Hey, hello, Linda here from ITTT. How are you doing today? Thank you so much for joining today's live session. As you know, it is the first Friday of the new month. It is July 1st. And every first Friday of the month, we are doing a casual Q&A session here at ITTT. We are live on Facebook and on YouTube at the same time. So that's very exciting. And today's your opportunity to ask me any question about TEFL, TESOL, teaching English abroad or online, or whatever you want to know. And I'll be here to answer them. And I hope that you can see me and you can hear me clearly. If you do, please just leave a comment in the comment box saying, give me a thumbs up or like a high and where you are watching from that'd be really cool too, just so that I know everything's working well. I can see that it says the connection is not so good today. So I hope that you guys can see me and you can hear me clearly and it's not too bad. I don't know why it is bad today. It's very strange. Usually we have a very, very good connection. So I'm not sure what might be causing this or maybe we have to go out and join in again. I guess we'll see how it goes. But yeah, if you can see me, if you can hear me, if everything's working fine, give me a thumbs up. If something is working, if something's not working fine, give me a thumbs down. So I can know.  I guess we'll see how it goes. But do let me know so that I know what's happening and I am in South Korea. It is 10 a.m. on a Friday morning. I'm super happy. Today's Friday. The weather looks amazing here, which is great because we are in the rainy season here and today's great. So no rain so far. The sky's blue. The sun is out. I'm super happy about that. I needed that after a couple of days of rain. So I'm super happy about it. But yeah, where are you watching from? What time is it there? How is the weather? How are you doing? Just let me know. And let me know if you can see me and hear me clearly. I don't have any answers yet in the chat. So I'm just gonna check real quick on my phone what it looks like on Facebook, on my end here. Let's see if it's working. And on YouTube perhaps as well. Oh, it is very... Okay, I see. Yeah, the connection is not really great, is it? The picture. What should we do? Should I go out and back in again? Oh, man. Let me see. Technical issues, guys. That can happen. Well, it looks okay, I think on YouTube. Maybe the problem is just Facebook. I have no idea. Guys, if you could, let me know what it looks like on your end. Oh, I think now the connection's actually better. I see that it is... Oh, and it is not good again. What is causing that? I have no idea. Very interesting. I hope that maybe as we go on, as we continue the connection would be better. I have no idea. I'm sorry, guys. Normally it's all good and perfect, but today apparently not. So let's just get through that today and hopefully it will improve over time. Also, not sure what else I could do here to improve the connection, to be honest. Seems pretty good. Let me just see if I can do something better here, but I don't know. We're just gonna go with it. I think now it's better, I hope. So guys, let me know. Where are you watching from right now? I'm in South Korea Friday at 10 a.m. And yeah, I'm excited to be here. It's been a while since we had a Q&A. I always like to do these at the beginning of the new month, just so that we have an opportunity, just a live session without any fixed topic, and we can just talk about anything that you guys want to talk about. So that's what we do every first Friday of the month and every other Friday that I'm live. There's usually a topic associated. There's usually a topic that we talk about. So we go live every week, every Friday around this time typically. And yeah. So that's usually how it goes. Let me maybe take the video off for a second and maybe the connection will be better. We'll see. But I think I hope it's not too bad, guys. Just if somebody could just let me know in the comments how it is on their end, how it is on your end, if it's okay or not, that would be highly appreciated because I still see the thing says the connection is not great. So I don't know. I hope you guys can see me and you can hear me. I didn't, I haven't got that comment yet. So please say something so we can move, we can continue, we can move on. That'd be great. So yeah, we do have a reaction here. Somebody give me a thumbs up. So I hope that means everything's working. That'd be good. That's good. All right. Anyway, that's just I guess how it is today. So guys, then let me just jump in and give you a brief introduction of who I am if you are watching for the first time today. So my name is Linda. I'm a travel writer and content creator under the name Linda goes east, east because I've always been super interested in Asia and excuse me, I've always been super interested in Asia and I've lived in China and I've been living in South Korea now for the past seven years. So I've been in Asia pretty much since 2012. So it's about 10 years that I have lived in Asia. And I have my own website at Linda goes east.com where I share a lot of information about what life is like in Asia and travel tips and tips for people who want to become English teachers in Asia or just in general. So you can also check that out. And I'm originally from Germany and the USA. And yeah, now I'm based in South Korea. So where are you guys right now? We have Mathur here. Hi, Mathur, who is watching from Bangladesh. Awesome. Cool. How about all the other people in this live stream today? Where are you watching from? Let me know. And then the other side of what I do is here, I am a Teflon TESOL marketing professional here for ITTT. I've also been doing that for many, many years now. And ITTT stands for International Teflon TESOL Training. You can find us on the web at www.teflonet.net. And I know that many of you are already ITTT course takers. And sorry, I had to watch the chat right now. There were some comments that I had to block. Anyway, I know that many of you have already taken ITTT courses and that's really awesome. And these live sessions really are for literally anybody. So whether you are already a ITTT Tefl course taker, you're certified already, or you maybe got a Tefl certificate from a different provider, or you don't have any Teflon TESOL certificate yet so anybody can join our live sessions and will benefit from them. What is ITTT in general? ITTT is a leading Teflon TESOL course provider worldwide. So that's what we do. We have a wide variety of different courses, online courses, in-class courses, combined courses, something for everybody out there. And if you're interested, I'm going to talk about the different courses in just a minute so you can have a look at it together. And what I also really want to do today is kind of show you this website, teflonet.net, our ITTT website, and kind of all the things that you can find on there because when you go to the website, it can be a little bit overwhelming. There's so much information on there and it can be a little bit difficult to navigate. And I just want to show you some of my favorite things on the website that are so useful and helpful for new teachers or teachers who want to be or people who want to be teachers in the future. So that's what I think we're going to do today. And oh, over here. And we also have a 30% of discount code. If you've been watching the live sessions here before, you know that every time during the live session, we share a 30% of coupon discount code for our Teflon TESOL courses that you can use. And then you get 30% off any Teflon TESOL course from ITTT. So that is super exciting. You can either scan this QR code right here that you see on the screen, or I'm also going to paste a link into the comment section. You can just copy and paste that link, which will lead you to the application page. And I think what I'm going to do is I'm just going to show you what that looks like real quick. And how the application process works. So we can look at that together. And then maybe you feel a little bit more comfortable and you have a better understanding of how the application process works. Okay, so maybe I'll just do that right away. I am going to share my screen with you just one second. Let me share my screen. And then I'll show you how to apply right here. So the link that I shared with you guys in the comments, this link, the apply link, and then the ending with Facebook Live minus Linda, this is what would get you 30% off in the end. So when you click on that, this is what you're going to see. This is the application page. And you can see here, it says congratulations. You're being granted a 30% discount on every online course and every in-class course deposit. So that is what this code will get you. So then if you are ready to apply, basically you would fill in these details. Okay. So for example, we're going to do my name and we're just going to do test. And in the email address, we're also just going to do test just, you know, just a test application right now. But you would fill this in. These again are optional, but you can do that. You can fill it out. And also, if you are a native speaker, fluent English speaker, but again, these are optional. So you don't have to fill this in. But what you need to fill in for sure is the kind of course that you want to take. Okay. So it would be here to choose your course time. And you can choose whether you want to take an online course, an in-class course, or a combined course. So most people actually go ahead and take the online course. And I'm going to choose that too, because that's just the most convenient option, because you can take it from anywhere in the world from the comfort of your own home, completely online. And then you can pick which online course. And you can see we have so many different options. And here in the top, you can see are all the course options, the regular course options. And then down here, it says courses with CTPR. This is a teaching practice recognition with like a practicum. So if you want to add that, you would have to choose the course staff here. And that's what I'm going to do. And I'm actually going to do the 220 hour master package, because I think this is actually the best course package. And that's the one I've also done. So this is the course package that I'm going to choose for