care about relevance

Sometimes my students' Chinglish stumbles disconcertingly onto elemental core meaning that native speakers overlook with their rote patter of nonsense. One example is a student's powerful use of 'like' and 'love' as intransitive verbs.

Nijao's meaning is anyone's guess, but the recognition that Westerners look for relevance in the nature of their individual work while Chinese find innate adequate satisfaction in being part of the working group and this cultural distinction acting to cause FT distress in China is an important observation.
Even the worst FTs usually feel some pride in the nature of his/her work in the classroom. But the classroom experience is never adequate to satisfy his thirst for 'relevance'; he hungers for some institutional and student acknowledgement of his importance in a country where individual accomplishment is subsumed by the group. This unrequited hunger often results in the anger at China that litters this forum.

In reality, the FT in China is neither relevant nor important. The classroom space/time moment with its ethereal opportunity either empowers a teacher or not.