Angry About YOU Getting Paid MORE

[Hypiereon]

I received this letter from someone who calls himself "Lawrence Yun." He apparently takes exception to the fact that I am giving advice to teachers in China that helps them get paid more for teaching.

Below, I have posted his complete letter to me, and then my response to him. Hope you find it interesting reading!

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
From: Lawrence Yun < yunruqiang@126.com >

Most so-called foreign teachers are losers back in their own countries and feeling good about themselves in China!

You are no exception.

When you get youself paid, when you are proud of the tips to get other white faces get paid, when you hang around from this Chinese school to another to get yourself paid higher, do you ever think you WORTH it? Don't be too cheeky.

The days when you white can get a teaching post simply because of your white shin won't last long in China.

And, befoer I forget, what the shit do you think you are!!??

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> >>>>
Mr. Yun,

You said, "Most so-called foreign teachers are losers back in their own countries and feeling good about themselves in China!"

You are right. Most of them are losers back in their own country which makes finding a quality foreign English teacher very difficult.

You also said, "You are no exception." You do not know me. I have never met you. That you can make such a judgment about someone you have never met is quite an exceptional ability.

You also said, "When you get youself paid, when you are proud of the tips to get other white faces get paid, when you hang around from this Chinese school to another to get yourself paid higher, do you ever think you WORTH it? Don't be too cheeky."

Whether I am worth it or not is not the question. I can get paid more than you and so you get angry. The question is not whether I am worth it, but why you do not get more money.

Obviously SOMEONE must think paying foreigners more money is worth it - and the people who think paying foreigners more than Chinese people are CHINESE PEOPLE. So, do not get angry at me for getting more money when it is a Chinese person who is paying me more money. Go get angry at whoever is paying me more money, or whoever is not paying you enough money.

I can ask for more money if I want to, and if I get more money why should you be angry? If you want more money for your job, go ask for it. If you do not get it, do not blame me.

You also said, "The days when you white can get a teaching post simply because of your white shin won't last long in China." As long as they do last, I will continue to profit from these days. If you had the same chance I do, you would not be different.

So, do not think you are any better than anyone else. If you had the chance to make more money than someone else because of the color of your skin, would you do it or not? You would do it. Why be angry at me for doing what you would do in my place?

You said, "And, befoer I forget, what the shit do you think you are!!??" The number of grammatical errors in this sentence is quite numerous.

1. You misspelled "before."
2. You started the sentence with a conjunction.
3. You have misplaced a comma.
4. A person is referred to as a "who" not a "what."
5. "Shit" is an improper use of this epithet. You should have said, "Who the hell do you think you are?"

So, to answer your real question, "Who the hell do you think you are?" I think I am an English teacher, a native speaker of the language, and my English is perfect. Your English is terrible.

Goodbye.

[cool ice]

Interesting read and I think 126.com is a recruitment agency. Have seen this email numerous times throughout job listings.

This Lawrence Yun guy seems to want you not to give advice to English teachers on how to increase their salary. So perhaps he feels with your knowledge out there in the open, he cannot rip of English teachers as easily by paying them low salaries.

[exported_kiwi]

Lets not forget that these same Chinese folks are the ones who'll take an extra wu jiao off us for a newspaper, or for whatever they want to. Not all of them are like this, but the ones who aren't, I've found, are very rare indeed.

This person obviously doesn't have anything remotely approaching an objective view about those of us who come here.

To say that we're all losers is erroneous and I find it more than just a little insulting, as I would think, do most of the REAL teachers here, the ones who, qualified or not, love doing what they do and are doing so at a higher cost than this moron imagines.

What these folks have to remember is that nobody in their right mind will come over here and teach for a paltry salary unless they're idealists. Most of us are realists about salary and the fact that when we go home, we need to have something to go home with, something like money so we can sustain ourselves while settling back in at home. People like this disgruntled chap also don't realise that we can earn more back home, so the actual cost is far greater than they imagine, whether we earn a lot in RMB, or not! They forget to take the exchange rates into account etc so the actual cost of being here runs over into a negative sum in our currencies. Those of us who aren't here merely for money cannot be cast into the same group of "useless mercenary" type teachers here. These mercenary types of us, and those who come here just for cheap beer, smokes and easy women are the ones who give this person a rather uninformed and unfair idea of us all.

