Tim Blair

Ah yes, the overconfident Oxbridge student who can sound like he knows what he is talking about even when he doesn't. I know them well. They can be deeply annoying.

He even looks a little like the real professor.

The boy has balls

Matty Richardson also plays footy for Richmond!

Is there no end to his talent?

That guy has serious sack. Hats off to him; he'll go far as an engineer if he knows his stuff.

Michael Jennings, thank you. I was just asking myself, "What kind of flipping idiot is asked to go halfway around the world to lecture on a subject about which he knows nothing, and not only does not wonder why he was asked, but apparently does not wonder whether there are no more qualified finance teachers in China (or Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong...)??" Now I know the answer: an Oxbridge student.

I wonder if he thinks he'll be able to "blag" his way through his engineering mechanics classes. Gravity is not so easily fooled. Hope he's never asked to design a bridge.

I find this most amusing, got to admire his bullshitting abilities.

There's an expert in my field (ESL/EFL) and we share names. At a national conference 10 years ago, I was approached by a US govt. official and offered 2 weeks in Italy lecturing on ESL student "Assessment" and all its variations to Italian ESL/EFL educators. I was flattered by the attention, but had to tell her she had the wrong guy. She didn't act too thrilled when I told her that (she had been flaunting her "catch" a bit too excessively in the eyes of her US govt-employed peers, and later blushed) Maybe I should have gone over and done my thing on assessment,(I definitely could have done a better job than Mr. Engineer did re finance) but thought better of it.

I wonder if changing my name to Michael Moore will get me guest appearances at McDonalds?

Tim, You should organise a cagefight between Richardson and our own Chris Sheil. It'd be the BS Ashes.
"You're dead wrong Richardson. Dead wrong."

Jake D:

Only if you're too wide to fit through the door.

For added realism, go through the drive-thru and order from the back of a flatbed truck.

LOL! Funniest thing I've read in a long time. I especially liked this quote:

"I have no idea who they were expecting. Being Chinese, they were inscrutable and if they were expecting someone else they didn't show it. Perhaps they thought I was a prodigy. They all called me professor.

What are his overhead marking and dummy spitting skills like? Can't be any worse than the idiot at the Tigers!

I bet he can miss the goals from 20 meters out dead in front, too!

The kid has balls. Good for him that he saw it through. Indeed he will go far. Hopefully, it won't be by bluffing his way through life.

A bit disturbing is Dr Cerratti who is, ".. often asked to provide Oxford academics for lectures overseas...".

Is it normal to provide Oxford academics to lecture in subjects they don't know anything about as long as the audience is a non-Phd one? It seems so by the article.

Isn't this rather bizarre? Why would you provide someone to lecture about a topic he/she knows nothing about ... even to non-degreed college students?

Half my commerce lecturers at a 'prestigious' australian university barely spoke english, so they could have been blagging their way through and none of us would have known.

This guy is a total f'kn hero! Although, jesus, if the MBA students found a lecture from a beginners' textbook highly informative, what does that say about THEIR training?

I've just posted a poetic ode to this fellow on my new blog.
I agree, National Party Headcase - what does it say about the state of education in China that the students found the talk informative?

You guys sound worried! Unsourced, unsubstatiated, cutted and pasted plastic blog! A British college student passes off as an economist, bet he's got a job lined up at Enron! Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah!

My life is a lie.

Hee hee hee!

And what about the Chinese students who paid money to fly to the workshop, their accommodation, meals and expenses, not to mention what they paid for the workshop? This was a real con and a deceit by an imposter. Nothing to boast about. You may all think it is funny, but how would you feel if you flew to Madrid for a conference and had a similar experience? It's turds like him that give Oxford and Brits a bad name. eric