I Just Like

As classes progressed, I became more critical of my employer.

Yuexiu Foreign Language College was a special type of school. It was a money-making institution, designed mostly for rich kids who did poorly on their college entrance exam.

Its classes appeared impressive. “Marketing,” “System Operations” but just like building bricks, many of the classes weren’t real. They were meant to look good.

They had one foreigner teaching gym when he could have helped so much more teaching another class, like half of my English students. But he was there so the administration could tell prospective students: “We have so many foreign teachers, we have one teaching gym.” The students, and their parents who were paying for it, were being cheated out of a quality education.

However, despite its capitalistic gouging, the school did offer the students a way out. The school was known for its study abroad program. For exorbitant amounts of money, Yuexiu students could travel to partnership schools in England, Germany, France, Australia and Singapore. In the business school, my students had their hearts set on Singapore, an island south of China with a large ethnic Chinese population. If they studied for three years at Yuexiu, and their parents paid enough money, they could be accepted into an unscrupulous Singapore business college.

Their three years at Yuexiu would shrink and count as one year, leaving them with two years to go. But if they graduated, they would have the coveted Foreign University Diploma. That piece of paper would put them above most other mainland graduates. It was a rip-off, but it offered a better alternative than just settling for less.

To be fair, my experience at the college was probably not an average one. My oral English classes were the shortest of any teacher, with the Business students who could probably care the least of any major.

Other foreign teachers taught newspaper reading, culture and writing, or simply how to pass the state tests. A good many were perfectly happy with their classes and would renew their contracts the following year. I was not one of those.

But I tried to make it work. In my Marketing Class, I decided to assign their first paper. They were to get into groups and write two paragraphs on one of China’s “marketing environments.”

While that sounds a bit advanced, it boiled down to three people writing three sentences each on technology, China’s culture, politics or people. While broad, the essay was to be in their own words. There were no questions. No one came to me for help.

When they turned in the papers, 75 percent of the class had plagiarized. To mix it up, I decided to take them on field trips. The great thing about marketing is, if the place sells something, you’re money. Because the marketing book featured a case-study on McDonalds that they couldn’t understand, I decided to pay our local chapter a visit. McDonalds is all over China. Shaoxing had three.

In the particular store we visited, I saw those glorious arches from my homeland. I would often go there when I was feeling homesick for quick and fatty fare.

However, before you even go in the store, you can tell it has a Chinese tint. Outside, what appeared to be Ronald McDonald sat molded to a bench. But it wasn’t Ronald McDonald. It was Uncle McDonald. The differences are subtle, but in essence, it means that Uncle has a smaller body and even smaller head, with extra-squinty eyes.

The speaker outside usually played the melodic McDonalds advertisement. “Ba-ba-ba-baba.” But instead of saying “I’m loving it,” the sweet-voiced singer sang “Wo jiu xihuan,” meaning “I just like.” I thought this was a great semantic improvement from American culture’s many abuses of the word “love.”

Inside, the McDonald’s staples were basically the same. Differences included putting sweet red beans on ice cream and offering fried chicken, because hey, it’s American. They also offered group family meals; family being the preferred style of eating.

Advertisements featured sensuous body parts: full lips, a neck, a Caucasian man’s peaked bicep, with a tasty burger beneath. I lectured my students on the genius of Ray Kroc, globalization and standardization for 15 minutes.

I opened the floor for discussion. We discussed buying ice cream and spent the rest class time eating sundaes.

It was 10 in the morning. During that semester, we went on several other field trips. One to Starbucks, where I had my morning coffee; one to Trust-Mart, Taiwan’s version of Wal-Mart, where I did my weekly grocery shopping; and one to the main street, where I got my morning exercise.

Each field trip contained a corresponding lesson and activity for the students, and a corresponding errand for me. I liked this way of teaching better.