Everything Is Harder Than It Should Be

I promised at the end of last post to tell you of what awaited me after interview weekend in Shenyang. I am the kind of person, (though many would pshaw this), who, in lots of ways, tends to accentuate the positive while NOT eliminating the negative. When I have a lousy job that I have to keep at least for a while longer, I try to remain positive. But when I nail down a good new one, the false positivity sometimes reveals itself. I don't like people who bury their heads in false positivity so I've been trying not to be escapist in my own life. China has not been kind to my character progression in this regard.

I've been back in Taiyuan a week now and I have been asking myself, "Has it always been this bad here?" I have often self-cheered under my breath with things like, "Not much longer now," or "Hang in there, Dave," or "This will all soon be just an amusing anecdote," but those placations haven't been very effective this week.

Let's begin at the beginning. I had a flawless flight home. I hung out with Gordon and Jo Jo, (and their charming cat Sochu), for a little bit on Sunday afternoon in Shenyang. We had duck together, the best meal I've had in China so far, then had a few drinks at their apartment. I will probably get a place in the same apartment complex. It was new, modern, clean, well designed, large, and functional. And a lot cheaper than the apartment I'd rented here in Taiyuan. Also, the school offers a housing allowance in the contract AND PAYS IT, so it will be free for me! YEEHAW!

They had Christmas decorations up and everything. It was a nice visit. They put me in a taxi to the airport at dusk and I was home a few hours later. It was 9:40 Sunday night and I had just arrived on campus so I made the stupid mistake of announcing that I just had my first perfect flight. I even said, "I hate to say this," while I made the announcement because I just knew the Fates would hear that and say, "Oh yeah! Forgot about this poor sod for a while." And sure enough...

The lesson I put together was one I'd prepped my Monday class for the previous week. We were learning about cross-cultural awareness so I gave them a few pointers then we watched the Simpsons episode in which they visit Australia. Well, we were supposed to. I wrote on the board some questions for them to answer while watching and while they were copying them out, I flashed up the Simpsons episode on the computer. It had no sound. I remember one other time this computer had no sound and all we did to fix that was press the space bar. So I pressed the space bar. This time it was the pause/play function. I got a student to fiddle around with the computer but we couldn't get sound. So I looked around. There was an empty classroom across the hall. I announced that we were changing classrooms. The students heaved big sighs and rolled their eyes but we got them into the other classroom.

The other classroom had great sound! Yay! Just... no picture. So we fiddled around with the NEW computer too and after a while it finally worked. This wasted at least half an hour of a two-hour class. And I have told everybody I can possibly tell about the shit computers at this school. They all talk to me like we're in a failing marriage. "Your comment is acknowledged. I am hearing your discomfort. I empathise with it and wish I could help you with it. I will talk to some people who don't exist about fixing the problem. Meanwhile why don't you talk to other people who can do nothing about it?"

But, whatever, I managed to get through the Monday after a long weekend. So I felt okay. When I got home I decided to contact Faith, who had paid for my ticket and I needed to pay back. I suggested dinner at a Korean barbecue we had talked about last time we went out. Her husband, Mr. Lee said it was good and it's not too far from my place. I can walk there in about 40 minutes. Plus, last time we met it was to give her something I had bought for her in Korea and I got her such a deal that she and Lee paid. So I said I'd pay next time. Faith checked and the restaurant was not there any more, but there was a new all you can eat BBQ place not far from it. We agreed to meet there at 7ish.

That afternoon I had a meeting with George and David from the university where I work. I had told George earlier and he said we needed to tell David. His Chinese name sounds a tiny bit like "David" so that's what I call him. I had told George I would be leaving the school and let him know how Huasheng had been behaving. They had cheated me into signing with TUST and they had threatened to pull my residence permit, which would screw the school. I wouldn't be able to finish my semester, much less the one-year contract. I did mention to George that I have serious doubts about the contract I have with the school. It was signed between myself and the school while I was still under contract with Huasheng. In my then legal contract is a clause that actually says I cannot sign with or work for any other schools. What we needed to do at the time, and what I was repeatedly telling everybody at Huasheng, was get a three-way contract signed. We never actually all sat down together. I know Huasheng thinks they've tricked both the school and me and they don't care about the legalities.

The upshot of the meeting was that TUST will have speaks with Huasheng and they will NOT transfer the visa to this school. There was a point in the meeting when they were showing me parts of the contract where it says that if I end early without good reason, I have to buy the contract out. I got very upset that they would even bring this up. I was not about to let fucking Huasheng cost me any more money! Here I was telling them that the contract was essentially useless. It was never a legally binding contract. I'm sure I'm right on that point. Yet, I have taught my classes faithfully, even 4-hour long classes of 90, for the lowest salary in China, since August. I don't have to, but I told them I WILL finish out the semester. I had also just informed them that I will be leaving after the semester giving them the maximum amount of time to find a replacement teacher and saving them two months of vacation pay. I could have said nothing, collected vacation pay for January and February, then just gone to Shenyang and left them high and dry. I didn't. And despite all that, they actually brought up this clause about leaving early and having to pay the college! Fucking Chinese business! I got a little angry and immediately David relented and George and he said that, okay, our situation WAS a good reason to leave early. But still... grrrrr.

I told them that they might even have a claim against Huasheng for the second half of my contract depending on what agreement they had made with them. Was I sold to the school? They say I wasn't but I have difficulty believing TUST was completely oblivious to what happened. Who signs a teacher who has a work visa from another school and doesn't sign a contract with that other school? I think maybe Huasheng has signed something with TUST that I don't know about. And THIS might be the reason that Huashyte is so hot and bothered to get me to sign the end-of-contract contract, or the "labour dissolve" contract as they call it here, which states that we have no more business together. THEN neither TUST or I have any financial claim against them for cheating us, if this is indeed what has happened. It is a HUGE mess to say the least! But hopefully things will get ironed out.

So I left the meeting with TUST assuring me that they wouldn't allow Huasheng to pull my residence permit or harm my transition to the new job. I don't know if they can actually make that claim... It might have been another failing relationship placation. Don't worry, we'll help. We'll talk to them. I've heard that before and gotten no results. They said they'd meet on Friday and let me know the results of the meeting. Monday is over and I've heard nothing from either of them yet.

So I go back to my apartment and decide to send my lessons for the next day's classes to the class monitor so she could print them out for the students. While I am in the midst of that, BAM, power outage! No power, no computer, no lights, no fridge, no wifi and when I tried to message Faith on WeChat, THAT wouldn't work either! I was chatting with her for a while about the meeting too and we were still sending WeChats back and forth when the power went out. She continued to send messages and I could receive them but I couldn't reply. I'd send the message and the phone would think for a while then give me a message that said something like local network cannot be reached at this time. Meanwhile Faith is asking questions and getting no answers. She's sending me question marks. Probably getting upset that I'm ignoring her.

Then just before 5 PM I was able to send messages to Faith but the power was still not on. It was starting to get dark. I found my trusty security guard flashlight and actually had to use it to put my shoes and coat on, go to the bathroom and whatever. My phone was down to maybe 20% charge and I had no way of charging it so I was trying not to use my phone. Oh, and inexplicably, my toilet stopped filling up. I got one flush after the power outage but it never filled with water afterwards. ???? I had to fill a tub with water and dump it into the toilet if I wanted to flush it. The other water in the bathroom sink and the shower was okay. Just no hot because it's electrically heated.

At around 6 PM I put my phone charger and flashlight in my pockets and left. I went to the front of the school where I always caught taxis and tried for a while. The whole campus was dark. It looked kinda cool. But I guess all the students couldn't use electronics so they all decided to go out too. By taxi. There was no catching a cab! So at 6:30 I messaged Faith, (WeChat was working outside my apt), and told her I'd walk to the restaurant and I'd probably be late. It would take me 40-50 minutes I guessed. I was right. I got there and Faith and Lee were waiting in line. The place was JAM packed! They'd been waiting for a while too. I normally wouldn't even bother but they'd waited for so long I figured I'd wait too. I had gotten up at 5:30 AM so I was getting tired but by the time we got into the restaurant to eat it was at least 8 PM and I had only had one meal that day. I ate a LOT! And it was really good! The second best meal I've had in China!

