What would you do with a million dollars?

My student asked me this question yesterday during our tutoring session.

My answer: Give my parents a vacation to anywhere they want to go. Then save up some of it. And donate some of it to charity. A charity in Malaysia, one that has to do with disabilities.

And he started explaining to me about a new tv show in China where guys are provided a selection of girls on the show. The show then features parts of each guy's life. Then girls will choose the guys they are most interested to get to know. And the guy will then choose from the girls interested in him who he would want to go on a date with. Something along those lines. When the guy is making his choice of girl, he can choose to ask the girls two questions and can choose an aspect of their life that he would like to see on video. Sounds like some lame ass show that just makes girls look like pretty cakes that you pick out at the bakery right? Seems like it kinda is.

Then my student proceeded to tell me about how a white American Ivy-League-grad guy appeared on the show and was not well-received by the Chinese audience. Apparently he made weird faces at the camera looking like he was trying to be funny, but was actually compensating for his nervousness. The question he asked the two girls who were interested in him was: "What would you do with a million dollars?" One girl said "I would take my parents on a vacation", and the other said "I would not want my life to change, even though I have the money". He didn't choose either of the girls. He said that he did not like either of their answers because with a million dollars a person has the potential of doing something big to change the community/society. You could do so much good with a million dollars and neither of them wanted to. He mentioned a famous Chinese saying "为人民服务" meaning "Serve the People". And he really believed that with a million dollars a person could do just that.

Then he talked about how this show gained so many viewers because it is unlike any other show in China. It is about being open, and being true to yourself and your personality. Girls who are only looking for rich guys, say it upfront on the show that certain guys are just not appealing because they are not rich. Apparently, one girl even said "I'd rather be sad and cry in a BMW, then to be happy with a guy that doesn't have a BMW". I asked my student if he usually judges a girl by their looks first.. and he said there was a girl on the show who wasn't very attractive and kinda chubby. But she turned out to be so smart and clever that he thought she was more attractive than the other girls. 

Then my student and I got to discussing the differences between Asian thinking and American thinking. Americans tend to be more conscious about how they are living their life. Are they happy? Are they enjoying their life? The Asian way on the other hand is, 'Am I earning enough to support my family?' 'I have to keep working hard and earn more money for the future'. Thing is, no one knows what the future holds. What if you work so hard, and then you lose all the money you earned one day because of a wrong investment choice or something? I guess working hard and knowing that you are accumulating something material makes us feel more secure about our unknown future. Americans are also very courteous. And I think I have learned some of that since being here. I now hold doors open for people when entering a building, and do it in Malaysia when I go back too. People are just not used to 'nice gestures' like that back home. Also, in America, people are more honest, and there is more trust that others will follow the rules. But back home, things are different. You can't trust everyone to follow the rules. If one person doesn't follow, others start breaking them too and it just becomes a whole mess of a cycle. Because of this American honesty, I've become more of a naive straightforward person, trusting that everyone would do what is right, and not just do things based on their own wants and needs. In America, people want to serve their communities, and want to do what is best for not only themselves but also others. Back in Malaysia, there are only a handful of people like that who do good amongst the shadows, unrecognized by others.

Such an insightful conversation. I love chatting with my students about their interests and I love getting to know them better. I enjoy helping them work through their kinks with their English and that they trust me enough to not be afraid to make mistakes. I watch other tutors yawn not just once, but multiple times a session, and look so bored while talking to their students that I just feel so bad for the studenst. What do they think of their tutor? How do they feel about their English abilities after talking to someone who just constantly yawns and pushes them to learn about things they are not even familiar with, or even interested in, like American health insurance. International students don't really give a shit about America's Medicare and Medicaid because we don't reap any benefits from it. Reading out a newspaper article about Medicare and Medicaid changes and how they will benefit the public is not just boring, but irrelevant to them. To me even, for that matter. Plus, the article was not just crazy long, but also full of statistics. And after the student showed he did not understand, the tutor just kept pushing him and blaming him for not listening closely to what the article was about.

Why choose to be a tutor when you don't even really care about your students, their improvement and getting to know them better?