Returning Home

Well, the tickets are booked - daughter and I depart this land on July 26th. The stress is building as I try to grasp the reality of returning to working longer hours for a lot less disposable income. And daughter contemplates returning to a High School.

Job-hunting from here is proving to be real difficult but, as I'm one of those laowei with no savings left behind in my home country, job-hunting is a priority. There's an excess of ESOL teachers in NZ at the moment, the only thing that makes me stand out from the crowd is the little bit of Chinese that I've picked up.

Over the time I've been part of Raoul's I've read several posts where people have wondered about the returning - what it'll be like re-adjusting...so I thought I'd start this thread to keep you in the loop. Hopefully it'll all be positive, hopefully I'll land the perfect job - have got a few applications in at different universities and high schools - hopefully I'll find a place to live easily enough and a good school for daughter. Hopefully, daughter and I'll easily readapt to having to cook everyday, to not being special anymore, to just being one of the crowd...

Ah, I don't want to leave but daughter is desperate to finish her schooling...for that reason this returning is like a returning to the real world. To the real life - full-time teacher, full-time mother....

I've enjoyed my year and a half up here in Nei Mongol and do plan to come back, once daughter is independent and off leading her own life - but in the interim, back to working long-hours, back to money worries, back to parenting worries...

back to paying rent, back to paying taxes, back to Nanny laws, back to the mundane!! Good lucks, Vege!

I'm returning home in July too - but just for a month's trip this time, that is assuming the visa is granted - just sent off the stuff (which took a decade and a day to compile).

Next year we are returning for 2-3 years, I want to do a PGCE.  If I am successful in that, we will then return here with the idea of my getting a 'proper' job in Shanghai...

I know it's the real world up here...but in so many ways it doesn't seem to be. Life has felt like a laid back dream. No rent to pay, no electricity bills, no petrol to buy, cheap doctors and dentists, cheap hairdressers, cheap food, cheap buses and taxis, cheap clothing and only sixteen actual teaching hours per week. Up here I have one income - a liveable income, I can suport the two of us on it easily and even save money. Life is sweet...in comparison to what I'm returning to, it feels like a dream.

I quite agree vege, and that's the only reason I sort of disagree with the idea that we are badly underpaid.  Of course I guess it dpeends what you want out of life.  I'm the sort of guy who just wants a decent place to live, reasonable working hours, minimal hassle, I don't care about luxury designer goods or sports cars, so to me, being here suits what I want way more than the UK can.

I was making megabucks back home (in comparison with most wage earners), but I was also working horrible hours and was literally forbidden from turning my mobile phone off.  I NEVER want to return to that sort of life.

Commiserations on having to return home to this push of that sort of life.  But you can always drop into the saloon, have a few drinks with us and plan for your return.  Daughter will soon be at uni and you can come on back!!

I really want to go back home...to visit. I really want to see my family, and a break from China is not a bad thing.

I may have to go back at some point, for my daughter's sake.
And I don't want to. The thought of going back makes my skin crawl.
I've read science fiction books in which once you spent so much time in space, your bones and muscles would alter permanently and you could never return to Earth and live.

I kind of wonder if I've gotten something like that with China.

Some good things may come out of my return Stateside, if it comes to pass, but I will mourn and grieve every day of my life until I can return.
Or check out another new horizon somewhere else.

The scenario where you work you a** off and they just want you to do more.  No thanks, no ya done good kid.  Here the students tell you they love you, you get walked home from class, they carry your book bag for you.  People smile when they see you.  Back home, it was drudgery most people weren't happy.  I know some of the bosses here are only looking after no 1 too, but somehow it feels like we are appreciated.

Or check out another new horizon somewhere else.

You can't do that  .....there would be a severe allergic reaction!!    (Besides...PRC is the "devil you know".  Also, the US/Western world is not that giving and kind to Young Fellas....no respect for age, wisdom and grey hairs).




p.s. Vegemite...sooner gone - sooner back!

What you all said.  I wish I could go back to visit more often- I miss friands and fam something fierce right now.  But the thought of 55 hours a week in an office, desperately impersonating someone who wants to own the company some day, wearing a suit and tie yet only a paycheck away from disaster...

 

A couple of days ago I called up Moms to see how she's doing and all she could do was complain about the the heat. 39C in the Toronto area that day. Laughing my pigu off at her as I sit in the in the comfortable 32C Changsha weather. Why go home? It's too m'kaying hot there.

Bloody hot this weekend in Jinan.

Well, it'll be the middle of winter when we return. It'll be wet, wet and wet..with the odd spot of sun showing through.

I'm considering sending some of our winter clothing on ahead via snail mail. How have any of you lot got stuff, goodies shipped home? When I was in Europe I shipped home a couple of crates and only one turned up...so I'm a bit weary to crate things. But I'm also a bit leery of the postage system here - not everything turns up where it's meant to go.

I basically don't want to carry around our heavy winter clothing when we spend our last few days traipsing through Beijing and Shanghai. So how to get them home?

I got info on this company at a Job Fair in Shanghai.  I haven't used them but talked with them.  They said their prices are better than China Post.  The provide door-to-door delivery.

http://www.sevenseasworldwide.com/?gclid=CMj1jtS6tYwCFSg7TAodOjQfeg

Vegemite, I posted stuff back to Australia in those 20kg (I think) boxes that China Post provide.  Was given the deal about it taking 3 months but it only took 6 weeks, or so. Lots of other people have had similar experiences. Can't remember the cost but it wasn't too bad.  To EnZed it's gotta be about the same time and cost, hasn't it?

All the best with the move mate.  There's good and bad about returning home, isn't there?