It's really a good idea! They have a heated grill but there's no fire or anything like in Korea. It's a plate and over top they put this paper to protect it from the impossible to clean charring. I always feel sorry for the people at Korean BBQ places who have to wash the grills! We had all kinds of meat! Not Korean, but similar. You grill the meat and veggies and then put them in a lettuce leaf. There were sauces too. Not sam jjang but not bad. AND... all you can DRINK too! I only had two beer though cuz I had to teach next day. It cost us 60 something quai. That's about 10 or 11 bucks. Macdonald's costs that! I then understood why there were a thousand people waiting to get into this place!

So not ALL bad news. I got WAAAY more than my money's worth lemme tell ya! They give you two hours then kick you out. At that point we were all still eating. Not as fast but still going. I had to laugh at Faith. She's not much of a meat eater so she didn't feel like she got her money's worth eating noodles and veggies. But she took a dessert to go. lol

When I got back to the campus the power was still off. I used my flashlight to get to the door of my apartment block but it was beeping wildly and my electronic key would not open it. I think what happened was the lock switched to battery back-up when the power went out. Then since the power was out for so long the battery had only enough power to make the beeping noise, not open the lock. I'd seen this before and I know that security guards, REAL security guards, will have spare batteries they can use when something like this happens. But how could I communicate this to the guards?

I went to the gate where there were two guards and tried to message Faith. WeChat wasn't working. So I called her. Luckily the restaurant had an outlet and I'd been able to charge my phone to about 50% while eating dinner. Faith didn't answer. Then I called George. He answered immediately and told me he would translate. So I gave the phone to the security guard. She handed it back to me and George was gone. She just shrugged and said something in Chinese. I signalled to the other guard, who was not in the booth, to come with me. He refused. I was starting to think I was going to have to spend a cold night sleeping outside. Then two things happened: George called back and the power went back on. So while talking to George I walked to my door and it opened. WHEW!!!

Alas, my troubles were not over. I didn't need to email anything to my students for my Tuesday classes. That was lucky because the internet did not come back on with the power. I taught my Tuesday classes in a room with no power. I always bring water to class. With large classes I have to talk more than I would like so I need it sometimes. I couldn't get water because the electric water machines weren't working. But the dry class went okay. No internet for the entire day Tuesday. I think all that was required was someone to just hit the reset button on the server for my building. David's office is two floors above me. I talked to him that day and he said he hadn't noticed the wifi being off. He checked on his phone and confirmed it was off. I told him how important wifi is for my classes and how I had already had to altar several lessons without it. He said something like, "I am hearing your sadness and I can relate and sympathize. It is making you uncomfortable and I acknowledge this. I will endeavor to rectify the situation in any way that I can't."

I had lessons planned for the next day, but they required technology. I wasn't going to chance it. I copied about a hundred emergency lessons for Wednesday's classes. Sure enough the power was out in the buildings I taught until the fourth and final hour of teaching that day. I ended up using the same lessons for four hours the next day too because I still had no wifi and couldn't have sent anything else. The wifi finally DID return Wednesday night when it was too late to send lessons. When was the last time you went a few days without internet? It was a nightmare!

One good thing that the power outage caused was a confrontation with an asshole teacher I've been trying to meet up with. This guy teaches some sort of math or science and EVERY time he leaves class just before I get there with scrawlings all over the board, chalk dust all over the lectern and computer, the screen down, the projector on and the computer locked into his lesson. EVERY time. I showed up for this class on Wednesday and, because of the power outage, he was STILL teaching. And just to be even a bigger shithead, he went right up to the hour. He's supposed to quit at ten to the hour. All my students and I waited politely outside. I walked into the class and met him near the computer. As always the board was a mess, and everything else was too. The computer wasn't on and the screen wasn't down but I said in English, (which is the language he is supposed to be teaching in, but like all the Chinese teachers, doesn't), "Please clean off the board or at least get a student to do it for you." I even picked up a board eraser and demonstrated. He nodded, said nothing, then pushed past me. I watched myself from outside my body turn around and yell, "HEY!" The guy stopped and turned around. I then approached him. Meanwhile his students were almost all gone and mine were coming into the classroom. They'd all heard me complain about this teacher's lack of common courtesy before. I think they enjoyed the confrontation. I again used the eraser and said, "PLEASE, erase the blackboard or get one of your students to do so." He was about to say something, (NOT do something), when his LAST student grabbed the eraser and wiped the boards. I'll be curious to see the state of the classroom THIS Wednesday. What do you guys think? I am expecting the same mess. Even though China needs it more than any other place I've lived due to its huge population, they don't practice common  courtesy here and actually BLAME it on the huge population. I've seen Korea's common courtesy improve over the years and I am positive the foreign influence had a lot to do with it. I think it can happen in China too. But people have to do what I did. Not just for wiping off chalkboards either. People have to demand better behaviour from selfish assholes like this in many areas. I think it can happen.

So pretty much a week was ruined by the power outage. I am still feeling the effects THIS week. My toilet hasn't worked properly since. Today it is at its worst. I am still pouring water down the toilet sometimes. This brings up another hardship and another amusing anecdote. I have no kitchen sink so I have to wash my dishes in the bathroom. This weekend I cleaned up the house because I didn't clean the previous weekend since I was in Shenyang. So I had two weeks of dust on the floor and two weeks of dishes. The latter is not so bad for me. I'd re-use paper plates if I had them. But the dust build-up is something to behold! I have no doubt this too is adversely affecting my health. The dust is just ridiculous here. And while sweeping up on the weekend I breathe in so much of it, the next day I feel like I have a hangover/cold. It's disgusting! But, not much longer...

So I have to fill a tub of water in the shower for washing dishes. I put soap in and put the showerhead into the tub. When it fills up I wash the dishes in the tub then rinse them in the bathroom sink. I was changing the dirty dish water and pouring it down the toilet, you know, to kill two birds with one stone, and at the end of the pour I head a clank. Then I remembered I had put a sugar spoon in the wash. I never did see that spoon but I'm sure it's not helping the already backed up toilet.

Then today I go to class and teach last week's lesson to my culture class. Because it involves video and a PDF, which the computer in that class can't read, I couldn't use it last class. I downloaded a PDF reader, put it on my flashdrive, put the video and the PDF file on the flashdrive too and everything worked! Today, miraculously, the SOUND was working too! I had chosen this video, (about the Great Barrier Reef), because it just had music and words printed on the screen. Didn't need sound. But sound there was! Of course! But then I noticed something that has happened to me before. I had put some other videos onto my flashdrive for other classes. The ones illustrating cross-cultural understanding. Like a guy golfing in Japan who gets a hole in one and has to buy expensive gifts for his Japanese business partners who are golfing with him. Next time he aims for the woods at the same hole and says, "Oh darn, I missed. Oh well." But his ball gets a nice bounce off a tree and goes into the hole again. I have several good examples of things like this. So it takes up space on my flashdrive. Today they're gone. Oh they're still ON the drive, they're just hiding and I can't figure out how to read them. So they still take up space but are useless. Like some of my students. lol. So now I have to put those same files onto my flashdrive AGAIN so I can use them. I WOULD have used them last week when they were still useable, but, power outage. Hopefully I'll be able to have them on the drive long enough to use them before they disappear.

I think this happens because of all the computers having incompatible software. I don't know or care that much, I just wish it wouldn't happen. I have told the proper people about this too and received solid psychological support but no technical support.

And finally, this morning, when I went to take a shower, I had no COLD water. Hot was fine but cold wasn't. And yet the toilet remains unflushable.

