Wednesday 4th September
Bank account was urgently needed as payday was only a day away. With warnings of queues and delays at the bank, three of us headed down early during free lessons. You take a ticket and wait, and wait, for your number to turn up. They will speak English, we were told, they mostly do not. The first thing you are given, when asking to open an account, are some forms to fill in, entirely in Chinese. Fortunately a couple of the staff not behind the desks could speak a little and helped explain what was needed, names and addresses mostly. The line for your address was barely a centimetre long, how on earth are you to write your address in there?! After some discussion, we gave the school’s address and they filled it in with Chinese characters which take up a lot less space. That explained the impossibility of the form.
My number was called up first of the three of us and after this it was fairly straightforward. Even though the teller spoke no English it seemed a routine job, I signed some more forms, paid up the sum of 1 yuan, a bank card soon appeared, a lot of pondering my passport seemed to take place as they deciphered what to enter on their database, more photocopying of my documents took place... and then suddenly I was done. Proud owner of a Chinese bank account, card in hand and 1 yuan in the bank. As soon as I stood up the teller pulled down his blind, closed the desk and went to lunch, much to the dismay of my colleagues. I also went for lunch, and left them to it - ha!
Pizza today, bit expensive really compared to other places locally. Some of the pizzas here are very thing, not like anything I’ve had in the UK but good for a midday meal when you’ve still lessons to teach in the afternoon.
DnD again in the evening, what a hard game. GM really pushing us with some big bad guys to have to fight out way through. I don’t use the lifts in my own building, as I live on the 1st floor, but I was amused by all the signs on the doors of the lifts, especially this one - keep you hands to yourself!
Thursday 5th September
Payday had arrived, but there was no way to know if the money had even gone into my account. A bit of a concern given that I had only given finance my bank details the previous afternoon. For now it was a mystery. Otherwise the day was a quiet one, four lessons kept me busy, a bit of a fight with the photocopier made it pretty standard.
Friday 6th September
Another busy day, three lessons filled up the morning, but the short lunch could be extended as the period after lunch was free. First stop was the bank, and hurrah, I had been paid. I’m quite relieved that is sorted, and I then sorted out linking the account to WeChat, which is used to pay for everything here, taxis, food, shopping, train tickets, general money transfers, the lot. WeChat is like WhatsApp and PayPal combined. Without WeChat fully set up, you are stuffed for living in China. Paying with cash just isn’t convenient quite often, some taxis don’t carry cash, and a lot of shops treat 100rmb notes with suspicion, they usually accept them... but if they are a bit battered or raise any concern they may not, making it difficult to shift damaged banknotes of high denomination. I would suggest not accepting them in the first place if it can be helped.
Recommended a burger place by a colleague. A meal deal of burger, chips and a big coke was 21rmb - £2.40! Just what I needed to pick me up after three 70 minute lessons all morning.
End of a second week of school, routine is seems established now.
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