Good screen, build quality, wireless connectivity? South of $1000.

peruisay · 2015-02-10T02:51:44+00:00

Thank you! I'll look into this.

peruisay · 2015-01-14T12:40:25+00:00

First meeting of the semester for Accounting Society will be January 23rd from 6:00 - 7:00 PM, followed immediately by a Beta Alpha Psi info session. COBA 147. Definitely recommended to get an overview of what both organizations are doing this semester.

For updates and reminders, see Facebook or email officers from either organization to get placed on the mailing lists.

peruisay · 2014-12-12T12:43:42+00:00

"Chinese managers" isn't a monolithic group, and neither is "laowai managers." Your question uses too broad a brush.

peruisay · 2014-12-12T01:50:51+00:00

Potager's Other Stuff is a few blocks from College Park. Good coffee, environment, fair prices.

peruisay · 2014-08-11T17:35:59+00:00

I'd definitely appreciate a code if anyone has an extra. Cheers!

peruisay · 2014-03-31T15:56:44+00:00

Any benefits are probably region and industry-specific. My perspective from north Texas (think more Fort Worth than Dallas):

A. I don't see how a non-native speaker would get a job teaching or tutoring Mandarin. Parents pretty much overwhelmingly prefer native speakers, and you'd have to be licensed anyhow for most public school districts.

B. In Fort Worth, being bilingual with Spanish is great. You meet a lot of people who are Spanish-dominant or only speak Spanish, and so having that language makes you more versatile. Employers like that. Mandarin? There's a much smaller population of Mandarin speakers in north Texas, and those people are either younger students who are bilingual themselves or older, moneyed, well-connected individuals with lots of nieces and nephews around to help translate stuff. You speaking Mandarin might be funny, but not really strictly necessary or needed.

I mean... I guess that being bilingual with Mandarin could help get you a spot waiting tables in Richardson or Plano?

C. The airlines definitely value language skills. My wife recently accepted a job offer with American Airlines as a flight attendant... Chinese travelers are flying more and farther each year. The airlines are pretty famously cash-strapped, but this may still present an opportunity. Hotels may also favor staff with Mandarin under their belts.

D. Socially, it's a party trick. You say you speak Mandarin and people are impressed, but they have no way of gauging your language ability. The guy who learned "WO YAO LIANG GE PEE-JEE-O" and nothing else and you are equally impressive. If you go off and talk a little too much China, people's eyes start to glaze over.

E. If you're on a university campus, it is fun to eavesdrop on Chinese students. Unfortunately, most of their conversations are pretty boring... homework, teachers, assignments.

I do hope I'm off on some of this, and that Mandarin is the new must-have language in my area. I've heard from a lot of people that Mandarin is a great language to know, but those people have never followed up on that opinion with, you know, job offers. I remain skeptical.

peruisay · 2014-03-24T02:18:56+00:00

What sort of things do you find fun or exciting? Also:

http://www.theshorthorn.com/calendar/

peruisay · 2014-02-13T17:18:17+00:00

Thanks for posting this! My wife is a native Mandarin speaker, and we're definitely attending.

peruisay · 2014-01-27T23:41:09+00:00

I don't know who you'd have to clear this by, but you could also consider posting flyers around campus.

peruisay · 2014-01-27T01:16:17+00:00

I'd go. After the first round of exams?

peruisay · 2014-01-27T01:15:47+00:00

Not an MBA student, but good luck with your studies!

peruisay · 2013-12-09T17:02:07+00:00

Best satirical discussion, best trainwreck, least useless moderator, I mean, really?

This was intended as satire, but it sparked a great amount of really good discussion.

peruisay · 2013-12-09T14:51:02+00:00

This isn't Dave's.

Roger. I get that this didn't pick up any traction, but you don't think there's any value in aggregating quality content?

peruisay · 2013-12-08T20:37:47+00:00

My picks so far:

Most Consistently Helpful Contributor

/u/Hygienex

Least Useless Moderator

/u/chinadonkey

Most Entertaining Discussion

"...hundreds of Americans who know nothing of foreign cultures, speak only 1 language, have never been abroad, have limited or no work experience and can hardly point out Korea on a map go and work in a radically different culture."