And just to add a little more drama to this week, we have government inspectors coming to random classes. I've already had a couple of people inspecting my classes from the school. Now I have to perform for the government. I think they are probably trying to judge whether this place actually IS a school or isn't just some fumpee for profit business, (which it is). This has happened many times before to me. My credibility and honesty is used to make a crook look like an educator. And some of the other teachers were talking about this to me. Make sure you don't use the computers. Make sure you are entertaining. Make sure you make the students laugh. Sigh. Not for much longer...

So now you see a little better what I mean when I say I want to be a real teacher in a real school. Or when I say that everything in China is a little harder than it really should be. I saw a driver this morning turn a corner on campus and drive for half a block on the wrong side of the road. The driver didn't change sides of the road until an oncoming vehicle was forced to slow down or stop. It almost seems to me like the people here are purposely inconveniencing each other and making the lives of their fellow man more difficult or at least less convenient. Maybe they have some kind of belief that it builds patience or character in others and they are doing something noble. Do you buy that?

All I DO know is I'll be slightly more ignoble but tremendously more comfortable come March. So like a really good massage, this story will have a happy ending.


*** Wednesday update: That annoying teacher stayed late again today. But not AS late. Only half the class was waiting for him in the hallway. He didn't wipe the boards but the same student who wiped them last time, was wiping them when I got into class. The computer was still dusty but not AS dusty. And the computer, screen, OHP were all off and closed. There was only one cigarette butt under the chair. Yes, I forgot to tell you, he usually smokes a few cigs and just leaves the butts under the chair. (who SMOKES while they teach?!?!) But at least things were a little better.

BUT... (come on, this is ME here), the computer case was locked. LOCKED! This dude has used the computer for every class except the time when there was no power. He must have used it this class too and then just to be a colossal dick, locked it as if to say, "You want me to clean up, there ya go, Round Eye!"

One of my students called a maintenance worker and we got it opened. Only 10 or 15 minutes were wasted.

The classroom before that had no sound. AGAIN! The same maintenance worker was called. She comes in and takes a panel off the computer case that I didn't even know could be taken off. This exposes a whole equalizer/sound system that I was unaware of. She presses a few things and the sound comes on. I ask her to show me and AS ALWAYS I get a hand waved at several buttons in explanation. Nobody ever tells me how to do these things. Is it this inconveniencing thing? Do they WANT to do things the least convenient way? I have never seen these computer cases locked. Why today? Why ever? Why not give me a key? Why not tell teachers about the sound system?

I swear it boggles the mind!

China: Techno-illogically Awesome

So, last weekend I went to Shenyang for a job interview at the good place. It's Victoria University of China and we are teaching students English who want to eventually study things in English, ideally, at Victoria University in Australia. So it's not a fumpee, wannabe school, it's a real school. "Fumpee," if you are wondering, is my new favourite Chinese word. It means "fart," so I heard my young students, well, my young, male students using it a lot. But I learned on the weekend, from Jo Jo, that it is also used in Chinese to mean "bullshit." So I can say that most of the places I've worked are not schools, they're fumpee schools. I just wonder, in which sense all of my students have been using it.

I got a really cheap air ticket to go Thursday night after classes so that I could make it to my 9:30 AM interview on Friday. Everything went fine except I thought it would probably be a good idea to book a hotel before travelling. I only had the address in Chinese to show to a taxi driver, so I didn't know what area of the massive city of Shenyang to look for a hotel. Plus, my card, and my internet are hit and miss so I'd probably look for something for an hour, find a good place and have my card refused. This has happened before. Besides, Gord told me there are two perfectly good hotels right across the street from the school. Surely there'd be a room!

As I said, the trip went off without too much trouble. The only problem was that I couldn't use WeChat. It's really frustrating here in China technologically because you need wifi for things that don't use wifi to work. It's techno-illogical if you ask me. My 4G data doesn't work unless there is functioning wifi nearby. It doesn't have to be mine; I don't have to have a username or password; I don't even need to have my wifi on, I don't think, but if there's no wifi, my data doesn't work. Am I cray cray, or is data something we all get thinking that it will come in handy in times of no wifi? Isn't that one of the whole points of it? Well mine needs to be in a wifi hot zone or it won't work.

Same with WeChat. And it's even worse. I have to be able to read the wifi with my phone and log in I think. Like in the airport in Seoul. I got there one time and couldn't get ahold of Amber for this reason. I'm NOT the only one with this problem either. So anyway, I'm usually good all over the city of Taiyuan. It rarely comes up. In fact it's only come up in the two least convenient places it could: my apartment and the Taiyuan Airport. The Taiyuan Airport for the love of Peet! Why would anyone need to communicate with other people at an AIRPORT?!?! Highly illogical, captain. We haven't yet finished with this point.

The trip was fine, though I would have liked to message Gord to make sure he knew I was on the plane safely. I wasn't going to be staying at his place, but he was concerned. Also, it would have been nice to find out if he was going to meet me at the airport and have a beer or not. Usually Amber does this and it's always nice. I got to the Taiyuan Airport WAAAAY early. I forgot I didn't have to go through the time consuming customs and immigration. MAN that's nice!!! I don't know if I'll ever be able to stand in front of an immigration officer without looking, AND FEELING, like I've got a few Kees of heroine taped to me. It always makes me nervous even though I've never done anything wrong. I guess I always think maybe it's possible I've overstayed or my visa has been cancelled or a fumpee warrant for my arrest has been put out. I dunno. I have no reason for a guilty conscience, but I always have one. See? That word is cool, isn't it? hee hee I'll be using it again to be sure. I'm thinking of possibly OVERusing it. We'll see...

Before we get back to the trip, and the interview, I would like to complain about technology a bit more to give you a better idea of mein tekno kampf. First of all, I bought my computer in Canada, a generally law-abiding nation where copyright infringement is a thing. So it didn't come with Windows Office, Adobe Acrobat, or any other programs, (or copies of them), already on the hard drive. I use Apache Open Office because it's free and I don't have to buy a fake copy of it three every three months. I did that for Microsoft Office a couple of times. How can you tell if you are getting it forever or just a three month trial? I don't know how. And Acrobat was the exact same thing. Only you can't keep using the Acrobat when the trial runs out. It's done. With the Microsoft Office you just get a red warning every time you use it. It's just a couple extra clicks to remove that but I don't like it. So I use Open Office. Sometimes Open Office dox don't go through a Google email without being messed up slightly. Just slightly, but they get messed up all the same. So I've started using the "export as PDF" function. This is something I only learned through my usual arduous process. I ran a Google search on how to convert a doc to PDF on Open Office. I got into some lengthy download sessions of programs that SAY you can do it using "PDF Pal" or "Perfecto PDF" or "Transfile" or whatever. Usually the installations come with other unwanted programs and they change default homepages, media players, picture readers or whatever and when you finally get them, they don't work anyways so you THEN have to try to find all the crap that has been added or changed by that download and fix it. This can take hours and it very often leads to plenty of salty language.

I've recently had to do two things that required this process: 1. Affix a signature to a document and 2. Save only part of a PDF file. I won't tell you the document I had to sign but I figured this one out on my own AFTER going through all the fumpee sales and gobbledygook answers. Don't you just love when you get these computer geeks, who always start their advice with, "Oh it couldn't be easier," then go on to make you feel like this machine you're looking at is a frigging space-time continuum bender? "You just go into the registry and swap the common franctoid phrases with current cross-proxy protocols. Of course you'll want to back up your soft-bank structures with a secure failsafe peekaboo program. But once you've recalibrated the stereopixels into reducibly stringent chiplets, you're basically home free! Couldn't be easier!" Eat a Klingon dick!

