REAL LIFE EXPERIENCES IN CHINA

To help you gain insight, the following are excerpts from reports submitted by ESI and other teachers who taught in China in the past ten years.

"To me, one of the most important factors before going to China is to be certain that God is sending you there. When the going gets rough and it seems like you are working like crazy, being used, carefully watched and accomplishing nothing, the fact that you know you're in the center of God's will keeps you going and gives you hope.

China is not the place to go just for a fun, exciting experience. It can be fun and exciting, but a person really needs a sense of calling and commitment. This commitment should be in several areas.

First—to God, being where He commands and obeying Him.

Second, to your teammates—to be willing to really work together, encourage and support one another, bear each other's burdens, share one another’s joys and so on.

Third—to a standard of excellence in teaching English. This is our job and we should strive to do it well. Each teacher will have his own teaching strength and individual style. It can be fun to work together and to learn from each other!

I felt we really had a spirit of working together and helping each other with ideas and lesson plans, etc. Thus, I learned a lot about teaching from my teammates and really appreciated their input.

Variety seems to be a real key in keeping the students motivated. Picture files on American culture are a valuable resource that is worth developing."

"Another difficult area was not being able to have normal friendships or spend individual time with Chinese friends. Guests had to sign in to visit us at the guesthouse. Again, in this situation, giving up my 'rights' to a normal friendship helped to ease the adjustment.

God can still work it out for us to have friends but it may be in a different way and take a longer time than what we'd expect in our culture. Patience is a necessity."

"Sometimes we all felt very much 'used' by the Chinese. Mark 10:45, ‘For the Son of man came not to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many,’ often came to my mind and encouraged me by looking at the example of Jesus. Our purpose for being in China is to serve."

Another report begins with the following quote:
Although you American teachers come to us with different ideas, values, beliefs, and a different faith, I, no, all we students have come to deeply respect you for the people you are, and we dearly value your friendship.
The writer goes on to say...

"The word 'credibility' flashed through my mind as one of our students finished saying those words to me at a final oral interview. It was like God confirming for me that He had been honored in what He had allowed to happen throughout the year with our students, ourselves and the program in general. Praise God that He allowed those words to be spoken! Praise God that He is faithful in the long-term implications of what has been said and done!"

With that as a preface, here are some things a few teachers learned while in China.

1) Spiritual Survival

"As a team, we had daily devotions for about 15-20 minutes before class, plus a Bible study on Sunday night. There was also a local body of believers at the American embassy (in Beijing) where we could meet with other foreigners for worship on Sunday mornings. Personal quiet times and listening to tapes, both music and sermons, served to encourage me. Whenever I started to feel "dry" and sensed a "nothing is being done" attitude, God would remind me of how clearly and specifically He had led me to China, that he hadn't led me here for nothing and He was accomplishing His purposes as we walked by faith and not by sight.

What really served as an encouragement to me was a passage in James 5:7-16. It became a model for living in China to me. There are four basic principles that stood out to me:
a) Patience, not only with oneself, but in every interaction you encounter (no small feat!)
b) Perseverance, knowing God is at work as we stand firm in faith through every experience
c) Prayer, as we saw prayers miraculously answered and came to experience a deeper dimension of how prayer is powerful and effective. Experiencing a lot of spiritual warfare made intercessory prayer for students and for each other essential
d) Praise, above all, in the midst of everything, whatever the outlook be, giving God the praise for how He was actively concerned and at work in every situation took away the fears and a defeated attitude and gave a peace in expectation of what He had purposed."

Another teacher had some specific suggestions:
a) Invite friends in the US to be a part of your prayer team, committed to praying for you and writing words of encouragement during the year.
b) Regularly share with someone about how you are doing spiritually, emotionally, etc. (either a teammate or a friend in the US) Especially work at sharing what God is teaching you and how you see Him at work in your circumstances.
c) Keep a spiritual diary or journal.
d) Bring some good Christian music to listen to.
e) Bring some devotional or Bible study books to read.
f) Have fellowship with other Christians, especially singing, praying, etc.
g) Get away from your school situation for an afternoon or a day, either alone or with a teammate to reevaluate your spiritual life and be refreshed.
h) Try fasting for a time to regain spiritual awareness.

2) Loneliness and Isolation (two very different reports)

"Because of the contacts I had prior to going to China, the isolation factor wasn't as severe for me. I had Chinese friends, most of whom visited me in limited frequency through the proper connections, and it made a difference."

"One of the biggest things that we've had to deal with is isolation. Our 'life-space' here is so much smaller than in America...and it is no accident. Very little involvement with any Chinese people (other than our students), little media contact, very limited numbers of persons with whom you can converse freely in English, and a very small circle of people around you with a common cultural background and outlook. And the language barrier seems larger each day. How much we take our language for granted!

The sense of isolation increases with time because the ‘newness’ wears off as you are faced with living and working over an extended period of time in another culture. Probably in some countries (especially European countries), foreigners are not quite so obvious or unusual. But in China, certain differences make you quite conspicuous, and always being an object of attention adds to the sense of being an outsider. So, even after adjusting to differences in food, climate, living conditions, other differences become more apparent and require more difficult adjustments...mental ones. You find out just how much a part of you your own culture is. And simple homesickness can't be avoided.

As the tremendous contrast between here and home becomes more and more evident, it is very easy to start complaining and condemning. Frustration is a fact of life here, even in very simple daily things, because things just aren't done the way we do them back home...and it's so easy to start telling yourself (and others) how much better our way is and how dumb their way is.

The results of this kind of attitude (China-bashing) can be really serious. A few of the foreigners in our dorm have become so negative about everything that my teammate and I dislike being around them. All they have to say regards bad experiences and criticisms of the Chinese way of doing things. The attitude is so contagious. We have had to fight it off continually..."

3) Team Dynamics

“It seems to me the ‘team’ has a unique ministry in its witness of relating well together and all members should put those relationships as priority. This is not a place for 'mavericks' who want to 'do their own thing' without regard for the effect on the team.”

“The restrictions in what could be said (to Chinese friends) took some getting used to, but what I found most difficult was understanding and developing relationships with the other team members, especially during the first months…”

“The best characteristics to have are: Be ‘other’ centered; not self-centered. Be flexible—willing and able to change and adapt to new situations. Finally, be giving to others and sensitive to their needs.”

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