this test application right now. And then plans for your teaching career. It says briefly explain why you wish to take a TEFA course and your employment plans after you complete the course. Again, this is optional, but I recommend you put it in. We just put a brief explanation what you want to do. And you can also fill out where you would like to teach. So I'm just going to put in, for example, I want to teach in Japan. Why not? Let's just pick Japan for this. Hello. Is it working? Okay, it's my computer. My computer's kind of slow today. I don't know why it's very strange. Anyway, and then once we fill this all out, we're going to do apply now. And we're going to hit this button and it's going to take just a few seconds processing, processing, processing. And then it says your application has been successfully submitted. And you want to make sure that your name is correct, that the email address is correct. And then you'll also see the course that you picked, that that's the course that you really wanted. And you'll also see how much you saved. So with this 30% off coupon code that I just shared with you guys today, you actually saved $120 on this course, which is quite a lot. So that's really good. And from there, you can then move ahead with the payment. So we have a couple of different payment options. You can pick the one that you like. You'll also get emails after the stage again with the, with payment options. So you can actually exit this page safely. But just want to make sure that if you don't receive an email within 10 minutes, you should check your junk mail or bulk mail folder in your email account. Sometimes the emails can end up there. But typically we would send you out an email here. We have also sent you. We have all, we also have just sent to you, to your email, oh, to your email, a copy of your application. So again, if you didn't receive that, you should check junk or bulk mail or spam folder of your email account. And from there, you can then complete the payment. You don't need to complete the payment right away. You can also wait, you know, a day or two. You don't have to do this right away. I just wanted to show you guys what it looks like when you apply and that you will get a 30% discount off of your course. So that's how it works. All right, then let's just get back to this right here. And some questions that you guys might have. We have a question here from Matjir. I'm going to take the question in just a minute. So Matjir is asking, if I go to South Korea as a tourist, is there any opportunity to work there as an English teacher? So for, yeah, going there as a tourist. In many cases, a tourist visa can last up to three months, I believe three months, between 60 days and 90 days, depending on your nationality for South Korea. But you are not allowed to work on a tourist visa. So as a tourist, you cannot come and teach English in South Korea, unfortunately. The only way to come to South Korea to teach is to do it the proper way of going through the E2 visa process. E2. E2 visa. And you can also Google this E2 visa for South Korea, for example. I'm just going to put that in a chat so I can put it up on my screen. E2 visa for South Korea. This is the official visa for English teachers coming to South Korea. And that's the only way you can teach in Korea unless you have a different type of visa that allows you to work in South Korea. There are different options. They have permanent residency visas that allow you to work. I have a visa at the moment, which is tied to my husband's. It's a spousal visa, which also allows you to work. So if you have any of these other visas that basically allow you to live and work in Korea, you can also apply to be an English teacher at different schools. And what's actually a benefit when you do that. So under the E2 visa, only people from seven countries, seven specific countries are able to be English teachers in South Korea. And that is Canada, the United States of America, UK, Ireland, South Africa, and Australia and New Zealand. Only these seven countries are able to get an E2 visa for teaching English in South Korea at the moment. That is the regulation. And there is a loophole for Indian citizens as well. So Indian people who fulfill all the other requirements for this visa, and they have an Indian teaching license, they can also get an E2 visa for South Korea at the moment. That's unfortunately how it is at the moment. And it's probably going to stay like this for a bit. But there also has been some movement where a language school really wanted to hire a teacher who happened to be from Nigeria, which also uses English as their official language, by the way. But it is obviously not one of those seven countries that I just mentioned where English teachers in Korea have to be from. So they were unable to hire this person. So they kind of started going, taking the support, or just kind of trying to change this regulation. So that's something that's going on at the moment. And I'll keep you updated on that. But like Matri asked, you cannot teach English under a tourist visa, unfortunately. So what you could do is you can look into different visa options. Maybe you could be a student, you can get a student visa. And then later, after you've been here for a while, you can transition over to a long-term residency or permanent residency visa. And then you can also work in Korea as an English teacher. So it's a little bit tricky, not going to lie. But that's unfortunately how it is. Yes. Hello. Taking this question here from Li Wanming. Is it Li Wanming? I hope I'm probably not. I used to study Chinese. And yeah, I forgot a lot. But anyway, perhaps it was halfway correct. Anyway, yes. So the question is here. Is it Thomas? Okay, Thomas. Thank you, Thomas. Is it possible to receive official authorized TESOL training online in China? Yeah. So our online courses, they can be taken from anywhere in the world. So if you are in China, you can take an online course from ITTT. No problem. We've had thousands of course graduates who either are from China. We have a couple of Chinese English teachers who have taken our courses and also people who then moved on to teach English in China. Also me, I got my TEFL certificate while I was in China at the time. So definitely possible. And our courses are officially recognized all over the world. And we also have the notarization option. So you can get your certificate after you receive it, notarized. And I think that is something that you now need in China. You did not need that when I was there. Basically, I'm just going to show you. I need to take the blurry thing off. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. So you can actually see the certificate. Okay. So this is what the certificate looks like. And I have a couple because I took that master package, basically. So this is the 120-hour course. It looks like this. And for China, I believe you need an extra stamp, like a notarized stamp, which we can also give you at ITTT. We could actually provide you with that. So no problem. Something we do regularly. Like I said, we have many people who move on to teach English in China, actually. And many people who are teachers in China, who also get certified. So not a problem at all. Yeah, sure. You're very welcome. All right. So I'm thinking now, I don't know if I share my screen again, if it will work, or if it will be very slow. I see that sometimes I think the connection is not so great. Sorry about that, guys. I don't know why that is today. No idea why it's doing it. Maybe it's just too hot. It is very hot in South Korea and very humid. So maybe even my computer can't deal with it. Who knows? All right. I'm just going to show you now real quick and bigger a couple of things on the website. So this is the website that you'll see when you just go to teffelcourse.net. Oh, and I'm just going to add this little banner here. Please don't forget to like and subscribe. So you don't miss any of our upcoming live sessions either. So that'd be great. Okay. So this is the website that you'll see when you type in teffelcourse.net. Some of you might be familiar. Some of you might see this for the first time. So there's a lot of information. It can be a little overwhelming, which is why I just wanted to really show you guys what it looks like. So as you can see, we have here online courses. We also have in-class courses and we also have combined courses and also a really cool thing that you can do actually that a lot of people don't know. You could take this quiz right here. As you can see, this is the header. You scroll down a little bit and then it says, which is the right course for me? And you can click on that and you can actually take this quiz and figure out which course is recommended for your situation. So there are different questions like where you want to teach, there are questions on your budget, there are questions on your background, etc. So this is a really cool thing to do when you first land on this website. That's something you could do. You could take this quiz and figure out which course is right for you and then you could go from there. You can have a better understanding of the different course options and if you're completely new to this, all of the different course options will be very overwhelming. So taking this little quiz here might be a good idea. Cool. Okay, then something you could also do on this website is to check out alumni opinions and reviews and videos. So there's a section here. You can check those out. These are regularly updated as well and different people talk about their experience with ITTT. So there's a lot of different people all over the world who take our courses and yeah, you can check out the reviews. Really good too. Then, let's see. Oh, it is really slow today. Oh my gosh, okay now. Down here, this is also really good. Here you can actually compare our online course packages to find the best ones to suit your needs. So you can see exactly what the differences are between those and maybe I should zoom out a little bit. So we can kind of... Oh, this is so long. Okay. Oh, and now it's too small, I believe. Well, let's just leave it like this for a second. So you can see basically with these courses... Oh, now it's too small. Sorry, guys. Okay. So yeah, you have the courses, also the TEFL level is indicated here. And