I didn't want the frustration of searching so I tried a few things that I reckoned would work, and one DID! I just scanned my signature and then added it to the document. Of COURSE it couldn't possibly be THAT easy! I tried that a couple times and it didn't work. So I just thought I'd try saving the signature as a PNG file rather than a JPG and that worked. Are you kidding me? Why? I have no choice but to believe it's that way simply to make things difficult for the world. To give computer geeks more job security they can't have this process that billions will want to do, WORK with the most commonly used scan file type. No! They have to add difficulty so that ordinary people can't do it. Well, once again, eat a Klingon dick you nerds cuz I figured it out on my own! YEAH! In yer faces! I haven't played sports in a while but this might be just as good as the feeling you get when you score a goal or touchdown or win a game of whatever you're playing. Then I added it to the document and sent it. As an Open Office document. So the signature moved outside the box where I wanted it. So I'll probably have to save the document as a PDF and resend it. Sigh.

As for the PDF separation, it wasn't as smooth. I've had to do this before too but usually it's for work and I have time constraints so I just give up. No less frustration or salty language, it's just under my breath so students or fellow teachers don't hear. I can print out selections of a PDF I just don't know how to save them. So that was my mission. See, I have all these files in which there are the worksheets and then there are the answers. I have huge classes here and don't do the copying. I send lessons to my class reps so they can make copies for everyone. But I can't very well send them the worksheets AND the answers now can I? So I had a project.

I can't tell you how many programs I used to open the two-page file and try to save just page one. I selected just page one and saved. It saved both pages. On several different programs that could read PDF's. Then I noticed I have a "one page" option on a couple of them. I used that and the doc was reduced to just the first page. I then clicked save and it saved both pages. I did a search and the first answer was, "It couldn't be easier! Just go into your Adobe Acrobat PDF reader and..." Nope. And by the way, eat a dick. I actually downloaded a program called PDF24 and it allowed me to open up my PDF in it. I was able to select the second page and delete it. Then I saved. This took me over an hour. I am positive there is a simpler way to do this, it's just hidden by the nerds from us.

With net neutrality quickly disappearing and the things we all want to do getting harder and harder to do, I think soon the only REAL freedom I feel in this world, computer freedom, is coming to an end. It won't be long now before email will require local and federal clearance and an expensive course at some fumpee, for profit computer "school." But I'm taking advantage of it while it lasts. I streamed a couple of hockey games this morning. Both Vancouver and Calgary lost but they were good games. Anyhoo, back to the trip.

The trip was a short one and for the first time in a long, long time, the plane food was crap. I guess I can't complain because the ticket was so cheap, but too late, I already did. I WAS delayed about an hour so I ended up getting to Shenyang at around 9:30 Thursday night. And WeChat was working! So I sent a message to Gord saying I had arrived. Gord was talking in code. He said, "She's changed the meeting to 3 o'clock." I thought the teachers had a meeting. So I said, "Sure, no problem. I can go to my interview and then after your meeting we can go out for beers." He just repeated that the meeting was changed to 3. Stupidly, I didn't think he meant my interview. I just said, "Am I supposed to be going to this meeting?" I just looked around the airport for a short time in case I saw him but I was getting accosted by the taxi harassers so didn't want to stay too long. So I got into a taxi and went to the uni. Gord sent a message like, "Dude, dude, she's changed the meeting. Just go with it, man. Where are you now. If you wanna..." I thought he was gonna suggest drinks but it was 10 o'clock and I was up at 5:30 that morning. I was still an hour away from the uni and then had to book a hotel. I didn't wanna stay out too late or drink too much before an interview anyways. I sent several messages that I was in a taxi going to the school but got no answer.

Then it hit me. My interview was changed to 3 so I could go out for beers. I still am not sure if Gord was at the airport or not. I didn't see him if he was.

I reached the school at 10:30. I tried both the hotels across from the school, but to my surprise, there was no room at the JingJiang or the Home Inn. I checked two more and they were both full. Or would not give me a room for whatever reason. I messaged Gord and told him this but didn't get an answer. So I wandered around for another hour in the frigid Shenyang air. It sounds like I'm complaining but I was happy to check out the hood, and it was like -8 or something. Not that cold. A good night for a walk.

I checked about 8 or 9 hotels. One Home Inn Plus showed me a sign that read, "We don't give service to foreigners." I guess that's the plus. Then I started wondering if this was the reason I'd been refused at other places. No way to know really. Well it was now 11:30 and things were getting pretty dead even though this neighbourhood where the university is has a few other schools so it's pretty lively. But it was only Thursday night so mostly it was just taxis cruising around. And me. I finally went down a road that was a dead end and flagged a cab. He took me to the fourth Home Inn I'd been to and FINALLY there was room at the inn! I got into the room and messaged Gord to let him know I'd found a place and he messaged back that he was about to go out looking for me. It's good to have a friend in town. I was starting to get a bit worried.

We finally established that the interview had been changed to 3PM next day and I hadn't received Donna's email. I just didn't check. And, at that time I didn't yet have Donna's WeChat so she'd sent the message to Gord to tell me the time was changed. So I tried to sleep. New town, interview tomorrow, 2-hour walk in the cold, I had a hard time getting to sleep. But just as I did, I got a new message from Gordon. I think he woke up and thought about me and sent a message before he was fully awake. "You hoteld?" was the message. lol It was at about 2:30. But I sent him a message back reassuring him I was. It's nice that he was concerned.

Next morning just before 7 AM it was snowing and Gord sent another message to me trying to find out what hotel I was at and get me booked somewhere for the weekend. So as to avoid a repeat of the night before. He had Jo Jo busy trying to book me somewhere but I didn't know where that was and I decided to go down and see if I could book the same place for another two nights. It turned out I could and it was cheaper than Jo Jo's price so I did. I told Gord I was about 20 minute walk from the uni. He had a hard time believing that but since I was up already and since I'd seen a Burger King in my travels, I showered, walked to the BK and had a bacon and egg croissant. It took me 15 minutes to get there and, sure enough, 5 minutes from BK to the uni. 20 minutes. So I decided to wander around the uni and take some pics. It was a beautiful day although a bit colder and windy. About -12 Celsius.

Here's the main gate. It is actually called Liaoning University. On the campus of Liaoning is Victoria U. of China. So they call the place "L.U." Which is nice cuz my alma mater is Lakehead University. We called THAT L.U. too.

I arrived at 10 AM. I know this because this clock bonged 10 times. This is the administration bldg. Fitting that it's the one with the clock.

By 10 AM the sun had melted most of the snow, but not all of it. This was well into my walk actually so it was closer to 11 or 11:30. There is a LOT of nature on campus! Grass, trees, shrubbery. And there are SUPER wide roads and paths to walk on. They had a great deal of land to build the university on and evidently they didn't feel the need to scrunch everything together. It gives a decidedly non-Asian feel to the campus. This was also a very nice day. Cleaner air than any day in Taiyuan. I was thinking, if this is usual, I'm gonna love this place! But I didn't wanna count my chickens...

I saw this statue just after the building above and had to take a few pictures. This one was probably the best. It's the Liaoning University School of Keyboard Playing. Geddy Lee of Rush was a guest speaker here I've heard. Actually I'd imagine that this is probably a guqin? Not sure. Interesting statue though eh?

The pic below is probably my fave that I took. It's a building seen through the arches of another building. It is not the most elegant of construction at L.U. but I really liked some of the buildings and some of the landscaping. A common theme in the pictures I took though is the total lack of people in this wide open, spread out campus. At times I felt like I might have been visiting the University of Pyeongyang. Or even Chernobyl! It was deserted compared to anywhere else I've been since coming to China. A little eerie. But in a good way.

Couple nice stadia. I'm hoping there will be some sports to watch there so I can show my support and my school spirit. Even if it is, (shudder), soccer.

And to the right is a building with a pond. There were a coupla them. Lots of frogs and pussywillows in the summer I bet. Add some frog song to the campus. I got to thinking that this would be an ideal place to just let a dog run free. I have wanted a dog for so long! But I just can't bring myself to get one with the instability of my life. I'd get a black lab and name him Dave.

