Conversation with Sam, Part One: Teaching in Peru vs. Teaching in the Middle East, and Old Ladies Abroad

In the last half of VODKABERG, I mention a couple of younger guys referred to as Sam and Chuck. They were both in their early 20s when they arrived; Sam actually came to Vodkaberg after reading about it on my blog, but he wanted to be a TEFL teacher already so I guess that's okay. 

I kind of served as a mentor and degenerate uncle to the two of them. They've both decided to continue down the dusty path of TEFL, and are now seasoned vets of the business.

Sam married a girl he met in Vodkaberg (one of the more succesful examples of marriage from that city, which generally doomed marriages to a two-year duration) and they've been sort of doing the world together, teaching in China for the last three years and now washing ashore in Peru. 

Here's the first part of a conversation I had with Sam recently, about teaching in Peru vs. teaching in the Middle East and the explosion in the number of old women getting into TEFL. Enjoy a couple of battle-weary TEFLers bitching about their jobs. 

Sam

4/1, 11:30pm

We're in Peru now.

English Teacher X

4/1, 11:33pm

How's that going?

Taken any Ayahuasca?

where you working in Peru?

Sam

4/2, 12:00am

(Redacted)

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:00am

i mean, private language school, as usual?

Sam

4/2, 12:01am

Oh, yeah. A shitty one. My 'boss' is just out of college and been teaching for a month.

But they gave us both full time jobs.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:02am

$5 an hour type stuff?

or you get a salary?

Sam

4/2, 12:02am

$5 indeed

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:02am

Five bucks is five bucks.

Sam

4/2, 12:03am

It's funny, though. They give us a higher hourly wage than any of the other teachers I've talked to. We have pretty good CVs, but they did absolutely no checking into them.

Should have said I have a MA

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:03am

Guys make $8000 a month here and ride their bikes to work and then go home and eat ramen noodles.

We're the scruffiest bunch of six-figure-salary earning guys you've ever seen.

Habits of a lifetime die hard

Sam

4/2, 12:04am

Haha

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:04am

and guys are usually paying off debts or giving it to their wives or whatever

Sam

4/2, 12:04am

Yeah, I imagine alimony is a big part of why some of those guys live there in the first place.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:05am

Yeah, that and a few guys now paying off college loan debt

Sam

4/2, 12:05am

Ironically the teachers here are woefully underpaid, overworked, and unvalued. But they're all bright and shiny and stick to the dress code and are super optimistic about being here. It's like traveling back in time.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:07am

They're all young, I'm guessing

or old guys with wives

Sam

4/2, 12:08am

Yeah, except the few old ladies.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:08am

There are a few guys in their 30s here

poor bastards

Sam

4/2, 12:08am

There is a new rash of old lady teachers going around. i think they are finally starting to go retire abroad too.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:08am

Yeah, and from that EAT PRAY LOVE thing

Sam

4/2, 12:08am

exactly

We've met a few here already.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:09am

Crazy Bob said a lot of middle-aged women teach in Abu Dhabi

Sam

4/2, 12:09am

yeah

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:09am

saw a lot of them in Costa Rica

Sam

4/2, 12:09am

More and more everywhere now.

Probably not Siberia though

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:09am

Teaching or volunteering at the orphanage or whatever

Sam

4/2, 12:10am

There are tons of 'volunteer' people here. At orphanages but other worse places to. We met a girl who is paying money to volunteer at a weaving collective.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:10am

Why I recommend you guys go the Middle East and make yourselves a stake now, get the money while the getting is good. Too many teachers in the world

Sam

4/2, 12:10am

We wanted to go to at least one more interesting place before we can't.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:10am

you get so much vacation time in the middle east, you can go anywhere you want

Sam

4/2, 12:10am

I guess that's true

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:11am

I'm seeing more people here who changed to teaching TEFL when their jobs disappeared in other fields

journalists, there are several of those here, because there’s no more work for journalists

Sam

4/2, 12:11am

Woah

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:11am

so they became English teachers to pay for their kids’ college or mortgages or whatever

Sam

4/2, 12:12am

But there still must be tons of jobs. We met a polish girl who got a job Kuwait for tons of money, not awesome english, no specific qualifications

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:12am

oh yeah, demographically it's a mess here

something like 75 percent of the population is under 30

they need jobs, English, etc.

Sam

4/2, 12:12am

Most of the people Chuck worked with in the Emirates weren't native speakers.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:12am

Yeah, we got Egyptians, Pakistanis, Jordanians, Philipinos

One option for the future is getting certified to teach health and safety type stuff

first aid and CPR guys make good money here

Sam

4/2, 12:13am

Really? Never thought of that. That's a great idea.

Well, we gotta go to our teacher orientation now. We haven't actually started. We start tomorrow.

University kids. One of the worst types of students really.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:14am

Not worse than my bunch

I got ANGRY university age guys

Sam

4/2, 12:15am

No one will ever be worse than the semi retarded village girls we taught at the college in China.

They can't learn.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:15am

My guys are amazingly bright when it comes to avoiding work and cheating

they have the most elaborate excuses for everything, it's amazing

Sam

4/2, 12:15am

I'm looking forward to teaching Spanish speaker actually. Maybe they can actually learn some freaking english.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:16am

Bueno suerte

Sam

4/2, 12:16am

Honestly the most fun students I've had are the 35-50 year old russian housewives. Not the young hot ones, but the older ones.

They like me more for some reason.

anyway, talk to you later.

English Teacher X

4/2, 12:17am

Ciao