The International Schools Review Forum

Well its small compared to Shanghai. Its much more a blue collar city then the cosmopolitan culture of Shanghai. Its takes about 3 hours to get to Shanghai (depending whether you take a bus or train). Its hard not to compare Ningbo to Shanghai. The people are very nice but foreigners arent as common, so you wont see as many of them and as a result the economics of the city arent set up for expats and a lot of imports, so finding things will be harder. Of course costs are cheaper as well. If you were looking for a lot of western availability and conveniences you picked the wrong place. As long as your not brand picky though you should find what you need (The hardest part for me was finding the optical shop, to get contacts, every time I went in he'd check my eyes again).

The humidity makes it seem a lot warmer then it is, in the summer i didnt know if i was sweating so much as just wet from the humidity.

The night life isnt the greatest, mostly pubs and bars. They serve mainly Tsingtao and Tiger, though you can find Carlsberg. your not going to find a big dance club scene, and if thats your thing take the train and lots of money to Shanghai. Eating out is pretty popular, and pretty cheap to do. You will find a lot of really great and authentic chinese food.

Huamao Academy isnt the best school in the city, they have an OK reputation for a 2nd tier school. They have problems like any type of school, mainly competing for a limited pool of enrollment. They know they arent the best, but they want to be (who doesnt) they just dont have the budget. This is the type of school you really want to keep your head down, and be very flexible, there are going to be problems, and somethings will probably seem unfair to you. It will help if you remember that the pot just isnt big enough for everyone to eat all the rice they want.

All in all its a pretty "routine' type of life,

Well there are some western conveniences and they do have import stores, but its not to the degree youd find in Shanghai. You might be real comfortable with it. For instance take shampoo. There will be one "american" brand (herbal essence is big) everything else is going to be a chinese brand. Your not going to find a whole shelf devoted to american brands of shampoo. Its like that for everything, if your not brand specific you should be OK. Then there are just things your not going to find available (Like a collapsible laundry basket). For me in GZ it was a shower rod. I had this full size garden tub in my apartment, but I couldnt find one of those spring loaded shower rods. Found shower curtains at Trust Mart with fish on them, but no shower rods, took months and a lot of looking before i found one.

The other thing that your going to find is an issue (at least for me) was english in beijing, GZ, Shanghai, HK, more people understand english. In small places like Ningbo, its far less common.
Youd think with so many schools and a university their would be more sophistication, and there is at the upper end of the societal spectrum, but those arent the people you interact with and depend on to do things. Youll find an expat bar and be able to have some beers while BSing to one another, but everyone else from the bus drivers to the store clerks to the bank tellers are far less likely to understand you. Thats why you need a day and time during the month to go to the bank, because the foreign accounts clerk/teller is only available at limited times of the week. If you go into Watsons, dont be surprised if the manager follows you around, hes really just there to help you with whatever you need, since its unlikely his other employees would be able to understand you.

Trust Mart has been the Walmart front in China for a LONG time, the just started rebranding the stores as Walmart. It's not the same kind of Walmart Super Center you'd find in the States. It's MUCH smaller and has the same issues I described above. It says Walmart but it's market is native Chinese.

There is only one direct route train to Shanghai, and yes it's an Express train, but it's not like one of the bullet trains you'd find in Europe or Japan.

I just want to post a follow up about Ningbo and the school I'm working in (MEA international) after living/working here for 9 months.

Ningbo is your average Chinese city, it's not as international as Shanghai, but it does have essentially everything for everyone. It has a small, but lively expat community. The bus system here is pretty good (although I mostly travel by taxi since they are so cheap). .-wise, Laowaitan is the main bar district where the expat community head to.

MEA has a supportive and pretty close kit staff since the school isn't large (300 students). It's based in a large Foreign Language School so were quite lucky to utilize many of it's facilities, since where quite small. Don't expect it to be a totally expat school, there is quite a sizable Chinese student population. Since the school was recently accredited as a IB school, this would be great for anyone who is looking to gain any IB experience (PYP and DP).

There was virtually no information about Ningbo or MEA on this form when I was looking around. So I hope this paints a general picture on what Ningbo and MEA international is like.