Readers of these forums, and contributors as well, should take to heart what Mr. Latimer has written. Without overt condemnation and by maintaining a tone of neutrality, he has provided comments on and advice about a theme that is one of the common denominators here.

I would only add that "truths" are often obscured by the simple convenience of omittance. To take at face value the warnings offered by certain individuals is all well and good, but I often find myself wondering what they have left out. The picture they want to paint, then, seems a bit clouded.

Quite recently, for example, a poster provided all the negatives he could think of about being employed by Guangxi University. Here's what said poster left out and also misrepresented.

1. Guangxi University has three colleges that hire foreign teachers for their language programs.
2. There are three different locations on campus where foreign teachers are housed. Moreover, it is possible to rent one's own apartment off campus.
3. There are many teachers at Guangxi University who sign new contracts every year. There are a few teachers that have been there for five years and others who've been there nearly as long. I spent three years there and left somewhat reluctantly.
4. Guangxi University has a beautiful campus. Yes, in some places it is too noisy at certain times of the day, but it is possible to find peace and quiet. A good night's sleep, by the way, is not that hard to come by. Interestingly, I recently got an email from a past colleague who moved into the new apartments close to the cafeteria. His only complaint was the noise from other FTs coming home drunk every night. Funny how the poster omitted that sad truth.
5. Some teachers don't make it past the first term before being asked to leave. Usually, it's those who find the most to complain about without actually having taken the time to realize that whining won't get you very far. (Oddly, what I noticed at GXU was that those who whined the most and got fired the quickest were those with no qualifications and zero experience. For some reason they thought they had all the answers and were going to solve all of the problems with the Chinese education system in their first term.)
6. Yes, security is weak; however, foreign teachers have the option of locking their bikes in rooms provided for that purpose. New teachers usually have their bikes stolen quite quickly because, though warned, they rarely heed the warnings until they've lost their first bike.
7. Two of the colleges that hire foreigners are quite close to two of the apartment houses. The third is a ten minute bike ride, or a two kwai cart ride away. Some teachers enjoy the walk and see it as good exercise.
8. During three years at Guangxi University, I only went without hot water once or twice when they were working on the water system. The power goes down about twice a year, but they're working on making it better. The apartment was one of the best I've been provided in China.
9. The university is laid out in such a way that there is East Campus and West Campus. East Campus has some advantages over West Campus and West some over East.
10. The provided computer connection totally sucks, but it's possible to sign up for a connection provided by private companies. I paid 650 kwai for a year so that I wouldn't be bogged down by the university provided connection.

I can imagine that there will be some who are dissuaded from going to Guangxi University due to believing the post that I alluded to above. Unfortunately, they may be missing out on a situation that could work out quite well for them. I witnessed the growth of many young teachers who went there for their first jobs. They didn't pretend to have all the answers. They asked for advice when it was needed. They didn't judge the students, the Chinese staff or the administration. They simply did the best they could and worked hard for a few years before returning to their home countries with valuable experience and good recommendations for future employment in the field of second language acquisition.

Always tell the truth. That way you don't have to remember what you said.--Mark Twain