Shenmue Dojo

wdrpgwd wrote: This is also an investment.

My brother and I are 2nd in command at this school and we are getting larger every year. The owner is getting older and we plan to take over the school full time. We would love to design it around Shenmue and have members of the Dojo come teach English and live our their dreams of living in Guilin.

We have many connections here and a degree is not required for our school. Some basic Chinese is required though. You don't need a teaching Visa either. A basic passport is all you need but you have to leave within 90 days.

We are still in the planning stage for how we are going to do this.

wdrpgwd wrote: I feel guilty now, Peter...

I feel like I need to explain who I am now.. I'm not a casual Shenmue fan. My brother and I are 35. We are identical twins and we help lead a school just outside Guilin in Yangshou where we teach poor kids English in helping them get scholarships to achieve better education.

This was inspired by Shenmue. My Avatar is of me laying on a raft on the Lijiang river just outside Guilin.

I've been there from the beginning like most of you. This will be a great experience in my life that I will treasure until I die.

EDIT:

You can find us on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/VolunteerEnglishTeacher?fref=ts


A lot of the pictures are of my brother and I.

Here is me with the kids.

robatfreedom wrote:

wdrpgwd wrote: This is also an investment.

My brother and I are 2nd in command at this school and we are getting larger every year. The owner is getting older and we plan to take over the school full time. We would love to design it around Shenmue and have members of the Dojo come teach English and live our their dreams of living in Guilin.

We have many connections here and a degree is not required for our school. Some basic Chinese is required though. You don't need a teaching Visa either. A basic passport is all you need but you have to leave within 90 days.

We are still in the planning stage for how we are going to do this.

hey man - just want to say this is absolutely amazing.
I was in Yangshou last year - If I had known I defo would have popped by!
My wife is a languages teacher who is learning mandarin (Ihowever have been studying japanese!).

Guilin, and the whole area around the Li river, was a beutiful place and would love to go back for more reasons than just Shenmue.

I am really happy that you got the opportunity to meet Suzuki-san and the others - plus that you were able to contribute to the campaign! Well done!

Erevador wrote: This thread was just retweeted by Yu Suzuki!

LanDC wrote:

sand4fish wrote: I can't believe all 3 of the people who bought dinner with Yu Suzuki belong to this place. This forum is definitely the best Shenmue Forum out there!

Ken Sugimori isn't here, as far as I know. He's the artist for Pokemon. He posted on his Twitter that he got it.

https://twitter.com/SUPER_32X/status/610645120526848000

Yokosuka Martian wrote: So how much money do you think would be necessary to do such a thing?

wdrpgwd wrote: We have been getting some backlash in China. Somebody here has published my post and it got sent to China and in the translation it was written that we were implying that local kids in Yangshuo are poor. We teach children from all over China and not all of them are impoverished. Yangshuo is not a poor city and the kids in the picture are part of a summer program from bigger cities.

We are in the middle of damage control now. Many of the locals are happy about the exposure. The school has received tremendous attention and we hope it will mean growth for everyone. I'm hoping this gets corrected soon. We are doing a couple interviews with news outlets in the coming days.

Who new one response on a message board could turn into this.

Yokosuka Martian wrote: So how much money do you think would be necessary to do such a thing?

It's not expensive. Your biggest cost will be getting here.

Here is the cost comparison for Chicago vs. Guangzhou

http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?country1=United+States&country2=China&city1=Chicago%2C+IL&city2=Guangzhou

Guangzhou is more expensive than Guilin but you can see how far your money goes there. It's very affordable.