In response to counterpoint (martin hainan)

Let me provide you with a counter strike to the timed mouthpiece here below.

As the recruitment season for September 2016 FT positions begins in China, for those reading
this forum who are considering accepting a teaching position in China, these pages
contain many important caveats about selecting the right position and protecting
yourself during the recruitment process. There are also many many comments about the
career shortcomings of employment in China.

The Chinese hiring process is absurd, unethical, sexist and racist, and it can hardly be debated in depth as people in it are often unforthcoming, unknowledgeable, incompetent, inconsistent and hideous. (I really hope you aren't one of them)

What these pages do not tell you is that teaching in China is an opportunity for a joyful and
life-changing experience as you participate in the learning process of many students
whose lives are fascinatingly different from your own. Given your difference in culture
and the frenetic pace of change in Chinese society, teaching these students is an
opportunity for you to significantly impact their view of the world and to assist them
in contributing to China's new global prominence.

To assist indoctrinated young people in such a formidable society as China has in order to improve their lives is truly a challenging opportunity, although to serve those ill prepared souls in the backward nation so that they could create their own Chinatowns around the world or so that they could tell us how to teach them is repulsive to say the least. I bet a number of those local reps in recruiting that I have mentioned above have been the fine young people that have once studied with FTs too. Further more, what a "life-changing experience" that is for us, when we are to follow our local academic superiors who have memorized their operational manuals and who of course have learnt (selectively) from us. The "new global prominence" stinks in its system and air literally.

As a foreign teacher, the vast majority of Chinese people will treat you as a valued guest in
their country and be eager to help you when you are in need. It would serve you well to
respectfully reciprocate.

The "treat as a valued guest" is truly obvious as it is when they ignore your teaching but scream "waiguoren" from far distance. What gets me is the 2 year olds that can't say much in their own language, yet they master the so popular word to point to foreigners in such an articulate way. But I agree to certain extent with you, since I had a local stranger asking me in a broad daylight whether I needed a help flagging a cab. Had I been drunk, I wouldn't have felt so patronized.

Most importantly, teaching in China, or anywhere else, is an opportunity for your own
personal growth. I wish you well in your teaching and sincerely hope that when you do
finally leave China, you leave wiser and more accepting of the world and its rich
diversity of humanity.

Agreeably, teaching is essentially a chance for one to improve. Whether one can actually upgrade his/her true academic aptitude given the circumstances, however, is a billion Yuan question. Some of us are smarter than before for we know that walking into a toilet without any napkins is unwise and that assuming the billion and a half people have diverse views is silly.