(funky music)
- Hey guys, xin chao, my name is Alex,
I've been living and teaching in Hanoi, Vietnam
for the past eight months and today I'll be taking you
around to show you what my daily life in Hanoi is like.
So it's about 9:00 a.m. right now,
I'm on my rooftop currently about to head to a yoga class
at my normal studio so I'll take you guys along for that
and also open it up for any questions
and leave my Instagram handle, thanks.
Hey guys, so everyone in the city here drives a motorbike
to get around as you probably have already seen,
and it's definitely an easy way
to get from one place to another,
it's pretty cheap,
I pay about $30 a month to pay for my bike
but you need to remember to wear a mask as well
'cos the pollution is pretty bad.
So here is fellow ITA alumni Emma
driving away on her bike, bye!
Okay, so I'll give you a tour of our house,
this is where we park our bikes,
going into the living room,
I live in a shared house with seven other people
that I actually all met through the TEFL course
that we did in Hanoi.
Moving into the kitchen,
the house came fully furnished with everything
that you would need to cook,
utensils, plates and everything.
It was very easy to move in this way
and we actually have an elevator which is very nice.
Okay, so now we're headed into my bedroom.
I have clearly a lot of closet space,
a large western bed and even a great view of Hanoi.
It's also very easy to find things
to decorate your room here.
Okay, so I've just started work for the day.
I work at a Kindergarten from two to four thirty every day,
Monday through Friday,
teaching 18-month-olds to six-year-olds,
and it's really fun, I like it a lot.
So I've just finished teaching at my Kindergarten.
I had an hour long break to have a coffee
before I start my next class at a center
that I teach at Monday through Thursday
for an hour and a half and these are some of my students.
Say hello!
- (all together) Hello!
Hi, this is my amazing TA!
Hello!
Okay, so I just got back from a full day of teaching
and I wanted to answer some questions before I leave again,
mostly about my jobs and how I found them.
So everything you do here can definitely be last minute,
it's very easy to find a job
and very easy to find a place to live,
so the best way to do this is Facebook,
use the Facebook groups which I'll add the names here
but if you join them you can say I wanna live here,
I want this many bedrooms,
I want this price,
and you'll be looking at places the next day.
You can do the same for a job,
so I wanna teach this age,
I wanna sign a contract for six months
or I'm not interested in signing a contract,
I wanna work in the morning,
I wanna work in the evening,
it's all up to you so you kind of decide
and make your schedule around that.
Okay, so like I said, it's pretty easy to find a job,
you definitely can plan on finding one in a matter of days
and it kind of is what you make it
so whether you wanna do Kindergarten to adults,
you wanna work public school, private school,
anything you want,
it's all really available right now and pretty easy to find,
and a common salary is about $20 an hour
so you can plan on that for when you're budgeting.
Okay, so now we're off to try a new Mexican restaurant
that's opening in the old quarter which,
if you've been to Hanoi,
this is definitely where you've stayed before.
Hey guys, so I wanted to end out the day
by answering the rest of your questions.
A lot of people asked,
did I have any experience before this?
And the answer is, no, I got all of my teaching experience
during the TEFL course that I took through ITA here in Hanoi
and, okay, so as far as finding a job,
it definitely is a little bit easier
if you do have a bachelor's degree,
a lot of people will ask to see that,
but in the case that you don't have one,
you can still definitely find a job here
and it is very possible to be teaching without one.
Okay, so as far as driving a motorbike goes,
I did learn how to drive a motorbike in Asia two years ago
so I did learn before I came to Hanoi
but I do think it's very easy to learn if you go
a little bit outside the city and it's definitely useful
and I would recommend it when...
Okay, so as far as choosing a city in Vietnam,
I actually came to Hanoi two years ago
and fell in love with it so I decided to come back here
and there are a lot of teaching jobs available,
but it also is nice to look into other places
like Da Nang where you can live by the beach
or going to a smaller province.
Okay, so to answer this question,
I did come to Hanoi alone,
I did not know anyone but I definitely decided
to do the TEFL course in person in Hanoi to adjust
and make friends before I started teaching.
Lastly I wanted to talk about visas
because it's kind of confusing.
If you want to sign a contract
and you know that before you get here,
you can get a three month visa to adjust to life in Hanoi
and then sign a six month to a year long contract
where you can get a work permit and business visa
through your school with a residency card.
If you decide that you want the freedom to leave
whenever you want and you don't want to sign a contract,
I highly recommend getting the year long visa
so that you don't have to leave every three months
like I've had to do but it really is your choice,
three month visas are always an option
if you're not sure how long you're gonna be here.
Hey guys, so that's it from me.
I hope this was super helpful but if I didn't get
to any of your questions I'll leave my Instagram handle
here below and you can feel free to DM me
with any questions that you have and I'll try
to get back to you as soon as possible so thanks.
(funky music)