I say go for it!
My cousin went through a rough patch when he was 17 after his best friend was killed in a car accident ca. 1983. My uncle finally sat him down and told him Enough wallowing around, what are you going to do with your life? From out of nowhere, he replied I'm going to China to teach English. So, he, being close to 6' and blond, blue eyed, etc., not knowing a word of Chinese, took off to some incredibly remote place in the interior of China to teach English to Chinese English teachers. This being before China had opened up much, the teachers had all learned English from watching movies from before the Revolution, so that meant gangster movies and the like from the 30s and early 40s. My cousin ended up doing really well and helped organize a porcelain factory, which exported enough to help fund schools, hospitals and other infrastructure for the Chinese. Now, he lives in Viet Nam, but it was obviously a great jumping off point. Weirdly, my uncle's second wife's family (his step-mom) started the opium wars and were the model for Taipan and other books of that ilk. They still have amazing artifacts at their estate in Scotland from that time. Lots of stories there (including my aunt escaping from China when she was 8 after she and her family were placed under house arrest during the revolution).
Friends in China story #2: Back in the 90s, I played in a band in Boston and we had some young fans. One of them was a high school kid (whose dad started one of the major schools of Shiatsu, the only Westerner to have done so. He grew up fully macrobiotic) and he ended up getting in trouble with the law. So, as part of a plea deal, he told the judge that he was going to college, so he got off pretty light. Only trouble was, he wasn't admitted yet. So, he came to me for a recommendation letter. I wrote him a glowing letter (knowing, of course, that he wouldn't let me down). He got in, did his time over the summer and ended up graduating with a 4.0 in Chinese and then moved to China to study Chinese medicine. I lost touch with him, as the emails I sent were bounced back. Fast forward 10 years. A keyboard player I played with moved to NY and joined up with a salsa band (again, weird dichotomy, blond-blued Texan playing salsa with the Puerto Ricans and Cubans and getting into some crazy back alley business in NY. Ended up running the band!) and they go on a tour in China. He loves it, and decides to go back on his own 6 months later. Gets to Beijing and heads into a bar where he hears some music. Sits down and this American dude comes up and they start talking. He mentions he lived in Boulder and the guy says Boulder? Do you know Edwin and Dawn? Unbelievable! How many people in Beijing and my keyboard player friend runs into the guy I wrote the rec letter for a decade previously first thing!
Anyway, China seems really cool. I'd go.
