White Buddha: ESL, Melvin in China

"To their credit, they've cracked down on some of that in recent years... Enforcing an entry card swipe system to track attendance, deducting 'morality' points for those late to or skipping classes... Used to be many wouldn't turn up at all, until the final..."

"But still, Chinese universities, upper tier, Ivy League status equivalent included, have like 80% class score, grading requirements and 98% graduation rates, not too demanding... Not exactly Yale..."

"Speaking of Yale, Yale withdrew from China, because so many of the students at its campus there were plagiarizing..."

"I taught a writing course at my last university and, first paper I assigned, nearly every student handed me a plagiarized paper."

"So I had to explain plagiarism and why it's wrong... And the students looked so pissed I'd even brought it up..."

"Afterwards I made them write papers, in class, so they couldn't copy anything from the internet, but then they copied off each other, students blatantly staring at each other's papers..."

"The Chinglish on many of those papers, too, was murder trying to wrap your head around it..."

"A teacher I know, at an upscale international school, went through about five layers of security measures to obstruct cheating, but somehow, even the kids who couldn't speak English would always hand in 'A' papers..."

"The corruption, it's endemic, from a micro to macro level... Even Xi Jinping plagiarized his PhD thesis..."

"They're conditioned not to think, purposely. Dictatorships don't want critical thinkers, intellectuals..."

"It is depressing. But I've made my peace with it. Not up to us to sort out. It's their country..."

"I try to help who I can help. Not pay too much attention to the slackers, those forced to be there..."

"It is a shitty thing to do, to force a language on someone. At least many of the English majors have chosen it..."

"A lot of the English majors were forced to study English as well..."

"Seriously, could you imagine that? A college assigning you a major?"

"Especially a language you have no interest in? Like you show up to UCLA and an administrator points at you and commands that you study Portuguese for the next 4 years, whether you like it or not!"

"It's university with socialist, Chinese characteristics."

"Explains the apathy..."

"Master's of Apathy..."

"Hobbies include shopping, computer games and breathing..."

"Learned helplessness."

"So this might be why my English majors can barely speak English."

"Used to be all the students, even Accounting majors, could speak well, easily hold a conversation."

"But since 2013, China's public schools have been doing away with a large portion of their English education, replacing English courses with Marxism, 'patriotic' education, Chinese cultural courses."

"Last couple years CCP has been banning Christmas too, Christmas parties, sending squads of goons, in grinch vans, to chop down Christmas trees outside shopping malls, tear down Christmas decorations..."

"Fascism with Chinese characteristics..."

"CCP has also been demanding Chinese companies change their brand names from English and European names to patriotic Chinese names... Claiming foreign names 'hurt the feelings of Chinese people...'"

"And they have been purging English language TV shows, movies from CCTV, apps, the Chinternet..."

"Didn't they also ban ghost movies, time travel plots too?"

"And a highly rated, beloved historical drama that was actually popular in other Asian countries, which is a rarity for Mainland China... Something about the stories being too 'racy', women showing too much cleavage..."

"The Great Leap Backwards..."

"Has to suck for English majors, so little useful media, and the atrocious textbooks they get... Full of Chinglish or 10, 20, 100 years old..."

"Have you seen their university course schedules? College students commanded to sit through 10 hours a week of those lame propaganda classes. On weekends, late into the night, too, until 10 PM."

"They could, at the very minimum, for the English majors, conduct those propaganda courses in English, couldn't they? A win-win..."

"They sleep through those propaganda sessions, like most of their classes. I've walked by those Marxism courses and seen them sleeping or watching movies on tablets, with headphones on, while a Chinese teacher stands behind a podium, reading from a book, mumbling into a microphone... The Peanuts voice..."

"Not every single one of them is sleeping... Some take it quite seriously... The Communist Youth League types... The 'wumao' eunuch sorts who go online and argue with foreigners, defending China's politics, policies..."

"I've had a couple eunuch students, admins, turn up to my class, sometimes trying to goad me into political debates..."

"I don't think it's fair to argue with Global Times readers, wumao eunuchs. They don't have unfettered access to information. Their ignorance is a handicap. They're intellectual cripples..."