yeah, basically what they include and what they don't include. And also here highlighted in orange is the 220-hour master package because this is really the most, I think, the best course to go with if you're either like new to teaching or you're just looking for a long-term career in teaching. And this is really the best value you get a lot. So with this one, you get... And this is a level five. You get obviously all of these things that all of our courses have. Also lifetime job guidance, which is also very important. Good for life. So whether you've taken a course yesterday with us or a course 10 years ago with us, you always have access to lifetime job support. And I'm going to show you a little bit about also how you can find jobs on our website. Because I think a lot of course graduates also don't know about this. I'm going to show you that in just a minute. And then this course includes business English as well and a course for young learners. So specifically a course about how to teach children, which is really good. And it includes obviously a hard copy, PDF certificate, and it is also internationally accredited as are all the other courses as well. It does not include online teaching specifically. It does not include teaching practice, even though you can add that to it. So there's an option where you can add teaching practice to that. It is not a diploma course and there's no academic planning. So if you want to go even further and you have all of this, this is the most comprehensive course that we offer, which is the 550-hour expert diploma course. And you can see the pricing, of course, and this price that you see here in black. Today, like I said, we also have 30% off. So you can take 30% off of this black price here as well in this white one. So that's a really good deal. All right. So that's one another thing here on the website. And then down here are our in-class course locations. So if you're interested in taking an in-class TEFL course, you might want to check out these locations. So an in-class TEFL course is basically what it says it is. It is in class at an in-class training center at a TEFL training center in one of these locations, and there are more locations as well that we have available. So for example, Phuket, which is in Thailand, beautiful island, beaches, etc. If that's your vibe, you can go to this center in Phuket and spend four weeks there and get a TEFL training for four weeks, Monday to Friday. Weekends are typically off with other trainees in a training center taught by a TEFL expert, a teacher trainer, and you'll also actually teach real English students there. This is a working English language school plus TEFL center. So they have English students there that you'll also be teaching. So this is a very great way for people who really want that teaching practice. They also want some experience abroad, a good time. This is something great to do in the summer or anytime really you have some time off because you need to go there for four weeks. So this is not something everybody can do, but it is really great and the best possible training for TEFL that you can actually get. So that's really recommended. But yeah, because of the time constraints and obviously these courses are also more expensive. That's why the online courses here are so popular because you don't need to go somewhere for four weeks. You can actually do this from your home, but it's going to take longer than four weeks typically. So typically the online course takes you have up to six months to complete it, but most people finish it in three or four months, or if you have a lot of time on your hands, you can probably finish it even faster than that as well. So it really depends on you. Good. Then now here is another application form, but I just recommend you use the code that I shared with you because it will get you 30% instead of here 15. So and then yeah, what do you can also do here at the bottom? What I recommend you do, if you want to get more information about ITTT, you can put in your email address here and you will receive our newsletter. So you should do that. And you can also download some free info material here. So these are brochures that you can get and there's a lot of information on those as well. Here is a link to the Facebook page, which is also really, really good. And I highly recommend you check it out because we share a lot of information every day. There's teaching ideas, teaching tips, job offers, videos, really anything that you will need if you want to be an English teacher or if you already are an English teacher, you can also use that material. Then just more information. Oh yeah, then down here, what a lot of people might not know is that we also have a blog. So these are some of the blog posts that we publish and you can also click on Read All and then you'll be taken to the blog page where you can see all of our recent, most recent blog posts. And typically either ITTT staff write the blog posts, myself included, or actually what happens a lot is that our course graduates, they write our blog posts. We have them as guest bloggers. So we reach out to people who have graduated from our courses and we ask them if they would like to share their experience in the blog and also experience of the different countries where they taught or different teaching materials that they use or some people have moved on to build their own online teaching platforms. So you find blog posts about that. So this is a really, really good resource. You should check out. So I highly recommend that you go and do that. All right, cool. I'm just checking in and I just saw this comment right here from Philip. Philip says, thanks, Linda goes east. I shall watch this later. Also would like information on if TEFL can be a long-term option in South Korea and not just for a few years. In other words, can someone make a career and possible permanent move to this country in particular, Korea does look like an ideal country for this. Yeah. So this is a great question. And definitely South Korea can be a long-term option. And I know many people who are living in Korea permanently. I've been here for seven years, which is also kind of long term ish. I know also a lot of people who, you know, are married to locals. I'm married to Korean men. They have their families here and they teach at the, they've been teaching like at the same school for years. Or I even know some people who have actually started their own English school in Korea. Or then people have moved on to other careers in Korea. They either work for a Korean company or they actually work for like English, for English teaching materials. So they develop teaching materials for books that will then be used in schools. So there's a lot of different ways that you definitely can do this. Everybody's path is different, but it's certainly an option. And South Korea is pretty good with offering permanent residency. So it's not too difficult to do. So I would say definitely if you're interested in that, go ahead and check out lynecosis.com for more information and maybe also reach out to me. And I can give you more details privately and maybe some links where you can get more information from official resources. That'd be cool. Yeah. Okay, so this is the blog again. And then again, we talked about the video reviews that you can also check out. We also have reviews about ITTT on different platforms. If you want to go ahead and check those out as well. Here are all the people or organizations rather that we partner with and our affiliations are listed down here as well. You can also contact us. So you can even contact us via WhatsApp. The great way to contact us is via email here at courses at tso-tefal.com. So that's a really great way. And here where we are, you know, on the social media side of things. Let me see what I also want to show you here. EFL and ESL jobs. So this is a good one to look at. So I'm just going to make this actual size again. Yeah. So this is basically if you are an ITTT course graduate, these are the best recruiters or just partner recruiters that we've been partnered with for a while. Who you will have access to here. So here are all of these recruitment agencies that we've worked with and you can actually reach out to them. And again, this is actually available to anyone who is on our website. So you don't even need to be a TEFL course graduate, but there are certain perks when reaching out to these recruiters and they know you are from ITTT that you will get that you won't otherwise get if you're not from ITTT. So that's one thing. And then what you can also do when you're, let's go back to the regular website, right up here when you go to jobs. So this is actually where I wanted to go to. So yeah. And then you'll see this and you can actually, if you are, yeah, ITTT graduates receive free lifetime job assistance. So to do that, you just email this email address for jobs assistance. And here we also always post the most recent job offers for teaching jobs all over the world or online. So we have a section for online jobs in particular. And then these are in class jobs abroad and they are different either started by continent or then also specific countries. So this is a really, really great resource to look at. And again, anyone can look at the site. So you don't have to be an ITTT course graduate to go to this site. Oh, South Korea is there twice. All right. Interesting. Yeah. So, yeah, let's look at Korea real quick. Or let's look at online jobs. I'm not sure. What should we look at? Asia general. Let's look at Asia general. Let's see what there is. Okay. Here we have a summer camp for Malaysia. That's cool. And you'll see the date when it was posted. So actually just a week ago about and then how who to email the contact person also. And yeah, roles and responsibilities, et cetera, et cetera. Can read more here. Very interesting. So summer camp will take place from July to August. So one month in Malaysia, that is really cool. So you should definitely apply if somebody's interested. That sounds like a really cool opportunity, especially because it's just for one month. Usually teaching contracts are at least a year. So this is something that's very special, these kind of summer camps. And now, because we're kind of entering a post COVID era, so to speak, we'll see much more of this because now people can actually come back into the countries they can travel without too much of a hassle. So we see many, many more positions like this come up where it's just temporary. So yeah, this is just something you should check out if you're interested. So that's TEFL jobs on our website, again, really, really cool. And then you'll find here the information like how to apply. Please contact the email address in the job heading for details on how to apply. So you would contact them and apply. Yeah. Cool. All right. Let me see what else I can show you on here. These are like the most important things. Also, something that you can do is request a call back.  