Last year, the previous staff was kind enough to leave us a letter giving us the lowdown on life in Tianjin, so we thought we'd do the same. This is now the third year in a row that there has been no one carrying over from the previous year - don't take that as a bad omen, we just have other callings right now... Some of the comments that are obviously from years previous have been left in for flavor, but all the factual information is up-to-date.
It's only for foreign passport holders, so don't try and bring your Chinese friends. It meets Sundays @ 10am, at the Tourism School on the corner of BinShui Dao and ZiJinShan Lu, attached to the Dickson Hotel. It's about a 15 minute bike ride from school.
Directions: Take a left at the Sinta hotel and continue up the street to the second intersection where there actually are working traffic lights and there's a sign for KFC. Turn right and go straight past the shops and the market and the McD's/KFC/Subway. Take a left at the light, right after the canal bridge. The tourism school is there on your right. Park your bike and follow the other foreigners into the building, up the spiral staircase to the right. Eventually you'll get to the auditorium and a whole mess of foreigners.
If you have any problems getting there, or just want to meet someone, contact Mary Lou Carlson. She's been here for years and has served as a contact for the CRIS school teachers in other years. She and her family are wonderful. Her home phone # is 2837-8256.
The cafeteria is free at lunchtime. You may love it, you may not. In previous years, teachers had to buy tickets for any additional meals. You can get tickets from Diana in her office. These meal tickets cost Y4.
Across the street is James'. Or, at least that's our name for it. The restaurant has a big "WELCOME" sign over the door and the food, while limited in selection, is some of the best we've had. It's clean and cheap, has an English menu. The 2000-01 team recommended the gung bao ji ding/ kung pao chicken, buluo ji piar/pineapple chicken, and ba-si/caramelized fruit. We would add the lamb with spring onions and the braised eggplant.
Down the street to the west (hang a right at the school gate) and almost to the corner is the Fish Head hotpot restaurant. Don't be scared off by the "fish-head" part. There's no English menu, so bring your phrasebook. Basically they give you a big pot of broth in which you boil your own food. The broth comes 2 ways: SPICY (la), and not spicy (bu la). We typically ordered lamb, cabbage, mushrooms, bamboo, noodles. Nat liked his occasional fish-head, too (or so he says). There're also really good frozen chicken & vegetable dumplings wrapped in dofu, but I don't know the name for that. But don't limit yourself, hot pot places are a dime a dozen in Tianjin: can you try them all?
A new noodle place opened on the corner of the alley next to the school. Freshly-pulled la-mian noodles in a curry broth with beef and pickled cabage make a nice Y2 lunch when the cafeteria serves shrimp or fish. Or watch your fried rice made fresh in front of your eyes in 30 seconds flat. Amazing!
If you want spicy food and don't mind paying a little more for it, try Tian Fu Sichuan Restaurant, just north of the TV tower at the corner of Wejin Nanlu and ZiJinShan Lu. They have a picture and English menu. It's good stuff.
There are a ton of little podunk places everywhere to try. You could eat at a different restaurant every night and never exhaust the supply of restaurants. The nearest food street is just off of BinShui Dao going south, right before the chain of fast food places. Fruit vendors mark the entrance. Or coming from the school: left out of the gate, left at the light, and right at the first big intersection after the sport university exit.
For western food, there's Subway, McDonald's, and KFC on BinShui Dao. (see fellowship directions above). There's also Broadway Cafe (bai lao hui), if you want more of a sit down/hang out place. The Broadway has All-you-can-eat Sunday brunch for Y88 and weekday lunch specials for Y30. Otherwise, pancakes are Y15, and pizza (good stuff!) is Y50. The easiest way to get there is to make a left at the Sinta hotel and continue all the way down past Binshui Dao, finally making another left at the corner where the Children's Palace, a big glassy structure, is located -- it's on a corner on the left, usually with a bunch of taxis in front of it.