"Debating with pro-China, pro-CCP people, when you come from a free country, is like the intellectual equivalent of Lebron James and a team of NBA Allstars playing at the Special Olympics..."

"Horrible for them to be denied information like they are, kept ignorant... The CCP must not be too confident if they won't allow opposing sides to simply speak..."

"From a competitive perspective, too, how hamstrung Chinese college students are being denied access to academic resources, losing time, irreplaceable, precious time, rotting away in those propaganda courses..."

"I guess they figure instilling nationalism and brainwashing to be of crucial importance, vital to their competitiveness. The fear of anti-government uprisings must keep the CCP's billionaires up at night..."

"They saw glasnost... They study the USSR's fall religiously, for a reason... Don't expect a free press anytime soon..."

"But if they're so serious about their propaganda and brainwashing courses, why do they allow students to sleep through them, play on phones the whole time?"

"Why aren't there teacher's aides prowling around, enforcing discipline? Like why have such strict rules, be authoritarian, yet have so little enforcement?"

"Chabuduo..."

"Don't fear, comrade, the AI, facial recognition cameras and software will be able to spot students on phones, those daydreaming, sleeping, 'morality' points and sesame credits deducted..."

"Monetary fines, instantaneously subtracted from your Alipay, WeChat wallet, like the AI software, facial recognition cameras are now doing for jaywalkers..."

"Xi Dada is watching..."

"There's already testing for that in middle schools. Cameras zeroing in on facial expressions, deducting points from students seemingly disengaged..."

"I'm still not convinced. Chabuduo is ever pervasive... It'll be programmed into the AI... Chabuduo will save the day..."

"Maybe not for the Gaokao, that could be above chabuduo..."

"Nothing is above chabuduo..."

"Lower tier universities, colleges... If chabuduo can prevail anywhere..."

"All Chinese colleges... You can't Gaokao these kids and not expect them to require the PTSD, mental health recovery facilities that Chinese colleges serve as..."

"The phones are medication and preparing them for the job where they'll sit in a cubicle all day, sleeping, playing phone games and shopping on Taobao..."

"Chinese colleges are like kindergartens for young adults. They've got curfew, nap times. It's basically adult babysitting."

"Aspects of it are maybe better than American colleges, no keg parties, or frat, sorority culture..."

"No 10 million dollar a year, asshole of a football coach... No NCAA crooks..."

"No adjuncts teaching at five schools, trying to make ends meet... Chinese colleges actually provide on-campus housing and decent benefits, pay..."

"American colleges are fucked up... Hear there's an American college thing called 'blowjob contests' where a line of girls sucks off a line of guys, and the guys vote on the best brain..."

"Happened once at my college, a girl was bragging about her dick sucking skills, blew five dudes in a row at a party, in front of everyone..."

"I saw a tiny girl, like 5'0, dark skin, think from southeast Asia, girl called Tina, at a fraternity house, take on the whole college football team. Linebackers, everyone, ran a train..."

"Couldn't see that happening at a Chinese college..."

"Not happening as much anymore at American schools. Students mostly sitting around staring at phones, 24/7, there too..."

"A happy medium between debauchery and prudence would be nice..."

"They're nowhere close to debauchery at Chinese colleges..."

"The boys and girls sit on opposite sides of the classroom, barely talk to each other."

"Most any of them do, if they have a boyfriend or girlfriend, is hold hands..."

"I had one girl confide in me, after class, in tears, that she'd had sex with her boyfriend, after he pressured her to do so, and then he broke up with her afterwards, saying that he couldn't be with a girl who would have sex before marriage..."

"Hypocrisy with Chinese characteristics..."

"Learned helplessness..."

"Chinese hospitals regularly offer hymen replacement surgery. Probably have the department for that not too far from the medical testing they need for a marriage license..."

"Vagina mechanics..."

"Gotta wonder who invented that procedure..."

"Can and can't get away with anything..."

"Seen their dorm rooms? Five, six, eight to a room, only one squat toilet... Bunk beds... A college I was at didn't have AC or heating and the dorms'd be freezing in the winter, far colder than outside, boiling in summer, far hotter than outside..."

