Hello Michael,

I empathize with you about your experiences at your university. Where I work, I was not paid for seventy-six days. When I pointed out this slight omission to one member of the F.A.O staff, they just talked to eachother in Chinese and laughed. I have enough grasp of the Chinese language to understand that they were making fun of me because they thought I was spending money too fast. Well surprise, this "loawai" was correct and they had to pay me my salary. After that little incident, some other teachers stopped me on campus and asked me with amazament how I was able to receive 10,000 Yuan in one transaction. Even if you're right sometimes, you're still always wrong to some Chinese.
I have other stories of just being treated with hostility and rudeness by the other teachers. I am a one man show in a senior middle school of 3,000 students. I have taught 22 classes with no support, no guidelines, and absolutely no materials. I am the ONLY foreign teacher in the whole county with no country men or any family, but to some of my colleagues this does not matter because I make more money than they do. I am one of those native speakers with a degree, TESOL Certificate, and 4 years working in an E.S.L. department at an American high school. So Michael, qualified or not, native or non-native, many of us experience what you have gone through. I guess I have somewhat been successful in engaging my three-thousand knuckleheads in trying to learn more English since they want me back and now the provincial head of teacher training wants to bring a foreign teacher to every school. So to those Chinese leaders that happen to read this don't treat your foreign teachers, native and non-native, like crap and you might keep us longer. I have learned to be very forgiving in China. A couple of days ago a sweet older lady called me an "idiot" as she passed by me- what gratitude.
My school district gave me a one year leave of absence to come and teach in China and they expect me back. I am thinking of staying for a few more years to take on more heartache and abuse. I fell in love, but that is another story.