Starbucks Coffee. Yes, the real thing. One location is on Nanjing Lu in the International Building. A second location opened this year at the new shopping center at the south end of Binjiang Dao (Jinhui Guangchang), with a Baskin Robins next door.
There are a couple places to go for grocery shopping:
Fruit, eggs, and flat bread can be bought on the street. There is a little alley out the door to the right of the school where you can get any of these. You can also find these in Food Street. Remember to barter for the fruit unless it's marked!
If you like Target or Super K, try Carrefour (jia le fu) or Homeclub (jia le). If you're a little more adventurous or thrifty, try the street markets mentioned below.
For general items, try the warehouse market behind BinShui Food street. Pots, pans, household cleaners and supplies are all there.
Opposite of Food Street on the north is the clothing market. Here you can make purchases of cloth, including denim, canvas and the oh-so-popular Hawaiian prints. There are also a whole lot of other things there too. Keep going up from that and you'll get to the vegetable market. At the far end of the market, right at the "T" is the 2000-2001 team's favorite vegetable lady. She knows some English names for the vegetables, and always throws in something extra. Make a left to find a street full of hot pot restaurants and tailors. Explore, poke around, and you'll find wonderful things.
There are a whole slew of places to go clothes shopping. The clothes-shopper's favorite for bargains should be Xiao Bailou. In addition to little clothes and shoes stalls and shops galore, there are two department stores (the expensive one facing Nanjing Lu, and a government store around back), a covered market, and a fabric market. If you want to have clothes made, this is a good place to buy it. You can also get cloth from the cloth market at the west side of the southern end of Binjiang Dao. Ask someone from the Fellowship (like Jen Chen) or a teacher here about finding a tailor. Everything is fairly cheap and you'll wonder why you brought so many clothes from home.
Other places to shop are Tonglou, Binjiang Dao, and New Culture Street. There's a #951 bus that runs to Tonglou that you can pick up on the northeast side of the Weijin Nanlu/Heinuchung Dao intersection. It also runs past the Earthquake monument - if you pass that, you've gone too far. Binjiang Dao is near downtown, so you'd probably want to take a taxi or make an afternoon of it and bike. New Culture Street is across from Nankai University and is about a 20 min. bike ride.
Right around the corner past the Sinta hotel and across the street is a Chinese recreation center of some sort. They have bowling, archery, pool, and a disco. We've only been bowling there, which was pretty good.
On the 11th floor of the Isetan department store at the south end of Binjiang Dao is an ice skating rink. The ice was in pretty bad shape the two times we went, but it's the only rink in town.
The NYC Music Club is right across the street from Tonglou. They have a pretty good Filipino band and mid-priced Chinese food. It's a good place to go dancing.
Looking for Americans or other expats to hang out with? Your place could be Ali Baba's. It is a small restaurant on Nankai University campus with a large menu and decent food; it's where many of the foreign students at Nankai spend their evenings, and turns into a very jolly place on the weekends. Head straight into the University through the entrance across from New Culture Street, make a right after the lake and navigate your way past the construction. We recommend the rosemary chicken and the French fries.
The Broadway Cafe is a major hangout for the more upscale expats, mostly overseas employees of Motorola. Don't be shy, walk past the pool tables into the back of the restaurant to the bar area. Foosball and darts tournaments are held weekly, and in the summer you can play beach volleyball on a small sand court in the patio area.
DVDs and CDs are in available in illegal abundance. DVDs tend to be very good quality compared to VCDs, (most of which were obtained by a guy with a video camera in the movie theatre, and are neglibably cheaper or more expensive anyways). Typically, older releases are more likely to be the real movie, e.g. we bought Lord of the Rings before it came out in the US and it turned out to be a cheezy 80's sci-fi/fantasy movie in a LoTR sleeve. All movies run about Y8/disc, and a CD is Y5 (no bargaining!). Our usual store is just on your left as you enter the Binshui Dao market from the McDonalds end. Ancient Culture Street also has several locations. Check different stores for different selections. There is a DVD player in the lounge, our Christmas present from the school in 2002.
