Part of the AILE training group, SHANE is a private training center in Dongying, Shandong province, China.

During my 7 months with SHANE, I probably saw more corruption, lies, dishonesty and of course the "SAVING FACE CRAP" that I will for the remainder of my professional career. 2 pronged attack with SHANE: 1) you've got the "welfare office" (supposed to facilitate foreigner integration into Chinese life) who are crooked to the bone. My deposit on my first apartment (2000 RMB) was stolen by them, and as a parting gift, they only kept 300 RMB from my deposit on my second apartment. Reason: kitchen sink door was off and leaning against a wall. Why: because during a service call, the repair man took it off and didn't put it back on. The welfare officer, Adam who kept the 300 RMB from my second deposit was there when the repair man took the door off and didn't put it back on. And that's as good as it ever got with Adam and his team. The rest of my interactions with them found me waking up at night and in the morning screaming: "HULK WANT TO SMMMAAAASSSHHHHHH!!! 2nd prong) The school, run by Alice and Vivian. Of the 10 of us foreigners working there at any given time (lots of turnover) I'm the only one who had anything good to say about either of them. Alice actually did right by me, but it wasn't without a strong dose of SAVING FACE (God when is that crap gonna end?) Vivian, considered useless by all has an almost genuine smile. And that's it. The school is poorly run badly organized and I'm gonna stop right here because a book wouldn't contain enough pages for me to explicit all of it. These are just the general outlines and I'm saying stay away!!!!!!!!

On a positive note, I spent a few days in Beijing at the end of my contract before coming to Vietnam. God what a relief. So friendly and nice (or more so than Dongying which is completely uncivilized). People actually smile and say hello and there's just more of a western presence there. Anyways, those last couple of days in China, spent in Beijing made up for so many hard times. This of course has nothing to do with work life. I know nothing of the schools there, but as a city to befriend, coming from a Canadian, man I enjoyed the people there. So worldly in contrast to Dongying.

Good luck and happy trails. May your travels bring you good fortune and warm lasting memories.