Or you can reach out to us via email. Here's a contact us page. You can fill out this contact form as well. Or we have a WhatsApp button. Oh, if you press this button, you can message us directly message us what's up chat here, your different options. So there's a lot of options to get actually touched with us. I'm sure one of these will work for you. And then we can have a look at the affiliation, which is also very important. So here, if you're not sure about ITTT's accreditations, affiliations, et cetera, you should check out this page, which clearly states all of these. And this is kind of divided by course. So our in class courses are accredited by Lamar University, for example, but the and the five day combined courses are accredited by the teacher training council. So they're all kind of different online courses are accredited by the Paris College of International Education. And we're also a member of the International Association of Teachers of English of the foreign language. Oh, yeah, also in class courses are accredited by the Paris College of International Education. So you'll find a lot of information about this also links to the official sites where you can get more information about those details. So you don't need to worry about that too much. And then where was that? I wanted to show you that about certification. Oh, hey, how are you doing? I'm doing very well. How are you today? Good to see you. So again, this is the main site. And then if you go down, I think it was down at the bottom here somewhere. Let's see, I just saw it earlier. Yes, certificate legalization, I think that's it. Yes. So there, there are legalization and authentication options and some people for some countries, they will need that. So there's a couple of things you can do. So if you're interested in that, you should navigate to this website. And this is all something we can do for you. You just need to let us know there also be options. See, this is specifically for China and Vietnam, for example. So this is something that those countries will require. And we can also do that. So no worries for that. Because somebody asked earlier about Chinese legalization and notarization and stuff. So that's also something we will do. You just need to let us know. And it's possible. Okay. Good. Then I'm just going to go back to my slides here. And we can have a chat a little bit about your questions. If you have any today, do let me know. I just thought it was important to take some time and just show you the website a little bit because I know when you go to this website, it looks very overwhelming. So I just wanted to show you some of the most useful things you can do on the website that a lot of people actually don't know about. So I hope you liked that. And I need some coffee now. And then, yeah, guys, let me know what else you're curious about in terms of Teflon Tiso. And I also have my slides here for kind of the most commonly asked questions. So I think that was something that I also wanted to talk to you about one of the slides here. But yeah, pretty much that is it. So let's see if there was something in particular. Mm. So this one, which Teflon course is right for me? Again, if you go to the website and you scroll down just a little bit and you see that quiz, this will answer that question for you as well. Right. So that's a really cool way of determining which course is right for you. So just go to our website and scroll down a little bit. And then on the right hand side in like a sky blue color, it will say, which is the right course for me? Take our Teflon, yeah, our Teflon course quiz and find out in minutes. You should do that if you're not quite sure yet. Okay. This is also something maybe to talk about real quick. How much does a Teflon course cost? Right now on the website, we did see some pricing. But I just want to make sure everybody kind of understands that you should definitely stay away from free Teflon courses, right? We have seen them all over the internet or like Groupon, $10, $20 Teflon courses. Just be wary of any 120 hour Teflon course or any Teflon course costing close to nothing or being offered for completely free because when it comes to this kind of stuff, it is just like you get what you pay for. So cheap and free Teflon courses just aren't going to get you the desired teaching job abroad. They're most likely not accredited. They're not internationally recognized and they just lack even basic things like job assistance. And some of them don't even have an actual hard copy certificate. It's just crazy. And I always like to kind of compare this with a budget airline. Maybe you've heard me say this before, but it's kind of like yeah, like a budget airline where the ticket is super cheap.  But then you need to pay for all of these things extra. And then it amounts to this. It turns out to be so much more expensive than you originally thought. So that's kind of the thing with these Groupon or free Teflon courses. It's like that. So if you want job assistance, you need to pay for it. If you want a hard copy certificate, you need to pay for it. If you want anything, you need to pay for it. And then it's either the same price or even more expensive than ITTT Teflon courses, for example. And again, we do have a 30% off opportunity today. And I'm probably just going to share the link one more time with you guys. So you really have it and you can apply whenever you feel ready to do so. So it looks like this. Just copy paste this link. You will see the application page. I showed you how to do the application in the beginning of this live session. So you can just, if you missed that, you can watch the replay and check that out. But yeah, just stay away from free Teflon courses. It's not worth it. And yeah, at ITTT, we offer between 50 hours and 550 hours of training. So there's really a course for anyone out there. And if you're not quite sure which course is right for you, again, I can point you to our website and to take that Teflon quiz that will really help you determining to find out which course is right for you. The most popular one though is 120 hours or the 220 hour master package, which is the 120 hour course plus two specializations. So that's what I have. And that's what I typically recommend to people because the 220 hour course, I think I have it here. Yeah, so here the 220 hour master package, I think is the best one to do. If you're new to this and you're serious about teaching, you want to teach for a year or more than the 220 hour course over here really is the best thing to get in my opinion. It is the 120 hour course, which is the standard, the international standard course, 120 hours plus two specializations in business English and in teaching English to young learners. So those two fields are the most common, most important fields in English teaching. And if you have those on top of the standard one, you basically stand out from the crowd because typically nowadays, everyone has the 120 hour course. It's not that special anymore. So you kind of want to do a little bit more. So you really stand out a little bit and you have you can pick and choose where you want to teach. You, you just want to be able to really go where you want to go. And this is going to give you just that extra little bit of special spice for your application, basically. And then the other ones that you see here, 470 and 550 hour, those are for people who really want to do this for the long term.  So then you would go for the expert package, pretty much. Okay, we talked about in class, I think we talked about pretty much all of these. Then just real quick, how you can find us online really the best way is teffelcourse.net. And I'm also going to share our email address. So which is courses at tso-teffel.com. So this is really if you have any question, just email this email address and we'll be there to answer any questions you might have. All right, good. So then I'm still here for a couple of minutes.  So whatever it is, whatever little question or whatever specific question you have, just throw it at me and we'll see what happens. So yeah, now is your opportunity. Take it. Take your opportunity and just ask me a question about what's on your mind, teffelteasol teaching or Korea specific questions. We had a lot of Korea specific questions today because I live in Korea. So yeah, ask away, ask away. Or if there's anything else you would like to see, I can show you something. Okay, Jennifer here has a question. Is there a specific person I can talk to about getting a job, a teaching job with my master's degree in communications and my teffel certification? Yes, absolutely. So let me go back to our jobs section. So if you already know where you want to teach, for example, you could go to our jobs section, Teffel Employment, and there is an email address. It is jobs at teffel.ac, jobs at teffel.ac. This is our jobs email address basically. So you can email, send an email there, let them know exactly what you just told me, and then we'll be able to help you and also let them know maybe the area where you want to teach in the country or region. If you want to teach like in Asia or the Middle East, any details would be great. And then we'll help you out there. Then we have Southern Fried Peach. Okay, peaches, Southern Fried Peaches TV. Sorry, took me a minute to decipher. What are the best ways to prepare for teffel teaching with no degree? Good. That's a good question. Okay. With no degree, it's not impossible, not impossible. I think the best way to prepare is just to be patient. It's going to take a little bit more time probably to find that perfect position. Some countries, if you don't have a degree, are out right