TVis pretty pathetic. We used to get CNN and Channel V (Asian MTV) off and on, but no more. Star Sports is about the only consistent thing in English, but, unless you're an avid sports fan, not really much comfort. Nathan is in charge of all that, and the one to see if you're having problems. Aside from the normal, local stations, English stations are pretty expensive. They used to get Star TV with lots of good American shows, but those days have passed... If it's news you want, try the internet or our little shortwave radio. It's pretty crackly, but you can tune in interesting things every once in a while.
If you're not into vegging in front of the tube, and prefer reading instead, the resource room has a slew of eclectic choices, both for adults and children. Dig through it and you're bound to find something you're interested in. There's also a library with an English section, the Tianjin Library. The foreign language bookstores mainly stock the classics and crap, but are good for textbooks if you are a self-motivated Chinese learner. There are a few opposite Nankai University, and one near Tonglou. If you want more current reads, go to Wanfujing up in Beijing and check out the new Wangfujin Bookstore there. They have cheap hardbacks and paperback.
There are two short holidays during the year - one at the beginning of October, and one at the beginning of May. Depending on the length of the holiday and what you want to do, here are some suggestions for shorter excursions.
Beijing (1 ½ hrs by train). The #951 bus will take you directly to the train station in about 40 minutes. It's a good place to go on the weekend just to get away, is cleaner than Tianjin, and has wonderful tourist spots. Going in the fall when the trees are turning or in the spring when they're budding are the best times to play tourist. Otherwise it's just plain cold. Somewhere in the pile of English Adult books I've left my old guidebook and etc that has helpful things for finding your way around Beijing, like a guide from the ELIC Maclellan center that lists where their fellowship is, places to shop, eat, and tour, in English, pinyin, and Chinese.
Chengde (4 hrs) supposedly is a great spot for hiking. The old summer palace is there, and lots of old styled temples. Pan Shan is a beautiful mountain park ~2hrs from here, and if you want to lounge by the sea, check out Beidaihe, a seaside resort about 5 hrs from Tianjin, fairly clean, and has some western food.
Aside from the two mentioned above, we also get Christmas day, New Year's day, and Good Friday off. Remind the school about a month in advance about Good Friday as it changes every year and they don't keep track of it. The foreign teachers have had it off for the past 5 years now.
There is also 5 week period off in January/February for ChunJie, or the Spring Festival. This is a great time to travel, and head some place WARM. A word of caution, though: plan far in advance as everyone and their grandmother travels during this time. Thailand and Vietnam are typical places for foreigners to head at this time, if you want to get out of the country. If you would like a travel companion, check around with people at the fellowship to see where others might be heading; you may want to get away from your other team members at this time. If you plan to leave the country, you will need a reentry visa. Talk to Madame Wang in Accounting (or Roger) to begin the application process, which will require several weeks. Make sure to start early!
A reliable place to get airline tickets is at the CITS office in the Olympic Towers, near Tonglou. Request to talk to Louie, he's a very nice guy.
Here is what the 2001-2002 team did:
Note that there is no way to get there directly from the mainland if you want to visit Taiwan. You will have to go through Hong Kong, Korea, or as we did the Philippines (visiting a friend). Coming back is the same deal.
I'm leaving behind a blue folder marked "CRIS School Unofficial Handbook." In it are guidelines and master copies for grading, evaluations, responsibilities and all sorts of other wonderful stuff you'll want to thank us for, as well as what grade level we taught spring semester and how to get in contact with each of us. We're trying to leave this place in as nice of order as possible. When we got here last year, the previous team had organized everything in (new) cabinets labeled with each grade level, containing materials and previous teachers' notes and summaries. We've tried as best as possible to organize the children's books, and the shelves should still be labeled. It's the same with the cupboards and drawers.