Just look at this! If I'm a dog who needs to poo, this gives me a red rocket! And I didn't see any dog poo that I can recall. Maybe they're not allowed. But once again, where are all the people? I am not complaining at all! I will love the total absence of crowds at this place! Okay, I am talking in the future tense now so I might as well let the cat out the bag, I was officially offered a position at L.U. I'll be teaching at this school by March of next year!!! And I think I'm going to like it. The job offer was the document that needed my signature affixed to it. So now all I have to do is get a ton of paperwork done, some of it done in Canada, then get some documents from Huashyte that I know they are not going to give me. But there's a will here and where there's a will, there's a way. If I have to wait till my current work visa expires, I will. If I have to stretch the truth or fracture a Chinese law or two, I have been told that the law and what happens are only a well-placed payment apart. I remember in Korea in the early days going to Immigration with a supervisor who had an envelope full of money. That was the only time I was able to get a new visa in Korea without leaving the country. China reminds me a lot of the Korea of yesteryear. So I have no doubt that nothing will stop me from working at L.U. I am really looking forward to it!

And as if to give me a sign, things at TUST, the university where I work now, have been really crappy since coming back from Shenyang. ANOTHER episode where I thought I'd be sleeping on the streets of China! Ridiculous "school" happenings and the requisite Huashit being Huashit story. I will also continue with my techno-illogically bellyaching next post. You have no idea what chaos a power outage can cause in a place where even at the best of times technology is fumpee! Had to say it one more time. lol But I'm going to save all that for another post.

I am happy, and in the spirit of American Thanksgiving, thankful, that I will soon have a job that I believe will make this whole Chinese venture worthwhile. It was looking pretty sketchy but now it looks good. I am also thankful for my friends without who, (I know there should be an m there but I am off the word "whom"), I would be in a back alley bar wearing a headband and playing Russian Roulette right now. "Ditti mao! MAO! MAO!" I am listing these people in alphabetical order so as not to intimate that any has helped me more than another, Amber, DB, Gord, Heather, Jo Jo, Mike, Ty, you guys have all kept a few of my marbles from falling out my ears over the years. I love you all! Friends and work. Now all I need is family. Well, maybe in the future. I am thankful they're still all back in Canada doing okay. And this new job gives me plane tickets once in a while so I'll probably be able to visit more often. It's only taken me 50 years but life might finally be getting to a point where I am comfy and secure. But I may need a dog to get the full effect.

Smarten Up!

Remember when people used to say to unruly kids, "Hey, smarten up!" I can't tell you how many times I heard that as a kid and I did some stupid things so I probably deserved it more often than not. The thing is, I didn't like it. It insulted me. It offended me.

Well, as Steve Hughes says, "So what?" Did I get leprosy? Did I call the cops? Nope. I grew up. I wised up. And, I smartened up. Now, don't get me wrong, I still do some stupid things. Usually they involve travelling long distances, uprooting my life and risking everything on the words of dishonest people, but I can't stop trusting people altogether. That would be running away. Putting my head in the sand. Giving up on society. Escapism.

Most people would give me, as my high school principal Mr. Farrell used to say, a pat on the back up high, for saying that. "Yeah, good on ya mate! Way to go! Nice positive thinking, man!" But find those same people and say something about the problem in a negative way and watch how fast they blend into the bushes like Homer Simpson.

The latest example of this was a beautiful illustration of my topic today. I was exchanging goods with my co-teacher Margie. Ha! Fitting to talk about her right below that gif of Homer. Anyway, Margie has been here since '96. HERE. At this fake school. I don't know if it's always been so Mickey Mouse around here but I have been finished my double major class for a month now and nobody has asked me for marks or anything. There was no plan or notice for any of my classes. I was just thrown in a room with 30-90 students and told to teach. For half of my classes I didn't even know how to get to the classrooms! I was hired very last minute so had no chance to make proper curriculums, though, am glad of it since that would have been polishing a turd. Honestly, the lengths to which over expectation of students can possibly go seem to have no limits here. I told you of the beloved bumblebrain class I have in which they have a text that academically, and in heightened, esoteric English, covers the intricacies of the major English speaking countries of the world. Their government, histories, cultures and such. Given to students, about half of which, are failing my severely dumbed down English class of the very rudimentary elements of English speaking countries and their cultures. Well I have another class that might be even lower. I am supposed to be teaching them TOEFL. This is an outdated, but still used, English proficiency test. I think they had some TOEFL texts but in about two minutes I could tell there were no students in the class who could get a decent score on the test. Not one who should be hired for any job requiring English. And CERTAINLY not one who should be studying something in complicated English. Just last class I saw them all carrying these massive, blue Chemistry books. Again, heightened, esoteric, chemically English that even native speakers would have difficulty with. These students? Use the thing as a door stop or a coffee table leg. It's not going to do you any good otherwise. On an educational level, this school ranks below a lot of the hagwons I've taught at. And the first and second things they did to me were, 1. cheated me into signing a contract here and 2. put me to work in August for which I STILL haven't been paid.

Having said all that, Margie has been here since '96. This should give you a hint as to the kind of person Margie might be. I refer you to my recent post about posobots. All of the stuff above is true and we both teach at this joke of a school, so naturally, with a guy like me who doesn't shy away from the negative, these topics are going to come up in conversation. Last time she was over here for a barbecue, I mentioned to her that she has been here longer than anybody has worked for any school that I know of here, yet she makes the lowest salary I know of here. And if you saw what she does, I think she might work harder than anyone I know here. But tell her of the school I have applied at where right now teachers are making in a week what we make here in a month and it bounces right off her. She has attained peace in her meagre earnings. Then I brought up my culture class when she was over here giving me some parmesan cheese she'd purchased, while I gave her some lettuce I had found. You have to go all over the place to find specialty items like these.

Margie has an interesting way of regurgitating harsh facts, then trying to gloss them over with nonsense. She says to me, "Yeah they're like baby birds in a nest with mouths open squawking for food, helpless to get their own." Right! That's EXACTLY what they are! They want me to teach them in a week, how to read these ridiculous texts they've been given. But then Margie goes into damage control mode. "Buuut you probably misunderstood them. They're bad English leads to misunderstandings sometimes. They probably didn't understand the assignment. They may have had trouble with your explanation. It's probably a cultural thing." and so on. Here's the thing: Margie speaks Chinese. I don't know how much she uses in Class but I have met several teachers here who are supposed to be teaching in English and are not. I even said to Margie that most of this class should not be in the classroom with a teacher who only speaks English. They're not ready for it. I even said that in Canada, a lot of these kids would be in special ed.

Margie teaches oral English to this same group of lugnuts and I have no doubt she is aware of the students who really don't belong on the inside of a university classroom, but she has her thing here and she doesn't want it messed with. I felt like an assailant on her peaceful malformation of reality. She gave me my cheese, found that the cheddar she was going to give me was frozen, said she'd give me a hunk when it thawed out, then couldn't blend into the bushes fast enough. She probably went to her apartment, drank hot water and meditated. Ha ha ha. In China, the cure for everything is hot water. I will never see that hunk of cheese. Margie doesn't contact me even though we both live on campus here. It's another example of a person I've scared away because of my negativity. I think I "offend" her. At the very least, Margie is never going to sit down with me, have a beer and bitch about work.