People like this Lawrence chap also forget that we each get paid according to our worth. It might grate on him a bit that his worth is lower than ours, but I'd ask him, if he reads this, to put a big picture of himself on a billboard somewhere and then advertise wherever he hypothetically works as having him as a native speaker and teacher of English. I wonder how many people would enrol in that school or training centre. It may also interest Lawrence that he is a victim, for lack of a better way of putting it, of his own peoples' racism. Chinese folks don't want to learn English from other Chinese, or sadly, non white and non native speaking teachers. Lawrence also needs to remember that we're offered salaries higher than indigenous people get because we're used to certain standards of living and if we were expected to live on the same income as the locals a few things would happen...

1. nobody would come and teach here, and
2. those that did come and earn such salaries, wouldn't stay long because the income wouldn't be anywhere near one that would allow a decent lifestyle.

I don't know about you folks, the teachers here are in this site, members of AACircle, but I figure that most are here for adventure, some for lifestyle and some because they're interested in China, or wherever you are, as well as those who are indeed losers back home. For whatever reason we are here, we're not here to lose money and maybe Lawrence should realise this. Ask any of the students we teach, in China, what is your goal and they'll answer, I want to be rich, have my own business etc.

Maybe Lawrence needs to clean up his own backyard before he wades into ours and starts trying to hit a home run right outta the park with such rot! Maybe he should make more of an effort to understand that we're not here to get rich, but we are here to get P.A.I.D in China as the original title of this thread suggests. In short, "screw you Lawrence!"

Nuff said!

[Hypiereon]

I perfectly agree with exported_kiwi, but to the person who e-mailed me (Mr. Yun) I was trying to be more agreeable in my response to him by just giving him the benefit of the doubt that he was right about a lot while trying to get at the real heart of his problem - he was just mad foreigners are getting paid more than him.

[borea]

Are we allowed to send that guy some hate mail? jus kidding!
Its kinda discouraging to hear thats what they think of us, i most definately can make more money in my own country, but adventures the name of the game

[exported_kiwi]

Net connection here is bad so I just read cool_ices' post. Yeah, I kinda agree with you, but have you looked at many of the vacancies on this site, or Daves? The pay around the place, in China for the next term/year, seems to suck! I'm in Guangzhou now and still not earning my target income, but that'll change shortly...... another story, but the salaries offered are ludicrously low for this, or other major cities. Can anyone imagine how one could live, and save on a mere 5000 kuai per month in a major city? I sure as hell can't imagine how unless you ate like the locals do and did nothing but go to work and go home, which'll kinda inhibit the experience just a tad dont y'all think?

However, if I had the opportunity to go and work in the provinces, in a place like Guilin or even Hainan, I'd be happy to be paid that much, with the usual benefits of course, home(off campus) utilities etc. Sadly, training centres here don't offer those and we have to find them all on our own, come up with a large sum of money as deposit and put up with all the pedestrian and renovation noise as well as the usual loud yelling, hoiking etc.... ahhh China, dontcha just love it huh?

A few more cents!

[LauraFaye]

Wow! This is ridiculous. I think this guy is, as a previous poster listed, just upset because he is unable to take advantage of new teachers. I cant imagine going into a country like China which is so different from what I am used to without some idea of what to expect. No one wants to be taken advantage of. I'm working in Spain and even here I know that Americans without work visas are regularly taken advantage of. I think as foreign teachers we have to support each other because most of these "english langauge schools" are just trying to make money off of us.

[Boke]

Dear Lawrence, your english sucks. Love Boke

[Willie]

shocked eh! Does that letter apply to me as well...I'm not Caucasian ...

Anyway, I don't think teachers collective are paid ENOUGH at all anyway.

Every individual has the right to ask for a better deal. I would too, considering the fact that I'm multilingual in the Chinese language.

I'll be seeking out Mr. Yun in the near future!

[abeu]

It's that the same as me getting pissed off at the amount of Asian women dating white guys compared to the amount of white girls who would even take a second look at me?

I'm Asian, Chinese in fact but I'm truly embaressed about Mr Yun. The fact that he still haven't gotten over the fact that life isn't fair, as an adult (hope he is).

Losers? It doesn't take much to make the same money in Australia.. seeing you have to have a degree to qualify. (Doesn't the same go for China as Korean and Japan?) I'm on 45k atm and I've decided to go to Korea to make less, why? Because I want to, and because money definately isn't everything.

"feeling good about themselves in China"? Everyone deserves to feel good about themselves. When you are not capable of doing so, you lower your expectation, simple.

I was actually surprised at how little teachers are paid. I mean to live in a foreign country alone, away from family and friends and all.