Blog Post #9: The Ultimate Bitch Post - First Leap Education
Location: Zhenjiang fuck still
Occupation: Reading articles about coping with anxiety.
Dear the internet,
I’ve kind of reached the stage of acceptance. Yes, my company is kicking me out days before my flight, yes, they’ve decided to pay me practically nothing, yes it is likely I will be financially fucked up until I get a part-time job at home and my student loan is accepted. I am not usually a ‘accept-a-bad-deal’ kind of person but I am emotionally drained. There is no post about Singapore. My company took my passport to cancel my work visa promising it would be five days. It was eleven. My month’s paycheck isn’t enough to cover the flights I missed and none of my employers will respond. But the idea of going into the office and screaming and kicking off AGAIN ultimately leading to tears AGAIN and nothing at all changing AGAIN makes me feel physically ill. So instead I’m going to get my own petty form of revenge in the way of bitching to 12 followers.
If anyone is following this page because they’re considering being a TEFL teacher I have advice: Do it. It’ll be worth it. If you commit and you’re ready to go you’ll grow and mature in more ways than you can imagine. Seeing the world is always a positive thing to do if you’re in a position where you’re able to afford it.
But don’t go to First Leap Education.
I was told I’d be unemployed for three weeks. It was two months. I ended up with a drained bank account and 5000 kuai from my last paycheck to last around 6 weeks till they paid me. A week before I flew out they told me I wasn’t in the city they promised in the interview. I’d be in a smaller city. Since I had no money, I had no choice but to continue on and take the job. I couldn’t chose my own apartment because they’d rented one for me. It was one room with no kitchen. They knew we required cooking facilities so they bought me a microwave. Don’t know what I would be microwaving. I don’t have a freezer and the fridge was broken. In this new city the cost of living was lower so my pay wouldn’t be what they promised in the interview. I’d gone from around 18,000 a month to 10,000 most months. The kicker was they knew from the time they interviewed me that there would be no places in the city they offered. First Leap lie to get what they want. It’s a flawless business model.
NOW HOLD UP HOLD UP moving abroad is a very big deal. You have to be able to roll with the punches, that I believe. It’s never going to be smooth and I knew that from the first time. But I had a job in China. I had a flat, I loved my teaching jobs, I had friends, I was in a major city. I moved company because it made financial sense and I liked the benefits, not because I needed a fresh, new experience. First Leap Education lied through their teeth and stripped all the benefits they promised me.
I loved my co-workers for the most part. But constant competition and telling everyone how to do their job, offering advice no one asked for got irritating. I had six months teaching experience and was treated like a child. I had bigoted idiots screaming in the office about how they hated black people, how free healthcare shouldn’t exist because if he was too disabled to work he would just die, how abortion was the murder of babies but people shouldn’t have kids they can’t afford and expect help, how Moonlight was disgusting, how he found a 14 year old hot and blamed the actress for wearing make up, how arabs were ugly, how there were hardly any gays in the world anyway so why does it matter? a constant spew of inappropriate shit that completely effected how I worked and never. fucking. stopped. I was taken aside and told to ignore him. We had a presentation about how we should avoid politics in the staff-room. The manager spent the whole time looking at me as though I was the problem.
Now for the actual leaving let’s see:
I tried to hand in my notice and they told me I couldn’t. When I told them I had to leave and they had no choice a few weeks later, they cut my final paycheck, made me hand over my passport to cancel my visa, threatened to black list me if I didn’t comply and kept referring back to a contract that they hadn’t even signed. I agreed to hand over my passport if they agreed to pay for my flight if I missed it which they agreed to and then retracted. There isn’t fear like being a foreigner in a city without documentation or a way home. My last two weeks have been, oh, just about hell. But it’s coming to an end. And soon I’m gonna pick myself up, find some fucking work, start up uni and write again. But for now I’m gonna have my little online tantrum because I have no time for a company that fakes degrees to get people on Z visas, hires people on illegal visas, treats their employees as if they’re disposable and drops them if their situation is proving to be too dangerous but will threaten a 21 year old with the law unless she complies in all the unreasonable things they demand.
Sincerely,
White Dreadlocks,
P.S. This is just one experience. Many people have nothing but a positive time with First Leap, I just didn’t. My old company was notorious and genuinely considered worse but I had a great time with them and felt I was listened to. It really is subjective. But if you want my two cents this is it.
Quote of the Day: Home Sweet Parent’s Home For Six More Weeks Dear God. (Try and fit that on a crochet.)