Lawrence Liu (Teacher 6! Teacher 6!) is the Dean of English. He's pretty much our go-between with Mme. Li on everything, and if you have any questions or problems, talk to him. He's wonderful and will try to be of assistance to the best of his abilities. He's also very ambitious to see this program grow, so be nice and help him out if you can. He may even share his secret with you.
The dress code is very loose. Officially there is none, but the school encourages us to dress up for flag raising on Monday morning. This year they even had a suit tailored for each member of the faculty and staff. Other days are more relaxed: jeans are OK as long as they look nice and you wear a nice top. Of course, on certain occasions you will wish you had a set of nice clothes, so bring some along.
Monday mornings you are expected to be at the school gate by 7:40 by the latest. You also need to be outside during flag raising and exercise periods. You do not need to eat in the cafeteria if you don't want to.
The school likes to play English music during passing periods. The foreign teaching team (ie. YOU) need to make this tape. Usually around 10 minutes of music does it. There are a mess of tapes to record off of; try to pick easy kids songs, or songs that are easy to understand. Don't change the tape more than once a month - the kids need time to be able to pick up the songs for it to be "useful."
On days when you have evening activities, foreign teachers are allowed to leave at 4pm, no earlier. If evening activities are cancelled for that night (for some odd reason), it's to be treated like any other day and you have to stay 'til 5:30pm just like any other day.
In case there aren't enough teachers, and a teacher to pick up extra classes (meaning more than 2 each day), the 200-01 team worked it out with the school that each teacher needing to do so will be compensated Y40 a day for each extra class. (for example, Kristi taught an extra class 3x/week, so she picked up an extra Y120/week). You can work it all out with Lawrence, if need be. He's very understanding.
In 01-02, each of the four teachers taught three classes each day (that's including night classes) and we got the normal Y2500/month, plus a Y400 bonus. Oddly, the main chunk was paid in advance and the bonus was paid afterwards.
Both semesters, we were required to help students prepare shows for their Winter and Spring programs. You'll also need to hold orientation sessions for when they go to the US. This is flexible, as the 2001-2002 team was not asked to do the orientation sessions.
The first level kitchen has all the dishes and utensils. That was the only kitchen we really used this past year. All the stuff that we leave is for you to use, as well as some baking stuff. This year the school bought us an oven so we could cook cakes, pies and cookies. It can fit a 9"x9" pan at most. We bought ourselves a blender to make fruit smoothies with; Micah's favorite was bananas, apples, pineapple juice, milk and ice. There are also a couple of recipe books, if you're so inclined.
We turned one of the bedrooms into a lounge. Apparently in years past there was a nice leather couch, but it was removed and replaced by a bed which often doubles as a comfy nap spot. Roger is a great guy, and part of his job is to "look out for us," which may include things that we'd think unnecessary. If anything needs repairing, there should be maintenance slips around to fill out. Give them to Roger to translate and he'll see that it gets done. And if he gives you any grief (which he won't), tease him about the girl in the box he smuggled up to his room... ;)
The school will also give you a bike. Be sure to have a lock and key and lock it when you leave it. They are to be parked in back of the residence during the week and can be parked by the stairs to your apartments during the weekend. If you have any problems, see one of the bike fixers outside the gate, and they'll fix it for a nominal fee. The guy with the big smile right outside the gate is really nice, but he never really tightens things too well.
Be nice to the gatemen. You can call them da-ye. (Da-ye is a term of respect for older men.) Actually, they are pretty endearing. If you bake cookies or cake, it's thoughtful to drop off a sample.
The gate usually closes around 10pm, if not, climb the fence (we would chain our bikes to the fence outside, too, until Nat got here. Now he lifts them over for us. Ain't he sweet?)
Roger will let you know when the hot water times are. Also, Nat and I both have noticed funky stenches in our rooms around lunchtime if we leave our windows open (I lived above the kitchen, and he, right over me). It's the China funk. I have friends in Beijing that complain of the same thing. We'll leave some scented candles and incense to help with the stench if and when you need it. Incense is also really good for keeping away mosquitoes.
