Life in Shanghai--August 3, 2005

I've now been living in Shanghai for five and a half weeks. It's already going by very quickly, so I didn't hesitate to sign a year-long lease on an apartment. I started working full-time a week to the day that I arrived so it's only now that I'm really starting to get a bit settled and I plan to finally do a bit more sightseeing. This also means that it's a bit too early to comment on my ideas of Chinese history and culture; the only thing I've realized is that my grasp on it is about as good as my Mandarin, and to look at China as only one country is like looking at Europe as just one country, except that China is bigger, has three times as many people and a longer and more complex history.

As far as teaching, I've already done a bit of everything working part-time and have been very picky in terms of finding a full-time job. Of course, for the last few weeks my "part-time" job has been 18 hours of teaching (given no preparation) 6 days a week. If something's just a little bit wrong, I don't take it. There's so much work offered that it's a luxury that I'm trying to take full advantage of. I'm teaching two business English classes, one with students so advanced that most don't need lessons and just want to practice, which means that it is often quite interesting. I also taught an intensive class with junior high school students, very rambunctious products of the one-child policy who were a lot of fun but maybe a little stressful at times, as they were so loud that the teacher in the next classroom complained a few times. On top of that, I've done three demo classes with young children! So basically I've gotten to meet a lot of Shanghainese people.

I got an apartment in the French concession area of Shanghai, which is considered to be "Old Shanghai." This is because there is also a "New Shanghai" that is still currently being built and is where one of my jobs is. There's so much construction that it's like being in a construction site. To give you an idea, there are currently 4 subway lines in use but within a couple years there will be 9. As a result the subway is ridiculously overcrowded and I avoid it as much as possible! I've already turned down a couple jobs for that reason. My apartment however is quite nice and in a good location not too far from the subway and lots of shopping. There's stuff to buy everywhere I look. I thought that I would only be able to buy the latest Hollywood movies on DVD here (which for me would be rather useless this time of year when nothing but crap comes out) but so far I've seen a few silent films from the 1920s, little-known Ingmar Bergman movies and even--get this--CANADIAN movies such as Leolo, Exotica and Margaret's Museum. I was also able to get the fourth season of Six Feet Under, which I was very excited about. Unfortunately, this does not apply to books and I am glad that I brought 20 (of which I've read 3 so far).

It would have been much easier for me to go to Korea or even Japan, but I haven't regretted my decision to come here for a moment. There's so much fascinating history here that it would even take more than one year to be able to take it all in, and I'd like to learn some of the language as well. It's not too hard to meet people, and it's not much of a culture shock when I grew up in a city with half a million (at least) Chinese people and the city not only has every comfort from home (pretty much) but is also very cheap and to top it off I'm getting paid. I've never lived so well on my own in fact. I'm able to go to restaurants all the time, which is quite a bit from Paris where I barely stepped in one restaurant during the entire time I was there. I think my experience in Paris helped a lot for coming here in terms of dealing with a new environment, new people, a language barrier and of course I also know how NOT to teach a language.