10. Lesson one

In the early days of this millennium, I graduated university in England and set out for a new life in China. Here, I share the quiet stories of my journey, a chronical of discovery and displacement, woven into the fabric of a land vast and unfathomable.

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I arrived at the classroom with the kind of nervousness that had little to do with what I was supposed to teach. No materials had been provided - nothing in the way of a curriculum or even guidelines for what was expected. My training in Beijing had been more about navigating the city and learning the basics of Chinese etiquette than about the art of teaching. I was here for one simple reason: to be a foreigner, an English speaker, a living testament to the international nature of the college. I was, for all intents and purposes, a prop. A "foreign expert," pointed to as proof of the college's global reach.

A small courtyard garden I passed through to get to the teaching building (pictured on the right)

But standing in front of a classroom full of young women, I suddenly felt anything but an expert.

The room was basic, almost to the point of being crude. The whiteboard was streaked with old marks, the chalk dust settling in the corners. The windows were old and cracked in places. On the secondary blackboard, some faded Chinese murals and slogans bled into the background, lending the room a surreal, almost ghostly quality. The place felt like a relic from another time, and yet it was very much alive with the weight of expectation.

And then there were the students. I soon realised that they were not the rowdy, diverse group I had imagined, but a striking assembly of Chinese girls, all improbably glamorous, as though they had just stepped out of an airline catalogue. Their faces were radiant with youth, their eyes eager with curiosity, as if they were waiting for something to happen. Their ages ranged from 18 to 21, and they were here to train as cabin crew for one of China’s many airlines.

As I stood at the front of the classroom, chalk in hand, I suddenly felt out of place. I myself was just 21, freshly out of university, and here I was - expected to teach, with no idea how to begin. They sat in neat rows, expectantly. I stood there for what felt like an eternity, the silence between us filling with the weight of unspoken questions.

Students from my first English class, pictured later in the year after securing jobs with one of China’s international airlines.

What was I supposed to do? Where was the plan? How was I supposed to start?

I tried to steady myself, but the sweat was already gathering at my temples. My heart was racing, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that everyone in the room knew that I didn’t belong there. The pressure of the moment was overwhelming. It felt as though the room itself was watching me, waiting for me to speak.

Finally, I broke the silence.

I introduced myself, clinging to the familiar comfort of my own name, speaking in simple phrases, as though to reassure myself as much as them. I smiled - nervously, perhaps too nervously - but they smiled back, some more genuinely than others. The ice was broken, if only a little.

Then I fumbled into my first lesson. There were no lesson plans to fall back on, no structure to lean into, so I did what I could: simple phrases, the kind of things these young women would need in their training as cabin crew. "Good morning," I said, repeating it a few times, as if hoping it would sink in. "How are you?" They repeated the phrases after me, some with more confidence than others. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

At one point, I asked them to introduce themselves, to practise saying their names and where they were from. It felt clumsy at first, watching them struggle with the English sounds, their accents unfamiliar to me. I was used to my own way of speaking, the clipped rhythm of the English language, but their voices rang out with a different musicality, their consonants softer, vowels rounder. It was beautiful, in its own way, and I wondered how they felt about English, whether it felt as foreign to them as Chinese did to me.

It was a strange dynamic: here I was, the Englishman, and yet I knew so little about them. These students, many of whom had never met a foreigner before, were curious, but not in the way I had imagined. They asked me - through words crafted on electronic dictionaries - questions about England, about my life there. What was London like? What did I eat? Was it true that English people were always polite?

I answered their questions, but I found myself as intrigued by them as they were by me. They wanted to know about the UK, not just from a textbook, but from someone who had lived there. It struck me how little they knew of my world, and how much I had yet to understand about theirs.

The lesson felt like a whirlwind. Every second moved faster than I could process. I wrote more on the board, corrected accents, encouraged questions. The classroom seemed to blur around me as I switched from one phrase to the next, from one question to another, all the while trying to project authority I didn’t feel.

By the time the bell rang, signalling the end of the class, I was exhausted. The students filed out, chatting among themselves in rapid Chinese, their voices a hum in the air. I stood there for a moment, unsure whether to feel relieved or disappointed. The lesson had been nothing spectacular. But somehow, I had made it through.

I wiped my brow, trying to calm the pounding in my chest. The room, once so intimidating, now seemed oddly quiet, almost empty. I thought back to the students - these young women, so poised, so eager. I had, in some small way, given them a glimpse into my world. But in return, they had given me something far greater: a lesson in patience, in curiosity, in the way people can come together across vast cultural divides.

I wasn’t sure how I had done. But I knew that I had learnt something. This was the beginning of something new, something unpredictable. And I had made it through, at least for today.

A Moment of Gratitude

If the words of Ill Grandeur have resonated with you, consider buying me a cup of tea. In China, tea is more than just a drink—it is a symbol of connection, warmth, and reflection. A one-off tea is a way of sharing in the journey, supporting the story, and keeping the spirit of discovery alive. Every cup helps bring the next chapter to life.