- Tatiana Smith spent five years teaching English as a second language in China.
- She lived mostly in Beijing, which was much bigger and busier than her hometown in Illinois.
- Smith said the cost of living is more affordable, but she experienced racism as a black immigrant.
This essay is based on conversations and emails with Tatiana Smith, 36, who spent five years teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) in China. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
For the vast majority of my life, I have lived in Illinois.
I grew up in a very poor environment, so I didn’t believe I would ever see the world. When I was 29, I joined the Peace Corps. I traveled to Liberia, an African country full of people who look just like me, which is cool, but it also affected how I related to the country.
I could join, but I was very curious to know what it would be like to go somewhere where they didn’t think I was a local.
In 2018, I visited China and explored Zhengzhou, Henan province on a tourist visa. In 2019, I officially moved to Beijing on a Z visa, or worker visa. To get it, you need a job that will write you a letter, a physical and a clean background check.
I returned to America in August 2024 to spend time with my family. By then, many of my friends, other foreigners, had also left.
I have noticed great misunderstandings between the US and China since I returned.
China is surprisingly capitalist
The unspoken rule of talking about politics when in China is don’t talk about Chinese politics. This became very clear to me.
I’ve heard a lot about how China’s communist regime is, but in terms of what I experienced, it felt just as, if not more, capitalist than America.
Luxury is big in China. There is a whole part of Beijing where all the luxury shops and expensive places are.
People on a pedestrian shopping street in Beijing. Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
In China, they promote entrepreneurship. There are many opportunities to start a business and the threshold to do so is very low if you are Chinese.
There is also a lot of business turnover. If one business left an area, something else moved in very quickly. In Beijing, if I walked by a closed shop that used to be a grocery store, a month later, it was like a hair salon.
As a teacher, life is more affordable
When I returned to the US and explained my lifestyle to people, there was a real cognitive dissonance about life in China.
For example, a teacher in America does not earn much. As a foreign teacher in China, my starting salary was RMB 28,000, roughly a little over $4,000 a month now.
In China, they have their own version of Uber called DiDi. I can take a DiDi to and from work for less than $10 a day. Taking an American Uber for 15 minutes now costs me $20.
I made enough that I could eat out almost every day. Cooking was something I did so rarely that it was an event and I invited my friends over.
I can finally pay all my bills at home and have money to travel. It was much harder to escape a scarcity mentality in the US.
Chinese food in America is nothing like Chinese food in China
When I had Chinese food in China, it was completely different. In an American Chinese food restaurant, it’s basically sugar-coated American cuisine.
But I would say the biggest differences were in the eating style.
As an American, we eat off our plates, but in many Asian countries, especially China, you have a communal dining situation.
Smith said the dining styles were different in China than what she was used to in the US. Courtesy of Tatiana Smith
It wasn’t like Thanksgiving, where the portion is served on the plate. You order multiple dishes and actively eat from the same plate that everyone else is eating from.
It took some getting used to, but the hot pot, for example, became one of my favorite things. You can make individual hot pots, but group ones were always the most fun.
Racism and discrimination arise differently
For the most part, I felt very welcome in China. But I don’t want to paint China as a glorious, perfect country, because it’s not.
Uighurs and other minority groups are being persecuted in China.
As a black immigrant, I dealt with some racism. Part of Chinese culture is the idea that being white is a sign of wealth and privilege, so the lighter you are, the more beautiful you are.
One of my teachers once said to me, “Oh my god, Black is so ugly. I can’t go dark.” She didn’t know how I would take it.
Smith returned to the US in 2024. Courtesy of Tatiana Smith
It was an intense experience with COVID.
When America began to react with anti-Chinese sentiment, there was strong anti-American sentiment in China in response.
Once, I went to the bank to transfer money, and one of the cashiers threw away my passport and they said: “We will not serve you.”
In the US, people have been killed in racist attacks. Whereas in China, racism is widespread but feels less dangerous.
The pandemic was not scary, but I will say unpleasant. The upside was that the immigrant community bonded. We were more open and tried to make friends because it was necessary for our mental health.