"I taught at a school like that... Students would be comatose in the morning classes, late Spring Term, from not sleeping because of the heat... How poorly ventilated, hot those buildings were, swarming with bugs too..."

"It's character building, comrade... Their Struggle Sessions..."

"And meanwhile the administration buildings and living quarters all had central heating and air... Admins in Audis..."

"Classrooms didn't have AC either, it was around 100 degrees in there, only had these loud, overhead fans that just moved the muggy air around..."

"Classrooms with decaying, moldy walls, old, hard, beat up desks, no projectors or computers, only a warped blackboard... Sweltering hot in there, the temperature, plus having 50 people packed in a tiny room... One time I got vertigo and almost fainted..."

"My last school had an online 'suggestion box' for the administration, open to students, teachers who wished to make recommendations... No one used it..."

"Hundred Flowers..."

"A good way to get deported, that..."

"I don't know, for shits and giggles, if nothing else, I'd fire up the VPN, leave a snarky remark about installing AC, ending vanity construction projects around campus, ditching the farcical 'military training'..."

"I fucking despise that military training..."

"During the military training, late summer, I saw a girl collapse on the street, from heat exhaustion, had to be rushed via taxi to hospital..."

"That mandatory military training every college must do is so unnerving, seeing those students dressed in camouflage uniforms, carrying flags, marching, belting out communist slogans and songs in unison..."

"Eight hours of hate..."

"It's a waste of time... They don't usually learn how to fight or shoot. They just yell stuff and learn to march. Seen prissy girls and fat kids, lounging in the shade, sleeping through it or playing on their phones..."

"Worrying, for their sake, if there really were a war. Those singing, dancing PLA guys, students who can't fight, can only march in formation... Not exactly formidable opponents... Plus all their weapons are 'MADE IN CHINA'... Guns, missiles can't fire..."

"Rest assured, comrade... They'll send wave after wave of humanity at the enemy, marching right at 'em, swarm 'em, like they did in Korea..."

"1.4 billion people, plenty to spare... They'll send the bare branches, diaosi, and old people first, wave after wave of ayis and shushus, with hammers, sickles and walking sticks... fatboys with cellphone nun chucks... Nongmin with pitchforks and lit cigarettes..."

"Ayis wielding pissing and pooping babies..."

"No war is gonna happen... Certainly no young people going... Those ayis and shushus won't let their pension funds go to fight... They won't even let them go outside..."

"Tiger parenting..."

"Many of my students' parents call them 6 times a day, simply to tell them to eat lunch... Facetime them twice a day... Tiger parents with movement tracking, listening devices, GPS apps on their kids' phones... Even from afar they can't do anything..."

"I was told by an admin not to fail any of my students, even if they never came to class, because it 'makes the parents, school and students lose face.'"

"The face... Always about the face..."

"You snowflakes... I worked as a high school teacher in America. I had parents flipping out on me, and snarky bureaucrats, who never taught a class in their lives, dictating our lesson plans. I once had a student get violent and slam a door shut on my hand, lost the tip of my thumb..."

"So Chinese colleges, I can handle pretty easily. Many unfortunate things about it, but, all in all, my students, lazy oafs included, are completely respectful and friendly to me, wonderful kids... Many genuinely want to learn, improve themselves... I can't complain much..."

"Yes, sir. They can be sugar-sweet, but careful what you say around them. There're at least one or two snitches in every class, recording you, ready to report you for spreading 'wrong ideas' or being a spy. They can even get paid reward money for it..."

"A middle-aged white guy teaching Oral English at a lower tier Chinese university. The picture-perfect profile of a CIA operative..."

"Read the comments some post online about foreigners, on Weibo, Sina... Scary stuff. The stink eye, dirty looks come from somewhere..."

"Has gotten much worse since the Trade War. Xinhua had a graphic with two boxing gloves, one painted as an American flag, the other as a Chinese flag, smashing into each other. Think of the effect that has on the local populace. That's their one and only news source..."

"I don't know, I've not noticed any uptick in dirty looks and hostility. I've always gotten dirty looks from the locals, especially the laotou."

"Nah, I'm definitely noticing more stink eye from younger ones nowadays."

"The generation now, those born in the late 90s, early 00s, are way more nationalistic. You should see the propaganda they were taught, hatred of foreigners... In primary school."

