclimbing.

Can anyone recommend a good school and maybe some affordable accomadation in Yangshuo?

I would like to be staying in an enviroment that is proactive to learning the language.

Are there any Chinese rockclimbers that would like a boarder?

Any information would be greatly appreciated.

Regards Neil Joy

[simonlaing]

Yangshuo is a small town an hour outside of the large city Guilin.

Here's one I stumbled on.. http://www.eslemployment.com/dcforum/DCForumID3/6303.html

I know the Guilin University provides chinese classes to foreigners. They may even have need of a native english teacher as well.

http://www.gutcie.cn/

http://www2.gliet.edu.cn/gjc/english/stu.asp

there is a Guilin Normal University as well (normal stands for teacher's university, sometimes these have better Chinese classes than the science or specialized universities)

There are a couple of schools probably around Yangshuo but if you can't find them on line I would get a tourist visa go there, get the job and then have them switch it for you . (Though I am not sure if the Olympics restrictions will make this annoying or not)

Also look at http://www.chinatefl.com/guangxi/study/gx_glgy.html

Good luck,

Simon:)

Edited October 7, 2008 at 06:51 AM by simonlaing

[njoy78]

Thanks for you reply Simon.

I`ve been receiving so much conflicting advice.

I`m really keen to study somewhere where there are very few english speakers and there are outdoor activities to do in my spare time.

I`m an avid rock climber so i was thinking Kunming may be a better place study.

But still i`m unsure.

Is the dialect understandable to other Mandarin speakers or am i creating problems for myself down the track?

I guess as long as i`m being taught standard Mandarin and the people on the street can understand me and i can also understand them then there is`nt a proplem, true?

I know i could just go to Beijing for proper Mandarin Chinese,but i know there will be many other foreigners there that will wanna speak english also. I`ll work it out soon enough!

[simonlaing]

They have an accent in Guangxi and Yunnan,

Yunan also has tons of minorities who may speak other languages in addition to Putonghua.

The places in my subjective experience to watch out for strong accents that could affect your Chinese learning are Guangdong, (including Hong Kong) , Sichuan R's L's , Shanghai , sh's zh's anything with an h is a problem. Xinjiang some what, and Hunan/Fujian less so.

Traveling In other places I have had not trouble in these places you could find people who could speak putonghua, and the professors would generally have good accents. Some of it is due to poverty of some of the places, Shanghai and Guangdong/HK I think it is a pride thing that they don't want to learn Putonghua as that would admit other places were as good as them. North East and South west (other than sichuan seem ok for some reason.) And my favorite town Nanjing, which was a capital, and preWW2 had a lot of people die.

These places have other things going for them as well HK/ SHanghai night life and booming economies , Hunan/Sichuan the spiciest foods in China, and hot pot.

To Choose something to fit your taste, I have heard there are rock climbing bars and outdoor clubs in Beijing if you look for them.

have fun,

SImon:)

[imron]

Having many or few foreigners around shouldn't really be something to worry about. If you want good language instruction, there will certainly be plenty of foreigners around because places with good teaching don't just sit there empty waiting for the occasional random foreigner to waltz into town. Also, any place that has reasonably well developed western outdoor activities such as rock-climbing is also going to have its fair share of foreigners (both Yangshuo and Kunming have plenty). The good news however is that having other foreigners about doesn't have to have an impact on your Chinese learning unless you let it. For every one foreigner there will be thousands more Chinese around. Language immersion can be found anywhere, so if rock-climbing is a focus, then find a place with good rock-climbing first, and worry about other foreigners later.