And that's all I wanted to do. It's cathartic. Cleansing. Therapeutic. But nowadays we're all trained, not to say mindfucked, into believing that's all bad juju. Even if it's the truth, it's offensive. I had one student from the TOEFL class send me a text saying my class needs to be more interesting and harder. I'm teaching things they did 12 years ago in school. Well first of all this particular student had missed about half the classes. He was probably sending this message to get me to believe he never shows up because he's not challenged. Second of all, I bet if someone tries to teach from that same, big, blue, chemistry book next year, he'll be "offended" because they've already done that. Well "done" and "learned" are not the same thing. He's probably right. These kids probably DID cover the basics of English a long time ago in their regular schooling. Taught by a Chinese teacher who couldn't recite the alphabet and they all cheated on their tests by copying the one student in class who had lived in America for a year. It was painfully obvious to me that these kids needed, so I am teaching them introductory English. Well this "offends" them because in their minds they are beyond this. The next class, this student, nicknamed Whale, shows up for class. I tape five pictures to the board and start asking random people things about them. Where are they from, what is their nationality, what is their hobby, what's their favourite food, what language do they speak, what are they wearing, because this is what we've been learning in class. I stress the S for present tense like "He speaks..." "She likes..." and I stress present continuous tense for clothes. "He is wearing..." "They are wearing..." I also make sure they watch for countable and uncountable A's and S's like a red jacket or blue socks. NONE of the students were doing any of this properly when I talked to them all on the first couple days of class. It's what they need to learn.

So I call on Whale and ask a question. He gets it wrong. I ask another question. He gets it wrong. I explain to him how if he'd been in class he would have studied this and may have gotten the question right. I call on a student with lower level of English who had been regularly attending. He got the question right. Whale has a choice to make. He can be "offended" or he can smarten up. Which do you think he will do?

It's really a choice between thinking or retreating into escapist quasi-thinking. Do we find our joy and happiness or do we pretend to find them by settling for shitty situations and blocking out any evidence of their shittiness? I went for one of my long walks yesterday and saw this:

Yeah, I was going next door to keep my colon true. ???

Well, by golly, I thought, maybe China has this figured out! I sure wish this school well! But then, just a few doors down I saw this:

The Bryan Adams Happy Learning Centre. And back to Earth my hopes for China crashed. lol

Another example. I occasionally engage online in conversation, or exchange of philosophies and opinion just to keep the lawyer in me sharp and since I'm starved for English conversation over here. Really, I argue. I especially like the challenge of trying to take people out of artificial comfort zones and make the posobots nervous. Possibly even wake a person up. Never know...

The other day I saw something posted online by a guy who's VERY awake, Bernie Sanders, about Canadian health care. It was a Canadian doctor saying that "Never has the Canadian government dictated what she does." I think even Bernie fell for one of the oldest and falsest lies about Canada: the myth of free healthcare. As the old joke goes, "Canadians are just unarmed Americans with free healthcare." I have heard it more accurately told as "better healthcare," but it's still wildly inaccurate. First of all Canada has guns. Three for every 10 residents. But they're hunting rifles, not Uzis. And for the love of GOD stop saying Canadian healthcare is free! It's far from it! Until you've worked in Canada and felt the sting of a 48% payroll tax, then felt the icy grip of the taxman taking 20% for a 100-year-old dinosaur income tax that has paid off the wars a thousand times over and THEN 15% on almost everything you buy and even MORE in excise taxes on certain "luxury" items like beer, AND THEN paid special bonus taxes if you have property or own a car or die, until THEN, don't tell me Canadian healthcare is free.

Healthcare is reported to be the thing that the highest percentage of Canadian taxes are spent on. I say that because nobody has ever read the horrendously voluminous Canadian tax code, (made so for that very purpose), so nobody really knows. Health care is expensive in Canada and the representatives of the hospitals, and the doctors, are getting rich off our tax dollars so it's unlikely that you'll get an honest assessment of the cost of healthcare from any of them. In a way, the Canadians still pay a lot for healthcare, it's just less personal. And because there is no way to measure exactly how much we each pay, people can still get away with saying it's free. Or telling other lies or making other misleading comments like the doctor who snowed Bernie. She said the "Canadian government" hoping people would think she meant all forms of government in Canada, but what she meant was the federal government. Bernie Sanders can be forgiven for not knowing that healthcare is something that is handled provincially in Canada so, no, the federal government doesn't dictate what she does, but the provincial government does. Thing is, she probably doesn't mind that cuz since Canadians don't really know what happens to their taxes, provincial governments get away with highway robbery by saying, "It's for healthcare." Nobody bitches about taxes taken for healthcare. Well we probably should start. But even people who GO to the hospital may not see the bill. They may not see what the taxpayer pays for things like the bed and room you stay in. Here's a frightening list of hospitals in the Vancouver area and how much a room costs for ONE day. Okay, this is for uninsured people, this is not what you pay if you pay your "premiums" or your mandatory medical insurance but it's probably how much tax money they take. Who knows? Maybe they take more since it's not directly paid for and nobody will be the wiser.

The premiums are $136 a month for a family of two and going up all the time. Can you imagine what is collected just on this? Add to that the even bigger pile of money from taxes. It's no wonder hospitals charge so much! There's plenty of money just up for grabs.

Now of course they're not going to be shouting from the mountains how much people get secretly charged for stuff at hospitals. These are stats that are hard to find! I worked for Alberta Health Services in Calgary hospitals when I was in Canada. I went through about 5-7 pairs of rubber gloves a shift. I had to glove up every time I touched or might touch a patient. Here's an article from the UK saying that hospitals there were paying 16 pounds for rubber gloves that could have been bought for 35 pence. That's about 27 bucks a pair if this same sort of thing happens in Canada. And it does. That's over 150 bucks a shift of Canadian taxes I might have been eating up. Now, maybe in Canada we use cheaper gloves than England, but this is just an example of what can happen when greed and corruption meet with an annual taxation glut.

Here's a list of things that are overpriced in American hospitals. Rubber gloves are 53 bucks there! Those little medicine cups? 10 bucks! A Tylenol? 15 bucks, baby! Come on, man! Surely it can't be that bad in Canada! Well in 2014 it was estimated that 141 billion bucks of our tax money was spent on healthcare. That's almost 4000 dollars per Canadian and of course only a fraction of Canadians spent any time in the hospital. According to Alberta Official Statistics, 7,596 people per 100,000 in Canada went to the hospital in 2013-2014. Let's say 7.6%. The population of Canada in 2014 was 35,540,400. So that's 2.7 million patients approximately. That works out to $52,222.22 per patient. And that's over and above any insurance or healthcare "premiums" paid.

People talk about hospital visits driving Americans into debt. How many Canadians wouldn't be crippled by a 52 thousand dollar hospital bill? I don't know many. Look, even if you asked ME if I have a problem paying taxes when I never go to the hospital, I'll say no. I don't mind footing the bill for unfortunate Canadians who get sick and need medical treatment. What pisses me off is when the price of that treatment is outrageous. And it IS in Canada. Getting worse all the time. But the vast majority of Canadians remain proud of our healthcare, even brag about it, and if you make the mistake of even accurately disparaging it, you will see ANOTHER myth about Canada debunked: the one about us never getting angry and being so polite.

I commented on the Bernie Sanders site mentioning that I love the man, but that talking to a doctor might not get you the most unbiased description of the Canadian healthcare system. I went into a few of the things described above. I immediately get one eye roll. Then I get a dipshit named Bryn who says that I pay about 50% less for my Canadian health care than Americans pay. So it makes tax rates irrelevant. Then he strays into La La Land and states that the average Canadian family has a total tax burden of 24% and that's a fact. What I am writing is not factual it's... something else.

So I reply to him that okay if a family of four has a Father, stay-at-home Mom and two young, unemployed kids that's 96% tax for the Father, zero for the other three so it averages out to, yup, 24%. You're right, Bryn. My bad.

You see, you can't just accept idiotic "facts" like that without questioning. One of the oldest tricks in the book to make taxes look lower is using "family" tax rates. But you need to THINK, not just blindly accept what some liar is telling you. It's funny that Bryn did this for MY comments but not the BS 24% tax rate Soma that some politician prescribed for him. Probably because the politician's happy news didn't "offend" him. My truth did.

