For internet access, you recommend proxy servers. To this end, TOR software is available for free and provides a constant register of voluntary proxy servers, with little to no input required from the user beyond installation. It provides totally private web surfing - it is just a small program that runs on Windows start-up.

Also, for private emailing, http://www.hushmail.com provides free PGP encryption. Very safe, especially if both sender and receiver use a hushmail address.

These applications, especially, TOR, I find very useful in China! If you want any more information about them, check the websites or you can post a message here.

Thanks for your feedback about the guide. The answer to the main issue you raised is a multifaceted one.

For starters, there are in fact far fewer female teachers in China than men, especially single ones. If our collective survey data are any indication of the actual relative percentage of women to men foreign teachers in China, then it appears that women comprise between 16 to 25% of the total foreign teacher population, based on our teacher satisfaction and reader surveys, respectively. However, of that 16 to 25%, about one-fourth are over the age of 40 and about half of them are single. Restated, and looking at this as an average of the averages, about 20% of all foreign teachers are female and most of them are under the age of 40 and in China together with a significant other. It would be fair to say that single (unattached) female foreign teachers in China are a relatively distinct minority.

We are aware that the guide is silent on the issue of Western women/Chinese men relationships. The reason for this is that this particular type of relationship is statistically rare. We cannot find any empirical research in the PsycInfo or SocAbstract online databases that has specifically studied this relationship type nor can we even find casual references to it in newspaper or magazine articles. Anecdotal evidence suggests that whatever few instances of Western women/Chinese men relationships do exist in China, they are grossly overrepresented by Western-born Chinese women, e.g., an American-born Chinese woman teaching in China who is married to a Chinese male national.

Strictly from a vocational perspective, I would say, as an educated guess, that there are no real significant existential differences across gender on any relevant variable one could identify, although there is strong anecdotal evidence to suggest that single women, at any age, might have an easier time procuring employment than single men.

From a strictly social perspective, it is very difficult to say what differences, for example, a 60-year old single foreign woman in Shanghai would experience that would be phenomenologically different than, say, a woman of the same age in either London or New York City. Having just written this, if you have specific topics in mind in which you anticipate significant differences in experience across gender as a function of country, I’d love to learn about them. I strongly suspect that whatever social differences do exist are probably limited to foreign men only who will have access to far more dating opportunities among (as a rule) less educated, highly Westernized, and/or divorced Chinese women (especially those with a child) who are not competitive for the most desirable and highly sought after Chinese men. A survey study that I am currently conducting of 500 Chinese college students at a high-ranked, first-tier university reveals a surprising indifference to dating and marrying foreign men.

Your job prospects as a 55+ single foreign woman will be no different, certainly no worse, in China than those of a 55+ single foreign man with the same background and credentials. A good place to start would be to take our China English Teacher Self-Assessment test and then to examine the Comprehensive Checklist.

I tell you what, if you do decide to work in China as a foreign English teacher, we’ll pay you for your personal story and if you find yourself in the relatively rare position of dating a Chinese man, we’ll pay you double for it! LOL.

Good luck and let us know what happens.

As an early-retired (55+) former registered nurse with a recent CELTA,who has always enjoyed new experiences and new countries (I have lived and worked in the Middle East in the 1970s, in the Australian outback and in Central European University teaching hospitals) I would love to find some information about life in China relevant to single women who have passed the early 20s partying stage.

Or perhaps I should just get a Chinese job, then contribute that information myself … LOL!

Seriously, what would be my chances of a reasonable job in a reasonable city, given my sex, age and background?

Danny, that was my entire reason for writing those related sections in the manner that I did and I’m very glad to read that you understood those points for precisely how they were intended.

A lot of foreigners, most perhaps, make the understandable mistake of thinking that they are going to be warmly regarded and highly appreciated for traveling up to halfway around the world in order to teach oral English in China. What they often find instead—typically after having just spent almost two days in transit—is a dirty and disheveled apartment that appears as if they were never expected, immediately followed on their second day in China by last minute and unfavorable changes in the teaching schedule in addition to numerous other little surprises (e.g., poor or non-existent Internet, inadequate air conditioning or heat, etc.). The total impact can be extremely demoralizing and psychologically disruptive. I think prospective foreign teachers, if they are sufficiently forewarned about some of these more unpleasant aspects of teaching English in China, can take certain precautions to safeguard against them before agreeing to anything. At the very least, foreign teachers should be mentally prepared for the distinct possibility of facing some very unpleasant realities, especially in the beginning. The guide was written so that not each and every foreign teacher in China would have to learn from his or her own mistakes.

Regarding the “mismanaged life category,” I think that has offended a few people when no offense was ever intended. It is a universal truth that poor and desperate immigrants, with no place else to go, are never warmly received anywhere in the world and are often terribly exploited: China is no exception.

In addition, although I don’t put too fine a point on it in the guide, foreign teachers who are currently in China as a result of a mismanaged life back home fall into two broad categories: Those who have learned from their past mistakes and use China as an opportunity to rebuild their lives—often into ones that are considerably better than what they had known before—and those who obviously didn’t learn a thing from their past mistakes and repeat them in both an exaggerated manner and at an accelerated rate (due to the added stress of living in a very different and psychosocially demanding culture).

In fact, if he ever finishes it (hint Bill), we will soon be publishing a very moving and amazing story about how one such foreign teacher used his “foreign celebrity status” in China to turn his life around in such a profound way that he actually credits China with having saved his life.

So, yes, it can be done but the key, of course, is in not repeating the same mistakes and that’s a lot easier said than done because a change in location rarely, if ever, changes who we are inside. But as Bill’s story will beautifully illustrate, because a profound change in culture (i.e., being thrown into unfamiliar territory) necessarily produces psychological disruption, sometimes that disruption results in the willingness to experiment with different (and far more adaptive) ways of responding to and coping with the world (in a manner similar to one who finally accepts and surrenders to the futility of his former ways and quits fighting with himself. And although he is scared the entire time, he tries new ways of doing things because it is clear to him that, this time, he has no choice unless he wants a repetition of the past). Moving to China to teach oral English with a lot of excess emotional baggage is kind of like throwing a snake phobic patient into a pit of harmless snakes. One of two things will happen: either he will completely lose it and fast, or he’ll be cured for life.

Best of luck to you and I hope everything works out to your advantage! Please let us know how things turn out.