away. Oh, I actually forgot to show you this as well. So we have a really, really big FAQ section on our website, and there is information about people, about what it's like teaching without a degree. Okay. So I can show you that and we can go through it. Yeah, where can I teach English abroad without a university degree, for example? So I'm just going to share that with you real quick so you can refer back to that here. It's this link. So where can I teach English abroad without a university degree? Yeah, it is not impossible. But yeah, it is highly recommended that you first complete a teffel certification course for sure. But that would be number one. If you don't have a degree, you definitely need to get a teffel. And I would also recommend if you don't have a degree to get a teffel with as many hours as possible, so the higher the better. While the standard is 120 hours, you would need to do more than that to just enhance your chances, if that makes sense. So either 220 is good, but I think you should go even more. So maybe get the 470 hour course, or even 550, which is the highest level. So it depends on where you want to go. So it's definitely possible to teach in Asia, especially Southeast Asian countries like Cambodia and Vietnam are particularly good for people without a degree. And also Latin America, it might be difficult to teach in Europe and the Middle East also. But Latin America and Asia, you will definitely be able to find a position. So just be patient. Number one, take your time, do lots of research, and get just a really, really high level teffel course on top of that. That will be my tip. Then we have Amitava here. Where can one teach English abroad with an associate degree of say two years and not the standard either three or four years, so that would be the same as what I just said. Same thing, Southeast Asia is great and Latin America. Actually for South Korea, they used to have a teaching program that was called the talk program, which was specifically targeted for people with associates degrees, but this program no longer exists. That is not a possibility anymore, unfortunately. So pretty much the same. Okay. Yeah. So, okay, thank you for that. I have 150 hour certification in some college. Okay. Yeah, maybe 150. You could get the specializations on top of that. So the business English one and the teaching young learners one, which would give you another 100. So you would have 250. And with the 30% off code today, those two are not that expensive either. So I would just give you a little bit of a boost. And then if you have any kind of teaching experience, that will also be great. So maybe you could start with teaching online, get experience, and then you can also put that on your resume, teaching online experience. That would be also really good. So yeah, awesome. Okay, let's maybe take one more question and then I'm going to go and say goodbye. One more question, guys. Who wants to be the last question of today? I'm like, disappearing with this blurry background. Am I? Let's do one more question or maybe if everybody's happy, then no more questions. Or if you have any topic suggestions that would also be appreciated. All right. Amitabha has a question. Since I already have the standard 120 hours in class, intensive course certificate, yes, from Nepal, right? Kathmandu, I remember, as well as a 250 hours online diploma course. Do I stand out from the crowd? Yes, absolutely. I think so. I think you do. What you also maybe should get, I don't know if you have a English proficiency certificate. So any kind of Cambridge or IELTS or TEFL certificate, maybe you can add to that. That's usually also recommended for non-native English teachers. Maybe you already have that, but that's also something that's really good. And especially non-native English teachers should also have in their portfolio any kind of English language proficiency certification with like as high a level as possible, obviously. So yeah, that would be great. Okay. Well, thank you guys. That was really, really good. I appreciated that. I hope you learned something new today. I hope you will be able to better navigate the TEFL course.net website and discover a couple of new things on there that maybe you didn't know were on there. So I highly encourage you just take some time, explore the website, take that quiz if you haven't yet, and maybe you'll discover something new and read the blog, subscribe to the newsletter, which I also showed you how to do, and then just take advantage of our 30% off opportunity. Why not? If you want to get additional certifications or if you're completely new to this and you want to start 30% off really goes a long way, it will save you a lot of money that you can later then spend on the things that matter most, going abroad, travel, explore, your move abroad. So on we tell us this, how do I get the TEFL English proficiency test for non-native English speakers? Any suggestions, Linda, on this point? So that was TEFL what I was saying, TOEFL. There is no TEFL English proficiency test. So this would be a TEFL or an IELTS or a Cambridge certificate. So you can just type in best English proficiency test, for example, best English proficiency exam for English teachers or something like that, and then something will come up. Usually these are like the three biggest, the Cambridge, the IELTS, and the TEFL, and they will have these tests pretty much in every country around the world several times a year where you can take them. Or maybe they would also do this online, I'm not sure, but usually there's a writing part, a reading part, a listening part, and a speaking part. Most of these proficiency tests work that way. So these are typically done in person. I'm sure there's one near you as well. Okay. Well, good stuff, guys. Thank you for your questions. I hope that I was able to answer them to your satisfaction that you'll learn something. And I hope to see you again next week. Next week, we'll talk about a specific topic. If you have any suggestions, let me know. And I can prepare for that. We had a suggestion next time. Last time, we had a suggestion last time. And I talked about that, like the biggest, best advice for new teachers or the biggest challenges for new teachers. And we talked a little bit about that. So if you have any suggestions for future topics, what you would like me to talk about, or focus on, let me know. You can also reach out to me on Instagram directly, eplendicoseast. And yeah, take care. Have a wonderful weekend. And I hope to see you all real soon next week. Okay. All right, guys, thank you so much. I'm signing off now. Bye-bye. Have a great weekend. Bye, guys.


So in this video, I'm going to show you how you can send a voice note on LinkedIn using LinkedIn messaging So it's important to know with this feature that it's only available on mobile So here is the mobile app on Android, but the process is the same on Apple devices So the icon that we're looking for is this microphone symbol here So quite simply what we need to do is to press this down Make a voice recording and then release the microphone symbol And then the audio message is sent and the recipient can play that at the other end Don't worry if your message is all garbled and you want to cancel halfway through Because you can cancel by just swiping away from the microphone I'll demonstrate that right now So first of all we need to press down the microphone and you can see that it is recording You've got some sound waves coming out of the microphone there And you've got the timer on the screen with the instructions to release to send or slide away to cancel So this one I'm just going to slide away and that message is now cancelled You can see that there's no message here that has been sent So this time I'm going to record one So I'm just going to click this symbol, hold it down and then say audio message testing So audio message sometimes known as voice note testing Then I'm now going to release this and confirmation that I do actually want to send that So I'm just going to send that test off and you can see that that is now in the messaging conversation So I can play that to see what it sounded like Or Karim can click the message and play it at the other end So that is how to record and send a voice note or audio message on LinkedIn


All right, Lady Aida and Dano. I know special guest tonight. We've got the new KB 2040 RP 2040 based keyboard board and We just fabbed a bunch of them. Dano is hard at work going through and testing each one these boards to make sure they pass test They've got the bootloader working. They got a working neopixel and then we'll put through the store And I'm gonna sell them to you and then you're gonna use them to make keyboards This is how it happens You


I have a guest this week who has been red hot with his footy plays but he's also been on fire with his college basketball picks. You might know my guest from Hammer Don or from the Pat McAfee show, but he is the sharpest in the room and the most bearded. You might have guessed it, it's my boy, Dump. I've heard Pat call you like his footy sharp. Would you consider that your favorite sport to cap, to play? Like, why do you love footy? All of the above. So when where I grew up on the West Coast, it's not like the East Coast of Canada where you're born with a hockey stick in your hand. My dad started coaching my brother at soccer when he was six. So I was four years old when I started playing soccer and everybody kind of it was hockey night in Canada. Everybody would watch, but for me, it was soccer Saturday. So Saturday mornings, you'd go play soccer, come home, watch the game. It's just something that I've always been able to watch no matter where I worked or what hours I worked. So anything you're looking at early? I'm with you on LSU and UNC. I'll probably just take a money line now. Oregon State catching points against Tennessee yet. It was plus eight and a half it opened at. I think it's already at plus seven and a half. That Oregon State team is a wagon right now. I love getting points there and also Ohio catching eight as well. I like that too. I think I have Oregon State actually beating Tennessee there. So I'm kind of, I like the points obviously because I think it might even went out right. I feel like Tennessee has been rather, I don't want to say fraudulent because look, they've been good, but they are not aware near the Tennessee team that everyone was talking about in the beginning of the season, in my opinion. Who is your or what you would consider your Cinderella team? I got a few here and it's actually, it is a Cinderella and it's who I have taken it all. I think they're plus 3500 to win it all right now at Fandall. I love Texas. I absolutely love Texas right now. They can shoot, they got big men and most importantly their guards all shoot over 80% on their free throws which is going to be huge in this tournament. It always happens. So I love Texas to win it all in this thing. Also, I want to throw Georgia Tech in there. I feel like that team has caught lightning in a bottle if any team this year has.  