Electricity comes 220 volts, but most rooms have 110 outlets available. The rub is that they may be in other plug shapes. The standard Chinese plug two rectangular diagonal prongs, and a third ground prong. Electrical supply stores are plentyful (look for one a couple hundred yards west of the Binshui Dao McDonalds) so if its inconvenient or expensive to buy adapters in the States, don't sweat it.
Under "My Documents" you'll find folders for each grade level and other useful folders to poke around in. It was our Christmas present in 2000, and so a lot of documents from the old computer are stored on the E: drive. Even though it's new, it runs Windows so it can be rather temperamental at times and finicky, too. The A: drive is especially so, and has been known to erase disks or screw up your document. If it freezes and refuses to unfreeze, just restart it.
We used Outlook Express for our email in 2000-2001 - if you have POP e-mail access it allows you to keep your own account (eg. Hotmail, Yahoo), with the luxury of being able to write and read emails off-line. There's also a nice little password option to keep others out of your inbox. There are two team accounts - one is <glewis@mail.zlnet.com.cn> and is the Main Default. It's hooked up with our internet provider and once a month you'll get something from Accounting telling how much you owe.
Credit cards not being widespread and the banking system still developing, you will have to go through the inconvenience of taking a trip to Tonglou to pay the internet bill every month or two. The ISP's office is on the 29th floor of the Tianjin Finance Building, at 123 Weidi Road. Simply take a taxi to Tonglou, or catch the #951 bus if you are feeling thrifty. From the foreign language bookstore start walking approximately east (McDonalds will be over your left shoulder across the road) and look for the tall gray office buildings on your right. It's the second one, and it has a bunch of bank tellers on the bottom floor. The elevators are around in the back on the first floor. Make a left as you exit on the 29th floor. Generally, you can pay the internet bill every couple of months.
The other one is <cristeacher@hotmail.com>. This is the one to use when writing Dr. Douglas as (for some odd reason) the "glewis" account never gets through to him, or to anyone else at Biola or in La Mirada (unverified -ms). The hotmail password for 'cristeacher' is ********. It's not very original, but hey...
The 2001-2002 team used mostly web-based e-mail, such as MSN, Sanriotown and Mail.com.
Every time you try to connect to the internet, you'll get a post dial-up box. I've set up a script to automatically enter your username and password so you don't have to worry about it. Just for reference in case you ever have to enter it manually, the username is "glewis" and the password is "*********". When the menu pops up, choose "1" and press F7 to continue.
For about $0.02, you can also make phone calls to the US or Canada, using MSN Messenger service. You can figure that all out yourself. It's not always the best connection, but it's the cheapest. The headphones/micro-phone should be with the computer or in one of the drawers and plug into the back of the computer. I used to use dialpad.com, but it's not much better and no longer free. You can also buy IP cards from a guy in front of the Post Office. Jitong has the best rate and you can use it in any major city in China. Make sure the silver hasn't been scratched off yet, and if you pay face value, you're getting ripped off.
School supplies, like pens and printer paper are available from Diana, who is in the Administrative office, out by the front gate (aka "The Smoking Room"). You can also get printer paper from Nathan.
If you want to have photocopies made (like worksheets), give them to Julie. Her office is the one after the smoking room. Be sure to write down who it's for, what pages, and the # of copies for Julie. It usually takes a full day to get them back, so plan in advance. Also if you are extra-nice to her, she is more likely to make quick copies for you in a pinch.
I'm jealous of your team, and at the same time I'm a little glad that I'm not you. When the school moves in November or October you will have to do a lot of re-learning and discovering for yourselves. It will be an exciting time to strike out in new directions and set precedents for future teams; think things through, please!
We're going to leave you a couple of suitcases full of stuff like a marked map of Tianjin and a Chinese-English menu, amongst other things. If you have any questions throughout the year, you can contact any of us. Our email addresses are in the "Unofficial Handbook." Have fun!
Micah Sittig, June 2002