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Guangzhou expats provided with better services

 

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“Z-ou, D-ao.” In a spacious, bright classroom, a teacher is teaching pinyin, Chinese’s phonetic alphabet, to a class of expats living in the city.

“My Chinese has improved a lot since studying here.” Moussa from Guinea is a businessman engaged in large-scale purchases. After learning Chinese for two years at the school on Dengfeng Street, of Guangzhou’s Yuexiu District, he can now speak quite fluently, confidently and with quite standard pronunciation.

In recent years, China’s standing on the world stage has continuously improved. Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong and one of China’s economic powerhouses, has been seeing a boom in the number of expats from all over the world choosing to settle here. Statistics from the Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau show that as of December 25, 2017, the number of expats living in Guangzhou reached 82,714; a steadily increasing trend.

In order to cater to the actual needs of expats, Guangzhou has actively explored new modes of management and services.

A staff of the Foreign Affairs Service Center in Dengfeng Community is teaching Chinese to expats(photoed by Wenxiang Liang)

 

Teaching Chinese for free

 

“The relatively low business costs in Guangzhou make it very convenient for me to sell home appliances.” Abraham from Ethiopia likens himself to a “migrant bird”, meaning he travels to Guangzhou to do appliance trades about 4 times a year. This year marks the fifth year since he first came to China, but he worries that his Chinese is still not fluent. “I think studying Chinese is very necessary because it helps me to do business.”

 

In fact, in Guangzhou there are many expats like Abraham who are eager to study Chinese. The Chinese Learning School, one of the most distinctive services offered by the Foreign Affairs Service Center of Dengfeng Community, has been widely welcomed by expats in Guangzhou.

 

Founded in 2012, it receives over 5,000 people every year. From January 2018, its opening hours have been adjusted to 3:30-5:00 pm Monday to Friday. The courses will be set up on the basis of student numbers and their requirements based on ability in the language.

 

Nine months ago, when Mallion had just arrived to the Dengfeng Street community from Mali, she knew nothing about Chinese language or culture. Later, through the introduction of her friends, she came to study at the Chinese Learning School. “I attend class if I have time, and now I can master a daily conversation.” she said, “I’ll come here for help if I have any problems. It’s as warm as my home.”

 

Wang Haige, a postgraduate student at Sun Yat-sen University, is a project manager at the Foreign Affairs Service Center in Dengfeng Community. Having mastered English, French and Mandarin, he is known by expats as person they can communicate with and trust.

 

According to Wang, one of the goals of the Chinese Learning School was to make sure expats can have simple Chinese conversations with local residents in Guangzhou. “For businessmen who come here to study Chinese, their wishes are to master daily communication but have less interest in writing.” Wang said.


Expats enjoying 'dim sum' in a traditional teahouse in Guangzhou(photoed by Ziwang Zhang)

 

Door-to-door service

 

At the Community Office of Assistance for People Coming from Outside Mainland China in Shipai Street, Tianhe District of Guangzhou, a publicity board with a huge QR code immediately grabs your eye. After scanning the code, expats can enjoy personalised one-on-one service.

 

Jura from South Korea is currently studying at South China Normal University’s International Cultural College. Three and a half years ago, she came to Guangzhou to learn Chinese. Over the years, she has been renting a house with her friends outside the school. “Every time I return to China, I need to register my residence. If I’m occupied with other things, I can still update the registration information as long as I submit the entry stamp by WeChat.” Jura said.

 

Shipai Street attracts many expats to live, work and trade here. The annual back-to-school season is the busiest time for the expat management & services station. As Jinan and South China Normal Universities are both located on this street, all international students from these two universities are required to register here. In addition, as one of the biggest expat management service stations in Guangzhou, more than 3000 foreign permanent residents have registered here. Apart from overseas students, most expats stated that they came to Guangzhou for business or work. They work during the day, and then go back home at night, so there is little chance for them to know about the community they live in. Therefore, the station has conducted activities on the theme of “building a harmonious community”, in which station staff visit these expats and chat with them, so that a better relationship will be developed.


Professional legal consulting service

What if you have a contract dispute when renting a house? How to protect your rights and interests when having problems with your loans? If expats encounter such problems, they might be very helpless.

Guy awarded the pennant which read “For solving problems for foreigners. For demonstrating great power of China” to Liede police station

Guy, from Venezuela, now lives on Liede Street - the heart of Zhujiang New Town. He was drawn into a loan dispute before, and his family suffered harassment for a long time. Fortunately, with the help of the Community Office of Foreigners Assistance Liede Street, Guy received the assistance of a professional lawyer, Xie Qingyu.

After graduating from Ji’nan University as a law major, Xie furthered her studies in the UK. During her internship at a UK law firm, Xie witnessed the helplessness of Chinese people living in the UK when facing legal disputes, either because of poor economic conditions or perhaps lack of legal knowledge. After returning to Guangzhou, she decided to do everything she can to help foreigners solve their legal problems. “I hope that foreigners in China can feel tcare and support from the Chinese government” she said.

By chance, Xie reached a agreement with the Community Office of Foreigner Assistance Liede Street to provide foreigners with some simple legal advice free of charge. If there are foreigners who need help, the staff there will give them Xie’s number.

Since November 2015, Xie Qingyu has handled about 30 legal cases involving civil and commercial case litigation, criminal defense, and equity purchases, among which lease disputes are the most common ones. Xie is well known among the foreign communities living in Guangzhou, and now more and more expats turn to her for help.

Xie said that she is willing to make more contributions to help expats have a better understanding of Chinese law and regulations. In this way, expats would tend to find themselves to be more compliant with laws and regulations.


Calling for more participation

As China takes its place in the spotlight, Guangzhou has been promoting the construction of the “three centers and one system” (namely, international shipping center, international logistics center, international trade center, and modern financial service system). Economic development has led to the flow of population, and the number of expats residing in Guangzhou has been steadily increasing.

With this in mind, how to do a better job of managing and serving expats is a major issue facing central cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

Zou Bo, a researcher at the Management Institute of the Academy of Social Sciences, said that in recent years, Guangzhou has explored many ways of strengthening the management of foreigners and achieved positive results, but that there is room for improvement.

Zou suggested that to cope with the needs of national and regional development and the actual needs of foreign residents, it is necessary for Guangzhou’s government to formulate rules and regulations concerning the management of services for foreigners, and to specify the work of each relevant department. At the same time, social forces should be better mobilized to attract social organizations to participate in the provision of standardized and professional service, in order to promote better social governance.

Author | Liangguang Hu,Xiaoyue Wang,Yichong Zhong,Wenhui Tan,Ziduo Yang

Translator | Xinyi Tao, Tian Tian

Editor | Simon Haywood, Keane

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