He didn't respond. But then another posobot named Ron wrote that the healthcare premium I mentioned in BC, (which he just assumed. I didn't mention), was a lie. He lives in Ontario and appreciates the healthcare there AND Tommy Douglas. Then he says I'm making up lies. Douglas was a Canadian politician who introduced a medicare plan in the province of Saskatchewan that was eventually adopted by the rest of Canada. In a national survey he was voted our greatest Canadian. Our healthcare is nothing like what Douglas implemented any more, but it is still as beloved because Canadians don't know the outrageous rates our taxes pay for it. And they don't want to know!

Like I just said, I have no problem with the Douglas system. I like it. I have a problem with greedy, corrupt medical price fixing. So I tell this to Ron, say that the people who call Canadian healthcare "free" are the ones making up lies, and give him a screenshot of the price of healthcare premiums in BC that he said I lied about. (which was actually 36 dollars MORE than I quoted) This does not deter Ron's patriotic vigour. He tells me that he went to the hospital last year for 20 cancer treatments. Now he is in remission. No point of service fee. "All paid for by my taxes," says Ron.

Do you see how beloved this myth is? But I didn't tell Ron that HIS taxes didn't even cover the room he was in. I didn't ask if maybe it was brain cancer he had because he'd have to be mentally malfunctioning to believe his taxes paid for that much hospital care. But Ron also asked me, "Why are you spreading misinformation?" So I had to say something in reply. I said, "So I am saying that Canadian healthcare isn't free, we pay for it with our taxes and you just said that is misinformation because YOU went to the hospital last year and paid for it with your taxes."

His reply was, "You DO know that most Canadians pay taxes and Canadian healthcare is far better than the US." I probably would have responded to that with, "Right, but not free." But he had to go further. He then posts, "You sound like a Republican anyway." So I just ignored him. He probably thinks he won the argument.

A Republican? The GOP? First of all, we don't have them in Canada. Second of all, those are the guys trying right now to get taxes for the rich cut and they're going to finance the tax cuts by getting rid of social programs that poor people rely on. Among them will be Medicaid!

Giving the rich MORE money and having the poor pay for it. Reverse Robin Hood healthcare is exactly what I was complaining about. But even if I posted this article on the conversation thread with Ron and Bryn, people just believe what they want to believe. For many it's the false positivity of blatant lies like Canadian healthcare is free! Homer too.

All a person can do is keep citing unpopular facts and keep losing friends. It's not a sad as it sounds. I don't want to be friends with cowardly escapists anyway. Start complaining about anything and they disappear. What kind of a friend is that? Listen, the point is, whether you pay exorbitant rates out of your own pocket, or if you pay them collectively as a province through the vaunted universal healthcare system, it makes little difference. What I believe is whether you're stuck footing the whole bill by yourself or whether you get help from your fellow taxpayers, the issue in healthcare is NOT this! It's the price setting and that is totally corrupt!

Back to our friend Ron. Who, let's face it, may not have had, nor beat cancer anyway. He might have said all that to win an argument. But even if not, here's a doctor who might be a better doctor to listen to about the REAL problem in the healthcare system. He's American and talking about America, but do you think doctors in Canada don't know all this? They're still prescribing chemotherapy in Canada too. If I have rectal cancer and go to the hospital, is there more human compassion and less CHA-CHING in any hospital in Canada? I think you'll find I'd be charged out the cancer ravaged arse the same as I would be in America. Just exchange the word, "insurance" for "taxes," and we probably have the identical problem. And the pharmaceutical company charging 5000 is the beginning. The drugs are probably worth 50 bucks. Then the HUGE markup by the hospital and the nice dividend made by the doctor keeps THEM silent. Our healthcare in Canada is a for profit industry just the same as it is in the States. Just a bit less individual. But hospitals, schools, damn near everything run like corporations where money is all that matters, are now the norm. It's not shameful, it's now accepted, in Canada as well as the States, as honourable, virtuous, heroic! People think, "Well he's getting rich, he must be helping the country." That's because we've been socialized to believe this horseshit. They are helping themselves TO our country. That's all.

This clip, by the way, isn't new. It's over 6 years old! It's like the current presidency of the U.S. Everybody knows it's a UGE problem, but nothing is done about it. Nothing CAN be done as long as the rich remain so firmly in control. But this can all be easily written off as conspiracy theory. It's easier. That way, I won't have to do anything uncomfortable like argue, protest or fight to get this changed. As I said, these are the kind of escapists I don't like. They are empirically detestable. If you're just plain ignorant, okay, I can be your friend. But if you're afraid of negative facts, SMARTEN THE HELL UP!

Pictures From the Poop Cam

What do you know! The poop phone continues to get better! If you don't know the story, I got a phone when I first came to China to work at Renmin University in Beijing. Two days after I got it I went to the toilet at the Renmin foreign language gulag, (a squatter), and the phone fell in. It didn't work at all afterwards but I dried it out and got it to work a bit. It has some odd habits like taking pictures in my pocket, turning itself on, flipping to sideways view, not turning off with the off button, losing volume control and once in HK it dialed somebody and I heard a recorded message when I got back to my hotel. I don't think I have to pay for that call thank goodness. But the worst effect of squatter splashdown was that it hasn't been readable by any computer since. I could always hook up to the USB and charge it if I wanted, but I couldn't put anything onto my computer like pics. And since this phone takes better pics than my Kindle, that was a bummer. Well I mistakenly plugged it into my computer the other day, (thinking it was plugged into the charging block but it was actually in the USB of my computer), and VOILA, it read it! So now, the very belated history of my Chinese experience in pictures. First the gulag. Pretty scary lookin' eh?

Just inside the freezer doors and to the right is the offending squatter. It wasn't quite as bad as it looks. Worked with a great bunch of blokes there anyway. Just not FOR anyone worth mentioning.

Well this is interesting. The pic function on this blog used to allow for more than one pic per line but I guess that's been taken out. UPgrades that are really downgrades. They're everywhere. I'm also typing from the middle of the page now too. Very interesting... Anyhoo, these are all pics of the campus at Renmin U. It's not overwhelming having worked at some nice places in Korea, but I think this was a pretty nice campus as campuses go in China.

 

This is the hostel I lived in while working at Renmin. It does look pretty cool from the outside but it was the most expensive place I've ever lived in. I paid different amounts on different months, but it worked out to about 1200 bucks a month. I just stayed there last week before I went to Korea and they charged me almost 80 bucks! That is outrageous! Not for Canada, but for China it's highway robbery! And I'm a preferred customer, I got a discount! I could stay at a much better place in Korea for 30 bucks. But I never wanna live in a hostel again. No cooking, no fridge. I didn't like it much. But speaking of good blokes, here's a pic of two of the guys who made life in BJ bearable. On the left is Allan. He's a Scotsman and he stayed in the same hostel just across the hall. We'd go on food runs or out for beers together sometimes. On the left is Heinrich. He's a South African former rugby player. I still remember a few Afrikaans swearwords he taught me and Allan. Just not how to spell them. Dooes and kak and fok and muffie. Ha ha ha. Also oxygen thief which we used for the boss. Hein was a barrel of laughs. Allan was my intellectual refuge. It was awesome having a beer and debating the best boxers of all time or politics or something far more abstract with Allan. Great guy. 

 

Here's one of the classes I taught at Renmin. Now that I'm in a much less, uh, prestigious school, I realize that the facilities, (computers that worked though internet was slow), and especially the students were very good! They were blasted with a book to read every week and 10 or 20 vocabulary words a day, writing every day PLUS all the regular teaching we did. It was a ridiculous workload and all for IELTS preparation. We did IELTS tests too and although this is ranked as one of the better English ability tests, there were things I hated about it. Like the fact that they literally tried to trick the test takers in several places on every test. IELTS tests are made purposely difficult and in many ways unrealistic and unnatural language is required to get a good score. But nothing's perfect eh? Poor kids...