So I believe they were like plus like 20,000 to win it all at one point. They did to FSU the other night. I'd never seen anything like FSU turn the ball over 27 times and Georgia Tech, they talk about spreads, opening spreads, they're catching two in the first game as well. I see them advancing and just, they're the one that I'm very scared to ever pick against. Who do you think is the top seed to be knocked all first? Ah, man. I'd say, I'd say Gonzaga again. It just feels like I don't see Illinois, Illinois, that's a hard side there on as well. Like you have WVU who I think could make the final four, Oklahoma State who I have making the final four and Illinois who could very well win this whole thing. Like those teams are battle tested, Oklahoma State, WVU, all those teams, anyone in the big 10 to Iowa. I like Iowa to make a run. A lot of people aren't high on them, but I could see them making the final four on their side. As long as Luca doesn't go down, I think that that's not a bad, a bad bet. Thank you for breaking down some bracketology with me. So we know that you are high on Texas. We are both low on Gonzaga and yeah, thanks for hanging out with me. I really appreciate it. That was awesome, Meg, and I appreciate it. Thanks so much. All right, y'all. That's all I got for this week. Hopefully you got a little bit of insight from me and Gump. You know that Gump has the Texas Longhorns hooking them all the way to the final and I have the fighting line. If you agree, don't agree. Just drop your predictions below. And as always, let's make some money.


Now a few from the North comparing social safety nets part two and part two as we indicated in our last show Ken Rogers and me is about the homeless situation in Canada to compare it with the homeless situation in in Seattle and points east and west in continental United States for that matter in Hawaii. Welcome to the show Ken. Hi Jake. So you know the thing is that a few years ago I mean well well within our lifetimes there was no homeless problem really you didn't see it you didn't hear about it you didn't read about it. Now all of a sudden maybe maybe you know 10 or 20 years ago there was homeless everywhere and I for the life of me can understand I cannot understand that you know the vectors that have created this problem all within the last few years. Suffice to say it exists in the U.S. everywhere every every major city and it exists in Canada too I was surprised to find that out because I always think that Canada is actually in its own way better at handling the social safety net. But tell us how it exists in Canada and western Canada and what it looks like for example when you go to Vancouver and you look at Hastings Street which I saw a few years ago when I visited you there's Hastings Street. What does that tell us Ken? Well the Canadians have not done a better job of handling homelessness as you see it on the streets of let's say Seattle and Vancouver the two that I know best in terms of the large Canadian city and large U.S. city where the mess is about the same or the disgrace is about the same or the horrific situation is about the same. Now if you were to list all the people that are on let's say why do you have a social safety net and who are the people that you're trying to cover that with? Well you'd say old age well you don't find any old age people all the people that were under the social safety net 20 years ago they're still under there this is this is kind of like a new group that that doesn't list the deserve to be there in some people's mind. Now you know one of the keys is drugs and alcohol so you end up with a bunch of people that are really deserves to be in a hospital under an alcohol or drug treatment center. There is no such adequate treatment in Canada or the U.S. similarly with the drugs there really it's sort of an illegal activity so that it's sort of shoved to the side and it is not treated as a health problem. You've got the people who are living in those homeless tents and so on committing a variety of crimes they're picked up by the police they're taken to court and a couple hours later they're back on the street or a couple of days sometimes so they're just an endless number of repeat offenders so you need a total change in the laws in order to deal with you know how do you deal with a person that's addicted to drugs that's an a repeat offender and living on the street. You know you really have difficulty doing that and I don't think the United States has done any better at it than Canada has. You know what's done better and it's a kind of you know commonwealth place and that's Singapore in fact in a week's time we're going to have a show with a Singaporean woman who is going to explain to us why there is no homelessness at all in Singapore. I don't know the answer to the question I just know there is an answer and I know that Singapore has examined and succeeded in some sort of plan to minimize or completely avoid homelessness. It's not like there's no solution here. Well let me show you you know if we have a shot available of Hastings Street in Vancouver the way the homeless scenario exists there right now. I don't know if the viewers can see that but it's about three blocks long totally blocks the sidewalk from one edge to to the of the road to the buildings and that it's it's really one where the city of Vancouver has had an order that the police are supposed to move the encampment you know and they really are unable to. Well you're sitting with a large group of the residents are ones that are on drugs or alcohol or they have a mental illness and then you've got a bunch of others that are generally males between you know 25 and 40 that are in pretty good physical condition that kind of play warlords or you know they live off the rest of the homeless and that whenever there's a police effort to show up you know they are always in the background making or even in the front making an awful lot of noise about well we have nowhere else to live and end and end and they get enough sympathy that you know the authorities back off and in Vancouver when they move them from off of a particular place example they were before they moved to Hastings Street they were in a large park well they moved them out of the park and had you know was like a garbage dump when they finally got them out of there you know well then they just moved to another place so you you know you I would guess that Singapore probably had a a fairly adept police force that jumped on it early and that you know they have some way that they're dealing with their what I call the mental problems or the health problems I think of drugs alcohol and mental illness all as mental problems where many years ago Canada and the United States used to have you know mental asylums you know and and you tended to have people in an institution that had a mental mental thing now they can't go to a hospital they're on the street yeah let me let me add a factor that comes to mind I'll call it the Lord of the Flies factor the phenomenon you know in 1969 you and I already knew each other for several years in 1969 my wife and I found ourselves stuck on the New England Turnpike because it was Woodstock and it Woodstock hundreds of thousands of young people were at Woodstock having a music festival and it was a phenomenon was relatively speaking it was well behaved it was fun it was music the poor farm the farmer who owned that land you know he suffered but essentially you know I don't think anybody was killed I don't think anybody was badly hurt and yeah there was drugs and you know there was alcohol but they managed to keep it civilized there was no Lord of the Flies phenomenon working okay the same promoters who did in 1969 did another one in 1996 I think it was several years later I mean like 30 years later and it was also likewise in upstate New York it was on a decommissioned air force base there I forget the name of the base and they had the same number of people hundreds of thousands of people and it was a different generation can it was a different structure and the Lord of the Flies phenomenon presented itself and these kids went wild they literally burned the place down there was violence there was wholesale rape there were all kinds of injuries the musicians you know left they couldn't tolerate you know the disorder and I'm saying to myself you always have that risk and maybe we have that risk more now maybe that's a factor somehow that plays into the young people on Hastings Street this Lord of the Flies there's no control there's no structure and they you know they're out there you know doing what comes naturally whether there is alcohol or drugs or not they're doing what comes naturally maybe it's a different generation was speaking about maybe it's a different a different way of looking at things but the second Woodstock was way different than the first well a lot of times you get the underlying economic situation affects a whole generation you know for example the baby boom reached its peak in approximately 1960 so kids that were born in the early 60s to the mid 70s which would be the same generation that shows up at Woodstock in the late 90s you know there they when they hit the job market all jobs were full and they were all full of baby boomers that were not a heck of a lot older than them and that weren't going to go anywhere for years and years and years and all of those baby boomers had wonderful education you know compared to their parents and that and so that their economic opportunity their upside was not the same as you know the kids 10 and 15 years older than them where