THIS highly diarised account of Janis Letts's experiences as an English teacher in China puts the reader in the less-than salubrious surrounds of modernising China, where cultural mores (smoking in homes and restaurants and throwing rubbish on the floor)
Places such as KFC and Starbucks provide the only relief from the constancy of having to navigate a foreign country without the local language.
- A Glimpse of the Dragon: Beyond the Great Wall, by Janis Letts. Self-published, rrp $29.95
Letts went to China at the beckoning of her son who runs a language school there. She took her other independent son with her.
They learn to break the rules to survive, lie about qualifications and get around the inbuilt refusal of Chinese students to face conflict.
Connecting to the Internet and having a shower are major challenges.
Letts does not let less-than-kind treatment from her son defeat her.
She finds work at another school, learns to get around by bus, makes good friends of her own and learns how to manage her relationship with her sons and her Chinese in-laws, while enjoying her first grandson.
This is a great testament to a middle-aged woman's adventurousness and independence.