"Atavism..."

"They're preparing for another Long March..."

"5000 years of history... Don't say they didn't warn you!"

"Dangran, comrade, most of the young people are quite patriotic, but not violent or crazy about it..."

"They can be... I know an Italian guy who was beaten up at a bar, simply for being a foreigner..."

"Bars are the worst. Random drug testing there too, make you whip it out, piss in a cup, in public..."

"A year ago I had to spend the night at a police station because the coppers had raided the bar to do drug tests but hadn't brought their drug testing kits, so we had to go back to the police station with them and wait for 5 or 6 hours while they found the officer who actually had the kits..."

"I hate Chinese bars, fake alcohol, never any girls there, aside from a few hookers, and it's mostly dudes sitting around, staring at their phones, or playing that stupid dice drinking game..."

"Worst experience at a Chinese bar for me was the time I had a young guy ask me if the Diaoyu Island is Japan's or China's... Told him I didn't follow the news much and don't know what Diaoyu Island is... He then screamed at me that 'It's China's!'"

"He kept yelling at me, 'China's!' 'It's China's!' and so I got up and left the bar and he followed me down the street yelling 'Diaoyu Island is China's!' until I got into a taxi and drove off..."

"Incredible how it takes so little for the CCP to push those nationalist buttons and have the masses go wild."

"Controlled conditioning... Pavlovian..."

"Still are some nice ones who see through that. Had one kid tell me how all the anti-Japan shit in the news is just to keep people from being pissed off about housing prices and pollution."

"One told me globalization is a positive thing because they can learn about human rights and how China doesn't have human rights."

"One of mine posted on her WeChat Moments about how last year they were supposed to hate Korea, the year before Japan, this year America... Which country should they hate next..."

"Taiwan!"

"Tibet!"

"The East Turkestan Republic!"

"Transnistria!"

"Doghouse Diplomacy with Chinese characteristics..."

"Ai-yo, fuck you hairy barbarians, you foreign devils! I'm still optimistic about China's future, once the Red Guard dies off... You'll see..."

"Some of these young people, these students truly are great. They're a big reason why I've stayed."

"They sure do beat the elder generation, for the most part."

"Fucking Red Guard, that 'Lost Generation'. Only Islamic State, Jihadis are worse than those people..."

"The Educated Youth..."

"Even the other Chinese hate that 'Lost Generation.'"

"Just smile a lot. Smile at everyone. Do the Asian thing. Even if they don't smile back. Which they often don't."

"They smile at me when I speak Chinese."

"Really depends where you are, I guess, and who you come across. I've met amazingly kind older people. I once had a random guy stop and drive me back to my apartment, which was an hour away, because I'd gotten off at the wrong bus stop and was haplessly lost."

"Just don't be a dick. Show the respect you want shown to you..."

"Certainly, be careful what you say and how you say it."

"Pretty much any country doesn't appreciate foreigners 'picking quarrels' or being judgmental."

"Definitely don't 'hurt the feelings of the Chinese people'. There's actually a law about that..."

"Oh, they are a sensitive lot. Fragile glass hearts. Don't handle criticism well."

"Face culture..."

"Such delicate creatures, they are."

"The three T's especially will have 'em riled up."

"Roger that, comrade."

"Not so sure about Tiananmen Square... That happened over 30 years ago... Most people these days are too selfish to give a fuck."

"A teacher I know showed video in his class of the 1989 riots, talked about 'Tankman,' since he was leaving the country in a couple days, and his students didn't really care. Most just had their heads bowed to their phones..."

"Taiwan and Tibet, though. Those are airport topics. Discuss those, and you'll find yourself at the airport, stat..."

"One girl I was dating flipped out when I mentioned Taiwan as a country. She actually threatened to have me arrested. Seriously..."

"The South China Sea too... That sure ruffles their feathers... The evening newscasters the other day were all butthurt about a Japanese primary school textbook with a map listing some tiny island as Japan's territory. The anchor was fuming about it..."

"Some of it I understand, the sensitivity, their antipathy to foreigners, especially those being critical... They did get done wrong, Mongols, World War 2, Century of Humiliation, the Opium War..."