In his latest Sinosplice post, John wonders whether the dread 7-day workweek will become a thing of the past as China adjusts its holiday schedule.
I arrived in Lianyungang on a Friday evening right before the October holiday. When my colleagues greeted me at the door, they said that while I didn’t have to take over my classes until after the break, I should still come and observe their lessons over the weekend.
“But, isn’t tomorrow Saturday?” I asked.
They murmured to one another and informed me that, while the next day was indeed Saturday, Chinese schools “make up” days lost to the holiday on the preceding (and occasionally succeeding) weekends. This means that your five-day holiday is bookended by seven-day workweeks, resulting in an odd wish that the holiday hadn’t occurred at all.
Of all the little Chinese scheduling intricacies foreigners learn to deal with, the seven-day workweek is easily the worst. A colleague of mine in Fuzhou once directed a spirited tirade against our Chinese 外办, as if a tiny office in Fuzhou Senior Middle School were responsible for the national calendar. Typically, I scheduled two relaxed days over the weekend before a holiday, including a classic teacher’s cop-out of screening a DVD.
Last year, those who make these decisions in China decided to phase out the two weekly holidays in May and October and scatter days off throughout the year, perhaps in an effort to avoid tourist crunches that occur when a billion people hit the road at the same time. This year, our May holiday was reduced to three days. According to John, this will be the last week-long October holiday. He’s for it. So am I.
Five-day holidays are fine, but the infuriating seven-day workweeks make them almost worth not having at all. Plus, there’s something wonderful about four-day workweeks, particularly when Mondays are off….long weekends followed by short weeks are great.
In any case, I shouldn’t be complaining. Because my boss is English, not Chinese, I get nine days off for the holidays. Next week, I’ll be off on a five-day bicycling trip around southern Yunnan, from which photos and text will follow. Life is good.
Comments 3
Ah, you have it good.
I remember when I taught in Hangzhou, I would do exactly what you mention: show movies on those weekend class days. (If we have to have class on a weekend, we’re sure as hell not going to learn, dammit!)
Occasionally I got away with canceling those classes by claiming they would be made up.
What always made it so difficult was that the “make-up” days on the weekend only apply to some days’ classes, and not others, so when you give the same subject to different classes on different days, you inevitably end up with an imbalance in total days of class for the semester.
Let’s just hope the whole thing is ending soon.
Posted 26 Sep 2008 at 10:57 am ¶Not only is it a 7 day work week, but when you piece it all together, it is working 13 days straight. Now as an English teacher, what with your 3 hour workdays and whatnot, this really isn’t too tough. But I’d imagine as a regular office worker or say a coal miner, it has to really drag. My biggest complaint was simply that the system was just too damn confusing. I remember they never used to announce the “official” dates of the holiday, until a few days before. Even though the announcement was easily anticipated, between the time it came out and the time the holiday started, there was always a considerable amount of confusion over which days were to be worked and which weren’t…Wouldn’t it just be easier to give everybody a full week off, and forget about the makeup days?
Posted 26 Sep 2008 at 10:54 pm ¶Wow, Ben. A three hour workday? I need to find out what school you work (or worked) for.
Today usually is a day when I show movies or play crazy games, but I still hate showing up at school. What makes it worse is that since I’m the only foreigner in my elementary school, I’m the only one who feels this way. Nobody else seems to care that they’re coming to school on a Saturday, and they certainly don’t have any sympathy for me!
By the way, a 5-day bicycle tour? Sweet!
Posted 27 Sep 2008 at 1:14 pm ¶Trackbacks & Pingbacks 1
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