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Ask Slashdot: Find a Job In China For Non-native Speaker?
An anonymous reader writes "My fiancée has recently been accepted into a Chinese university into their Ph.D. program, and I've been looking at jobs in China (specifically the Beijing area) and not having any success. I'm a developer with 8 years of experience (java), mostly on the server side, so I'm not lacking in the general experience, but the problem is I don't speak Mandarin or Cantonese. I am a native English speaker from Canada though. The only jobs I've had any responses from were teaching positions for simple English which isn't exactly my first choice. Has anyone had any experience or success as a programmer finding a job in China, without being able to speak the native language? Any websites I should be focusing on?"
Maybe instead of trying to find a coding job, find a job along the lines of "conversational english for IT type people"...
Help your fellow coders bring up their communication skills...
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
Hard to claim racism when no race is mentioned in the question or the answer, only language, though I do see where you're coming from. That said, the GP has a point, even if it was not made in the most politically correct manner. The fact is, in any country, if you don't speak the language, you're going to have very limited options. Generally those options are going to consist of jobs that don't require much in the way of communication, as in more manual labor, less office work. This isn't a product of racism, it's a product of "you can't get a job that requires communication if you can't communicate with the people you'll be working with".
Just tell your fiancé not to do it. I am telling you this from experience. My wife and I held getting married because she wanted to finish her studies she went through the whole thing till she got the PHD and I followed her around just like you are planning to do which also changed my plans. Education expenses were none since she made a nice income while doing research for the PhD.
The problem was after she finished. My wife became hormonal and wanted to have kids, and pop up 2. Now all she wants to be is a mom a stay at home mom. And I am not the only one with the same situation. I got about a dozen friends with wifes with expensive education just going to waste because they want to be a house wife.
Also you do not want to live in Beijing the air quality there is horrible.