you and I born and you know during the war you know we had like a golden spoon compared to the kids that were born you know in the mid 60s or the early 60s because any time if you were out of a job but you could get one in a few minutes I can remember when I was in high school a friend of mine and I were we're on a you know a concrete crew you know we were scrawny kids age 16 sort of thing or 15 and pushing one of those big concrete buckets and we were on a crew with a bunch of really husky Italians and they thought it'd be really cute if if we you know had more concrete in our bucket you know so when the lift comes up up the side of this building and and they fill this concrete bucket well every so often they had to move the planks where you'd roll these concrete buckets too you'd like the there was a concrete truck at the bottom and they had pumped it up to the top and in these buckets and then you'd roll a bucket over to somewhere in the top of this building well we were on the 10-story building and and this bucket was so full by friend and I let let the bucket off the building like it we couldn't make the corner when this bucket was supposed to turn and so you know we were instantly fired well about about four hours later we had another job okay you know we're you know that you know that difficulty for that generation of kids is that way and and and a lot of it affected their attitude towards drugs and and alcohol and and other people and I don't know whether you know that generations after them have have improved a lot because I haven't been you know hiring a whole bunch of young people to get a feeling so would you say that the the homelessness problem in Canada is more likely to affect young people because you know in Hawaii a lot of the people who are homeless are you know elderly they don't have another option and they you know wheel around a shopping cart and that's their life and it's really it's really tragic to see them operate are you saying in Canada they're maybe it's so everywhere I don't know that the homeless people are are younger and do you know not in the same spectrum of age well I I don't think we've got very many quite old people in Canada homeless people here don't include a large number of of what I would call seniors you may have a slug between you know 45 and 60 especially men that are on drugs or have some mental problem but you know we have an unusual high proportion of our homeless are natives like you know because Canada has way more natives in the US because you killed all yours off or you killed off most of them you mean you mean native Indians yeah yeah yeah like in Canada and a couple of provinces Newfoundland in particular they did the American method of solving what they considered their Indian problem and that was just wipe them out you know where especially the fur that you get west in Canada they you know almost like the higher percentage of the population is still native so are you saying in a good part of the population of homeless is native yes yes and a lot of it comes to legal problems not unlike my earlier legal suggestion on on mental illness and drugs being a health problem but you also have you know that kind of problem with the discrimination in Canada is there and it has some you know overtones that are similar to the US if you get a small portion of the population that's running around doing something that the public doesn't like it's kind of treated as if well all of those people are the same you know we're in Canada they're definitely not you know we've got some of our natives are your wonderful high performing citizens but we sure have a slug of them in the homeless community well you know that's something to for us for you and me to discuss in a later show that is the diversity in Canada it differs from the diversity in the US and in I think many ways and we should make that distinction but let me let me pose something to you Ken which I think is is really critical in both places and I mean I know I know that it's critical in the US I don't know that it's critical in Canada you'll have to confirm that to me there was an article in The Times today about some fellow who was running for Congress and he was like 25 years old and and the notion of the article was hey this is a whole new source of of Congress people of candidates of politically activated people who could change broken democracy who could step up and you know have the benefit of their education and be fair minded and you know not not QAnon or anything and run for office and win for office on the basis of their youth their vitality and their clarity and it's coming I don't know if it's going to come soon enough but it's coming on the other hand the other hand and this is the point all those people in Seattle San Francisco LA New York you know unit Boston you name it who are on the streets young people okay they're not productive in terms of the political profile of the country they're not following the news I doubt that they are they're not whether they're educated or not they're not following it they're not participating in the political process well for that matter in the public conversation they have withdrawn okay from society that's part of being in a homeless community such as the picture on Hastings Street and we lose them they're not going to be around to participate in the next generation of of political officials and candidates uh is now you think that's happening in Canada too well most of Canadian youth have also been sucked into their iPhone you know I don't know what you'd call it but but certainly everybody's walking around with their hand in front of them including the all the middle-aged women um but especially the young people I mean they you go to a restaurant and and you know there may be four people at a table and all four of them are looking down at their device rather than talking to each other so I certainly agree with you that they don't seem to be engaged certainly from a Canadian point of view when you look at the US and you see the scenario that people you know treat Trump the way they have in the sense of as if he was innocent of all things and you know being you know wrongly accused of things instead of being the the rogue and damage to the US democracy that he is or at least from Canada it looks that way for sure no perhaps that's because I watch the news and I watch a variety of news well okay I mean I you know do you have this want to say you I mean people in Canada have the same concern that the the body of citizens that shape the elected in the body of elected officials has gone south in the US it certainly has you know half of the electorate or roughly half you know support a guy who is destroying democracy um is that phenomenon is that perception is that you know that of circumstances the same in Canada do you have that concern in Canada and I guess my question is what about the youth or the youth part of that are they helping hindering not involved what are they the participation in our voting is still heavily towards the seniors and not as many young people voting but we don't have the same radicalization as the Republican Party in the United States I mean both are key parties we actually have three parties and the two of them make the coalition government at this time both of them you know the main party is is sort of what I call center left and the party that they're coalescing with is extreme left they're like Barney Bernie Sanders level um and uh but we don't have uh you know people that are you know going to storm the the parliament we have um mild versions of some of those extreme people you know we had a trucker dispute in where they showed up at the border crossings with 18 wheelers to you know blockade uh some trade uh and they also had it in the nation's capital they brought a bunch of block uh 18 wheelers and beeped their horns but that was it you know there was no storming of parliament there was no you know thumping the police or you know carrying a bunch of guns etc uh you know your um your comments about Hastings Street and about homeless youth um on Hastings Street and elsewhere in Canada suggest to me that people really don't like to have um you know the homeless around them particularly if they're disorderly and I suppose a lot of people in the US feel that way I do um but the question is um you know isn't this a social phenomenon um can you blame them do you blame them um and do you blame the police for not uh removing them uh and not stopping their you know criminal activities such as you know they engage in um and what you know what do people want the government to do uh and does the government have any intention to public officials have any intention of doing anything about this or is it just going to get worse on Hastings Street you know Toronto Montreal you name it well I suppose you need to come back to a premise in the social security net you know what it was really that you um help somebody who was temporarily unemployed get back on their feet and back into the workforce you know there's not a thought of that person being on the street you help the you know the single mother where the courts have been unwilling to you know push the uh the husband to pay any support or he's totally disappeared um and uh you know but the lack of good support legal side you know for that causes a huge scale of single mothers pregnant mothers that society looks after you don't see them on on Hastings Street or any of these streets you know so who were you supposed to be helping you know you have handicapped people now you do see some handicapped people but they usually are also addicted to alcohol or drugs so you're you're really dealing you know with who is it that is there the you're young people I don't see what I would call in their 20s there's very very few late teens 20 year olds on the streets in in Canada in a homeless sense you know the ones that are you know you've got some that are on drugs and alcohol that are a little older but you know the the only young people you see are the ones that are taking advantage of the others yeah you're going to get worse uh on I would think it'll get worse before there's corrective measures taken to to um uh deal with uh the mental illness you know what we can't have people with mental problems in the hospitals there's not enough room they've eliminated