It’s hard to believe that we arrived in China over a year ago, and now we’ve already left. So many amazing things happened while we lived in China. We were able to learn a bit of a new language (more than we ever do travelling through a country). We made solid new friendships with both locals and expats and we broadened our financial horizons for a semi-nomadic future.
We absolutely fell in love with China and leaving wasn’t easy at all. Saying good-bye to everyone we had met was hard enough, but bidding farewell to the nation itself proved to be surprisingly difficult. We’d become so accustomed to walking Chinese streets, seeing Chinese people, eating Chinese food and living the Chinese way of life that we found it hard to pull away.
Of course travel was always our plan and we’re extremely excited to be in Mongolia now, but part of us is still back in China somehow. There are so many things we’ll miss about China! We find ourselves saying Xie Xie (thank-you in Mandarin) to confused Mongolians. We already crave Dong Bei (Northern Chinese food) and we miss our friends. Of course there are some things we won’t miss about China, but they are far out of our minds at this point.
We had a great going away party and our friends made a great exit for us. We enjoyed a delicious dinner and partied way beyond our bodies recommended limits. I somehow fell off of a curb and sprained my foot, which I am not too proud of, but it seems to be healing and I should be able to walk normally in a couple of days.
Some of our students also gave us great good-byes. We received gifts and hugs from many of them. We watched them improve their English so much over the year, so our teaching gig wasn’t without its rewards.
Our Chinese colleagues also took us out for a going away dinner that really meant a lot to us. We had worked so closely with these girls for an entire year and it was really nice to enjoy a delicious Chinese dinner with them before our departure. A couple of them even had their first Gānbēi (bottoms-up beer)!
Surely the hardest good-bye was our farewell to Standy, our welfare officer/personal assistant/close friend. He had done so much for us all year and we had become very close with him. He is one of the kindest people we have ever met and we will forever remember him.
The entire experience in China was perfect. Our school was perfect, our contract was perfect, our friends were perfect and China was perfect. We’ll always remember our time in this outstanding country and we hope to keep in touch with all of the great people we met along the way.
Our time in China can’t be explained in words, so we put together a quick video to try to give a glimpse of the wonderful life we’ve lived for the past year.
Enjoy!
If you’re ever thinking of teaching English in China, don’t hesitate to contact Shane English School. They have branches all over the world and you won’t find a more trustworthy school to work for than the Shane School in Yangzhou. OUR EPIC BACKPACKING JOURNEY
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Hey! I made the video.Great show guys…was nice to visit u and enjoy your space in China.Great friends and great times.
B
Wow! I loved travelling in China (I only spent a month there three years ago), and I’m really interested in improving my Mandarin. I’ve been teaching English as a foreign language for a couple of years now, and I’m really tempted to go to China, especially after reading about your experiences there. Can I ask, what company did you work with? Did you arrange a job before arriving or from abroad? Please let me know by email if you’d rather not post all that information directly on your blog! Cheers.
Goodbye, have fun. We can hardly wait to hear about your Mongolian adventure.
Oh, Cindy is eating chopsticks……..
Am so fortunate to have crossed paths with you guys on your life journey! You will be missed and I can’t wait to see you in another random country sometime in the future 🙂 enjoy yourselves and be safe. Love the video too, sums up time in china well.
Sounds like you guys got quite connected to China. I enjoyed the video and we’re headed there in a couple of weeks (but only 10-15 days) so I’ll take a look at your site to help us with our plans!
Hey Sam! Thanks for the comment.
China was a great place to teach english. We has some amazing experiences there and really enjoyed the school that we worked for. It was Shane English School. They actually have a website and have many schools in other parts of the world as well:
https://www.saxoncourt.net/en/ses.php They also have schools in Japan, not sure why it doesn’t say that on the website though!
We arranged the job while we were travelling in China. We sent out a bunch of resumes and got lots of replies. This one worked best for us.
We have lots of articles about teaching English in Yangzhou, China…if you’d like to have a look 🙂
Let us know if you have any other questions. ..ps, where are you teaching now?
Cheers!
I think I’ve heard of Saxoncourt before, and may have even briefly considered applying to them at one point! Currently I’m not teaching full time (I was working until the end of last year in Europe; Austria and Spain mostly), but just travelling with my partner in South America. I’ve done some casual one-to-one stuff as we’ve been travelling (in Buenos Aires, and hopefully soon in Lima), but mostly I’m taking a break from it at the moment.
Thanks Bern! It was great having you 🙂
Cheers
Exciting! I bet teaching in Austria and Spain was great. We really want to go to South America next..we’ll be checking out your website!
Cheers 🙂
Thanks! We’re having a great time in Mongolia so far.
haha, she was hungry I guess…
We feel the same way about you Colleen! It was a great time in China and we’ll definitely meet up again one day 🙂
Thanks for the comment Jocelyn. We really did get connected to China. We had a great experience there. Enjoy your time there, it’s a great country 🙂