Still, I could have toughed it out for years if not for the shitty accommodations and the absolutely useless administration. So I went on a trip to Taiyuan to take a look at an offer from some place called #5 High School. They talked to me twice before I signed contracts. I met a guy named Joshua and a girl named Faith and they told me I'd be close to the school, I'd have 2 days in a row off, I'd only teach the high school kids and I'd have complete autonomy. Nobody micromanaging me. I hated the subway in BJ and the stupid rules and useless things we were forced to do. Marking codes for correcting the kids' writing. Why? They told us these would be used in England where they all hoped to go, but we all knew they had lost the contract with Middlesex Uni or wherever so I just used whatever I was comfortable with. (and my marking "codes" are far easier to understand for the student and better for me).  They also had rules about how to teach kids how to take IELTS exams. Make sure they know how to skim and scan. Okay, that's fine. But the oxygen thief we worked for cared more about the students knowing the difference between the meanings of the two words. He went into one class and asked students what those words meant. The students didn't know so he said at a meeting, "Obviously they don't know how to skim and scan." Just one of many ludicrously militant rules we were suffering under at Renmin. These would be gone in Taiyuan.

 

This, at long last, is the illustrious Faith. This was taken in the main courtyard of #5 High School during one of my interviews. She later showed me around the city a bit. After the second interview she squired me about the city looking for an apartment. She was, and still is, very helpful. She was spectacular at her job and Huasheng were absolutely stupid to let her go. But they just can't see the value of being honest and treating people fairly so that good workers will stay with them. That's why Faith left and that's why I am leaving. That's also why they lost the contract with #5 school.

 

Here are the students of #5 school doing their daily exercises and shouting and Tai Chi during the 10:00-10:30 break. They all have matching track suits they wear all day long. It's quite something to see! A bit of The Party! But I see nothing wrong with some mid morning calisthenics. Go kids go!

 

 

Taiyuan. Not the most happening place in China. The coal capital of the country, which puts it high in the running for coal capital of the world. You can see, (as the picture illustrates), about a block before the pollution and coal dust hazes out the view. And this is not on an extraordinarily bad day. I think this day was around the 100 mark on the Air Quality Index. Around Christmas of 2016 Beijing was over 500! It was like sucking on an exhaust pipe every time you drew a breath! I'm not sure cardio-vascular exercise does any good here. Which is fine. I'm still on doctor's orders to take it easy because of the old brain bomb waiting to explode at any time. So I walk. A lot. That's good enough for me. There ARE some pretty nice things to see in Taiyuan if you look hard enough and walk.

Is that gorgeous or what?

It's a little temple Faith and I went to in the middle of Taiyuan. It was January of 2017. I went back to BJ pretty sure I would take the job if offered. It was offered and I took it. So now I had to go back and find an apartment. Faith to the rescue again! We spent a long, cold day looking at high-rise apartments I didn't like until finally we checked out this one.

 

That's my place with the bars on the windows. Not exactly first floor. Sorta 1 1/2 floor. But I liked it. Other than the mosquitoes. Good kitchen, decent fridge, lots of room, about 5 minutes from the school, it was perfect! And Huasheng paid me for 5 months to work at #5 school. They made me pay 100% for visa runs, dragged their ASSES on getting my a work visa and did a few other unscrupulous things, but nothing I haven't learned to accept. You're gonna get screwed a little no matter what. Nature of the beast. HEY, I'm back to normal typing, not centered! Great!

This was the huge bedroom with the massive wardrobe, desk, through the doors the attached laundry room with crank hanging and in the corner you can see the air conditioner. It was luxury! And at less than half the price of the BJ hostel. 500 a month. Unfortunately, with the mosquito problem, (not to mention the lack of mattress), I slept all of my days in this apartment in this room:

A LOT smaller and adjoining the kitchen. You can see the real estate agent talking to Faith in the kitchen there. But it was fine. I was still happy. Until Huasheng lost the contract with #5 school. I had students tell me their parents were really angry because Huasheng ripped them off; the other teachers, (all Chinese but they taught in English), told me to quit and every single one of them did; Faith quit, all of the HR people I knew quit; the only people who remained were me and these two, the dynamic duo of Huasheng misdeeds, Mr. Liu and Diana. Diana is the owner and she tells people she has had many businesses but I dunno. Liu, as the story goes, was working in an embassy in the U.S. somewhere and his English is very good so maybe it's true. I have trouble believing anything they say now.

Because they are untrustworthy, they don't trust anybody. I tell you it took some coaxing for them to let me take this pic. And they didn't totally let me. They, obviously, were caught off guard. They just allowed me to keep it on my phone. What do you think? Do they look like the crooks they are? I actually enjoyed this day with them whacking golf balls and drinking tea. I think they believe it is part of their culture to lie, cheat and steal. Little do they know, it is the reason Huasheng is in the toilet. I probably would have quit if they hadn't strung me along for so long with false promises of the elusive Z visa. It took 7 months for them to finally get me my work visa. But we got it! Then they COMPLETELY SHATTERED my contract!

I was no longer working at #5 school, I work now at Taiyuan University of Science and Technology. Also a very nice campus. Here are a couple of pics.

That's the library. The centerpiece of the campus. The courtyard in front is MASSIVE! I've never been in the library. heh heh.

Here's a view of it at dusk from the roof of my apartment. There's lots of greenery and relatively fresh air on campus so that's nice. And there are places where I can get some of the things I need. I now teach in classrooms that are shitty and the computers have Windows '85, can't read a pdf and screw up my usb flashdrives, so this is the result:

I spend a lot of time improvising by drawing on the board and I spend an even longer amount of time creating handouts for my classes. This is one of the lessons I taught to my sluggos in the culture class. I'm sure they won't remember any of it. You can't see but on the far right of the board I drew a map of the world and I asked individuals to show me where the major English speaking countries were. They found China. That's it. One girl used her phone to find the U.S. Had to use her PHONE! And she correctly pointed it out. But nobody knew the country, the flag or anything about any of the countries. Oh, and ONE girl was able to draw the American flag you see and one, after checking her phone, drew the Canadian flag. The others were drawn by me. It was an early class, but I realized then what I'd gotten myself into. Ha ha ha. I can't remember why I drew the lollipop. I think it was "ice lolly" and "popsicle." God, I realize now they would have no clue what I was talking about. And care even less. But learn as you go.

So anyway, we're about caught up picture wise. The Huasheng annoyance of the week has been to transfer my visa. I told them that's totally unnecessary but I shouldn't have. I told them they need to do nothing. See, they do the opposite of what I suggest so now they are working like banshees to do SOMETHING. I told them to leave me alone and do the visa transfer from Huasheng to TUST on their own. It's up to the employers, not me. And with my lack of Chinese, what the hell can I do to help? But they continue to hound me. Today they said they need me to sign an end of contract contract. To verify that I am no longer working for them. I already gave them my letter of resignation, they don't need that. But they told me, (in all likelihood a lie), that they need it to transfer the visa. So between good old Faith and I, we hatched a plan. See I don't think they'll pay me my last month's pay. They've already deducted for days missed due to illness, not working on holidays and classes THEY cancelled with no notice, so I stand to make 3000 instead of the 8000 they owe me already. Yeah, they managed to screw me out of more than half a month's pay for largely legitimate absence. I am SOOO glad I quit!

But on the 31st I had a class to teach. Two hours. Out in the sticks. So really 5 hours including driving. I like the kids but I hate the class. So I said to Huasheng if they want me to teach, they need to pay me on the 30th. They didn't pay, I didn't teach. They said that they have a set way of payment that they can't change. Certainly they can't change it just because I want them to. Why do I think I'm so special? That's one of the classes I was docked for. Now they want me to sign this superfluous contract and my answer was, "Okay. I'll sign it." But then I added, "...if you pay me the proper amount you owe me. And since there is no way you can change the way you pay, just for me, we'll have to wait till the 15th or the 16th or the 17th or the 18th, which is when you normally pay me." I am awaiting their answer. Hooo hooo haaah haaaah! They wanna play games eh?