the specialty facilities for the mentally ill with all of the drug and alcohol problems you know both of which I call you know once somebody's hooked it's a mental or it's a a medical problem but it's also a mental problem or it's a separate one you you just gotta have those types of facilities I mean Vancouver City has even gone to the extreme of recommending to the province who again recommended it to our federal government that they make special legislation making possession of a small amount of any kind of drug is not a crime you know so that and the basic idea was if if a person who is dead can't be redeemed you know they can't they can't recover you know and and the idea is a lot of these people are recoverable for the good of society and for their family and themselves and human nature would say we should try to assist them to recover if they don't have enough incentive themselves well that's a lot of the problem with the homeless is this lack of incentive to do anything different what can the government do I mean if you if you were you know the prime minister and and I gave you all the authority in the world what would you do to improve this problem because this is the this is the blight on every city it's the blight on on the society in Canada and certainly in the US well I would certainly be more heavy-handed than Vancouver city has been recently and and they've let this thing get to a point where it's really really difficult now other cities you know like Kelowna in the center of British Columbia is a city about 250,000 people so it's pretty tiny compared to Vancouver but we still have a fair homeless problem but our our police you know clean the people off of any street that you know they ought not to be on and you know they you know they seem to be not as big a nuisance but there's still way too much of it for the public you know but those ones you know you take who is a repeat offender of any offense and you've got to forcibly put them somewhere now jails are expensive you know you've got to run them through some kind of testing to see whether they really really wish to be a productive member of society they wish to get off the the drugs and and booze and and in particular off the street but you've got such a huge percentage of them they just don't want to get off the street no I think there's a community factor you know they they they find friends there they find a consolation there and and they and they I don't want to say enjoy but maybe that's appropriate they want to be with that crowd and the crowd wants to be with them and and so they're going to you know they're going to migrate together isn't that part of it that is definitely part of it they certainly you know object to the authority and you know as a group and you know Canada doesn't have a history of you know cleaning up crowds in the same aggressive way that countries around the world do and you know some of the times the U.S. does a bit heavy-handed but you know that we don't bring big fire hoses out and just blast them off the street but we need to do more than we're doing for sure okay well maybe you should run for a prime minister and and get get this done can you know I'm reminded of of Market Street in San Francisco Market Street very wide sidewalks you know like at least 20 feet along Market Street and the last time I was there it was covered you know one side to the other with homeless kids mostly young well that's about the width of Hastings yeah it means very luxurious sidewalks and and covered with people and you could hardly step through the people there was an eyesore and it was a deprivation of my rights or anybody's rights as a citizen to walk down the bloody sidewalk and so I mean if we never forget that when they take over a park or a sidewalk they're making it hard for everyone else can you imagine the business that is on the between you know next to that sidewalk you know Hastings Street in Vancouver was a prosperous business street you know before the pandemic you know now you had the COVID in the middle and you know then the all of these homeless end up there in the meantime yeah well when you said that I thought for a moment you're talking about another kind of business and and where does that go in in the street itself on the sidewalk there are no bathrooms around for people who want to spend all day on the sidewalk that way so I mean it really is a deterioration of our cityscape it's a deterioration of you know the the social organization of the city and it becomes more and more a problem and more and more a requirement that something is done and I I'm not happy that Canada has the same issues as so many American cities in fact it's it's kind of it's consoling that you do on the other hand there must be solutions like in Singapore where we can ameliorate this the point is it didn't happen 20 years ago it wasn't like that 20 years ago now all of a sudden maybe it's raised from space you know that have changed our world and it is happening and it has every indication of continuing yeah well I don't know how the homeless connects to you know the prevalence of soup kitchens or or food banks you know in the US you got your food stamps you know but those programs have all expanded dramatically in scale and I don't know you know specifically you know what portion of homeless people use a food bank but it's almost like a totally different group you know food banks people drive to in a vehicle and pick up food you know they at least have enough for a vehicle of the ones in Canada you know they you know downtown or soup kitchens there's a lot of those near the the homeless people you know and I don't know what portion of meals they get out of the people like the salvation army and equivalent charities and we haven't we haven't even touched on COVID how COVID may have exacerbated accelerated this whole process you know talk about mental illness I mean I don't know if it's a statistical thing but it seems to me that the amount of mental illness you could find if you look in this country and in Canada has dramatically increased over the past a few years part of it is COVID part of it is being on the street you know if you if you don't have a ordinary social experience that's going to affect your mental abilities and ability so we haven't really we haven't solved the problem here Ken perhaps you know perhaps I was at a side thought was COVID in a lot of ways simply had everybody else's guard down you know the lots of the businesses you know they were temporarily closed well that's a good time to set up your tent you know or you know the the police is not are not as busy because you know COVID is on there you know the cities are pretty quiet you know great time to create your little community of tents well the only thing that comes to mind and we're out of time here is that you want to you know solve this problem you have to look deeply into it you have to find out the fundamental flaws in the society that allow this to happen and exacerbate and then you have to address them and I can only say that if we don't do that and we haven't then we really haven't looked for those fundamental flaws and we haven't addressed them and we're only going to solve this when we do that so and I would say it's probably both the same in Canada and the US yeah it really is you've got to meet the the mega health problems with a bunch of you know financial money from governments of on high and you've got to tie in your your legal and policing to match it yeah and make housing that's that is housing is a big problem onto itself I mean it's almost an endless bucket but but there's a difference between what what standard of housing people want I mean you you watch in Japan somebody's gonna stay you know downtown for the evening and they and they ran to a cubicle you know like a six by three by three cubicle in a wall you know where where you know in in Kelowna I was looking at a project the other day that was a subsidized housing project you know where you know this is people that are supposedly totally distraught and unable and they're providing them you know a 1400 square foot three bedroom townhouse I mean that's nuts yeah well it's not gonna not gonna work but it's a very interesting question about Japan and I think we should we should address that on one of our shows to see what the homeless situation is in Japan what the housing situation is can it's been a great discussion with you um we'll come back for more in a couple of weeks it's great to make these comparisons and see how how things are north of the border thank you so much all right bye for now Ken Rogers retired businessman uh in Kelowna British Columbia thank you so much thank you so much for watching think tech Hawaii if you like what we do please like us and click the subscribe button on youtube and the follow button on vimeo you can also follow us on facebook instagram twitter and linked in and donate to us at thinktecawaii.com mahalo


Sailors across the Navy have the chance to affect how new recruits are trained with a new program called Recruit Reboot. Mike Stevens explains more. Shibmates, receiving the best training from the moment you begin your Navy career guarantees the fleet will be armed with the most professional and technical Sailors possible. I truly believe our Navy's greatest weapon system is our people. So we must ensure they are exceptionally well trained. This is where I'm asking for your help. Right now, Naval Service Training Command is conducting Recruit Reboot, an interactive method soliciting feedback about our recruit training process. This is a great opportunity for you to talk about how Recruit Training Command can better prepare Sailors before they enter the fleet. For more information on Recruit Reboot visit the website.


Seven national officers of the PDP have resigned. They complained of being sidelined and unfairly treated by the national chairman, Uche Secundas. The national deputy publicity secretary, Diran Odeemi, deputy national organizing secretary, Hassan Yakubu, and the deputy national women leader, Hadidzat Umoru, are some of those who resigned. This latest event may feel the crisis rocking the leadership of the party. Hello, hope you enjoyed the news. Please do subscribe to our YouTube channel and don't forget to hit the notification button so you get notified about fresh news updates.