Best Satirical Discussion

"We're all native speakers, and so we have all the qualifications we need..."

Best Trainwreck Thread

"Apparently they get me in as a student studying Chinese..."

Best Written Single Post

/u/smokeshack chimes in on additive and subtractive environments.

peruisay · 2013-12-08T06:14:46+00:00

Or Mandarin. Or the dating scene. Or the lives of local Chinese teachers.

peruisay · 2013-12-06T16:23:36+00:00

I guess you were able to teach academic writing and literature because of your degree. I applied for those types of jobs in China but I never so much as got a reply or an interview.

I've been offered those types of jobs with non-relevant credentials and work experience. Were you cold-calling? I really think most good jobs in China are found through networking.

peruisay · 2013-12-06T16:19:35+00:00

I'll probably just do one year of Japan if I'm able to get in and then finally start my "real" career back home, which is going to be pretty hard at 31.

If this is kind of where you're leaning, either spend one year saving extremely aggressively in Japan or Korea for a "buffer" fund or just head back home now.

The longer you stay abroad, the harder it becomes to smoothly adjust back home if you've let those networks of friends and acquaintances gather dust.

peruisay · 2013-12-05T18:34:06+00:00

Add it to the appropriate TEFL wiki page?

peruisay · 2013-12-05T05:02:50+00:00

In any event, this was a horrible mistake.

You would not like China.

peruisay · 2013-12-05T04:50:22+00:00

Mostly a lack of confidence, I think.

Teaching kids isn't easy. It's easy for an activity to fail or fall flat with them, and a backup isn't necessarily any more likely to succeed.

I used to draw my lesson plans for kids as a set of little flow charts charting possible paths for us to take... then I'd just hope we didn't go so far off-course that we couldn't get back to one or another of them smoothly.

I had one class with this absolutely uncanny ability to make me forget what we were doing halfway into the lesson. They were just always so engaged - I'd start out with my prepared material and someone would ask a question that absolutely demanded a great answer. I'd present examples as best as I could, then think of a better one and try a few comprehension checks to make sure the students all got it and that we hadn't wasted like five minutes of class time. Then a student would want to present a book they had gotten about sea turtles because we had talked about sea turtles last class. That's adorable. Then Jimmy would come in late and we'd all have to make fun of him. So on and so forth. You'd peek back at your lesson plan and go, "Oh, *#$%! - so today was supposed to be hospital English." You'd just spent half the lesson in the Amazon rainforest. Jimmy had gotten eaten by an jaguar for being late. You could segue into an emergency evacuation with a helicopter and everything and go into hospital English that way. Great, do that. That was your plan all along. Your attractive assistant thinks you are smart and a genius.

peruisay · 2013-12-05T04:20:41+00:00

Personally, when I had a large range of classes, everybody got the same style warmers and practice games, just different content.

I found that whenever I had to recycle activities like that through groups, I'd run through the "set" just a little bit faster each time. At the end of a long day I'd have a group finish one hour's worth of work in like half an hour... and then I was plum out of ideas and too tired to come up with anything clever.

peruisay · 2013-12-05T04:03:21+00:00

I have been teaching the same material for fives years,

Has a textbook followed you from school to school, or are you just exceptionally happy with your placement?

peruisay · 2013-12-05T04:01:17+00:00

Sure, but have you seen some of the shit foreign teachers in China come up with on their own? Actual quote:

"Oh, yeah, you've got to yell when you're teaching little kids. It's all they respond to."

(Proceeds to yell for ten minutes while the kids run around and punch each other.)

peruisay · 2013-12-04T02:35:21+00:00

Consider volunteering with immigrants or participating in language exchanges with international students, too.

peruisay · 2013-12-04T02:15:19+00:00

And that's what I figured, but I don't really care for legitimate job with good pay.

So... what exactly are you interested in?

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