Moving in March to Sao Paulo

Hi Nicky,

My name is James, I am a Canadian and I've been living in Brazil for ten years now. I currently live in São Paulo and have been teaching English for 24 years. I am married to a young Brazilian woman and we have a 4 1/2 year old son. If you need any assistance once you get to São Paulo you can message me. I guess you already know that you WON'T get rich teaching here, teachers are notoriously underpaid. However, if you work for a school and start recruiting your own private students who will pay better you should be OK. Check out what other teachers are charging for private and "in-company" classes and charge in the same range. Brazilians are a funny lot, they have the attitude that if you charge less than other teachers you probably aren't a very good teacher. Strange that while they all love discounts they seem not to understand undercutting the prices of the competition. LOL

Regards,
William James Woodward - Brazil Animator, Expat-blog

Hi James,

Thank you for your reply. I will be teaching at a Callan Method school. Do you know anything about this?

Luckily accommodation is included in my package. I have heard that this is quite rare for teaching jobs in Brazil?  I only have one day off a week though. Is this normal for TEFL jobs in Brazil?

On my day off I hope to see as much of Brazil as possible. When I lived in Japan I made the most of my time sightseeing and trekking etc. Do you have any suggestions for my one day off a week?

Anyway, it is snowing here at the moment so I am looking forward to getting some sun! As pretty as the snow is I will never get used to the freezing cold!

Hi Nicky,

Since working as a teacher on a work contract, as opposed to a service provider contract, is rather rare and your accommodations are included in the package the six day work week doesn't surprise me. However, generally Saturday is only a half day in most schools. You may want to check this out with Callan School. I would expect that you will have some free periods during the weekdays as well. It is most common for students to take classes early morning, lunch time and evening. You will probably find yourself working three or four classes a day this way. I doubt that they will overwork you. While I don't personally know much about the school, I have not heard any complaints. If anything was amiss there would be some floating around, so that is a good sign.

As far as having only a day or at most a day and a half off each week you will really be limited to sightseeing in the Greater São Paulo area. While you could fly to some really wonderful destinations from here in about 1 1/2 to 3 hours domestic airfares are astronomical. Perhaps you could get some kind of promotional price at www.decolar.com (by booking well in advance)on a flight leaving São Paulo (Congonhas) on a Saturday afternoon and returning Sunday evening. It wouldn't be something you'd want to do every weekend, but I'm sure that since you won't be paying for accommodations you could afford to do something like that once every couple of months.

If you haven't already done so, please check out my posts "A Gringo's Survival Guide to Brazil" and "The High Cost of Living in São Paulo - How to Economize", you will find them quite helpful.

Cheers,
William James Woodward - Brazil Animator, Expat-blog

Hey Nicky!

I have just signed to join a trekking group in Sao Paulo. Our first meeting is this month, but then the idea is to participate of several trekking meetings during the year.

Let me know if you are interested.

Cheers.

Hiya,

Thanks for your reply. I love trekking so would love to join the group when I get to Sao Paulo. I went to Madeira in September which is famous for trekking and did some beautiful treks out there. How do I go about joining?

Are you teaching in Sao Paulo? Do you like it over there? 

Nicky

Hey Nicky,


We are just a group that have met through a website for trekking lovers. Our first meeting is on the 25th of February, it will be the first time that we will meet in-person.

The plan is to form teams to participate the competitions in Sao Paulo during the year. But our mainly objective is to make friends doing something we like: trekking, and enjoy the beautiful nature.

When do you arrive in SP? Because there will be another meeting in the beginning March.

Anyways, keep in touch and i can give more info to you.

This is my personal email: [email protected]

Cheers.

Hiya,

I am arriving on 22 March.Thanks for your email address.  I will definitely get in touch when I am there. My email address is [email protected]. I look forward to meeting you!

Nicky

Hi Nicky

Good on you for getting accommodation and yes.. most schools only teach half the day on Saturdays. I too teach at a callan school and we usually only have classes from 2 pm onwards and it goes on till about 9pm. So you most probably will have most of your mornings off to take on private students or do in company classes.


Don't be too nervous, Brazil is a beautiful country and in SP you'll find lots of activities to fill your time. There are a couple of meet ups among english speakers as well about twice a month at various places around the city, so that will be a great activity to fill on your weekends.

Good luck and keep in touch.. we could meet up once you arrive..

Cheers

Hi Gwen

Great to hear from you. I will keep in touch and look forward to meeting you soon!

Nicky

Hi nicky!

Let me know when you arrive, I am also relalatibvly new to SP.

It's sways great to have a new friend!

Send me a note with your email so we can touch base.

Nicole

Hi Nicole,

Sounds like a good plan! My email address is [email protected]. I will be in touch soon...Nicky

Hi nicky!

I hope u will enjoy Brazil with ur all talents ... So far I know that ... Because my wife is in Sao Paulo ...

U should develop Portuguese language , no choice

Thanks for your reply. I will be having Portuguse lessons as soon as I arrive. I  am not very good at learning new languages but hope to learn enough to get by!

Hi Nicky!! Good choice you will definitely love Brazil it's such a beautiful country, SP is quite a cosmopolitan place so you find people from all over the world even a lot of British , I am an English teacher as well, I've been working here since I came back from New Zealand. So if you want to know anything about SP please let me know it would be nice to chat with you. My email is [email protected]

Daniel