Guangzhou explores ways to serve expats: free Chinese lessons

With the rapid growth of China's comprehensive national power, an increasing number of foreigners have migrated to the city of Guangzhou. Up to Dec 25, 2017, the foreign nationals residing in the southern Chinese city came from some 220 countries and regions, and the population was 82,714, according to the Guangzhou municipal public security bureau.

To better serve the expats and help them well blend well into the society, Guangzhou has been exploring new management modes for residential, education, career, and legal rights services.

"The business cost in Guangzhou is relatively low, which benefits my home electronics businesses. The life here is also very convenient," said Abraham from Ethiopia. He has been doing business in China for five years and comes to Dengfeng Street in Guangzhou's Yuexiu district around four times every year. However, he is still not good at Chinese language. "I feel it very necessary to learn Chinese. It will help me have better bargains," Abraham said.

International friends enjoy Cantonese-style dim sum in Guangzhou  [Photo/southcn.com]

To help expats like him, a comprehensive service center at Dengfeng Street not only provides language services for temporary accommodation registration, house rentals, legal consulting, life information, foreign currency exchange and many other items, but also holds free-of-charge Chinese language lessons all year long.

As one of the center's most distinctive services, the Chinese language class has been opened since 2012 and attracts more than 5,000 foreign attendees every year. After Jan 2018, the class time became 3:30 pm to 5:00 pm every weekday. The curriculum for each lecture is adapted to the number of attendees and their language level.

Mallion first moved to Dengfeng Street from Mali nine months ago and spoke no Chinese at all. Then she attended the free language class under her friend's recommendation. "I attended the class whenever I was free. Now I have mastered daily dialogues in Chinese," she said, "Whenever I encounter problems, I come to the center to seek help. This place warms my heart like my home."

A Chinese language class for Africans at the comprehensive service center at Dengfeng Street [Photo/southcn.com]

Wang Haige, a staff member of the center and trustworthy friend for many foreigners here, is a postgraduate student at Sun Yat-sen University who can speak Chinese, English, and French. "For those business people who attend the Chinese language class here, writing Chinese is too difficult. They mainly want to learn to speak Chinese and conduct simple daily conversations with Guangzhou locals. And this is our main teaching goal for the language class," said Wang.