The special room in HELL just for me

Yes, I have to go to Wangjing twice a week for the next month. In the rush hour. 3 or more hours of travelling for only 2 hours of paid work.

How much worse can it be??!!

Well....

It's an abysmally 'designed' course. (Not 'designed' at all, of course. The school that set it up just plucked a textbook randomly off the shelf.)  It's a really crummy book I'm supposed to be using, and it can be covered in about half the number of hours timetabled.

The class isn't remotely quorate. You need at least 8 to 10 people in a lesson to generate some positive energy, and to allow for a decent variety of different activities. There were only 7 people listed for this class. 2 of them have left the company. 1 is frequently too busy with work to attend. And 1 speaks not a single word of English. You can't have a 'group class' with 3 people - it doesn't work.

No money. I took this on as a favour to a contact who has set me up with a fair bit of interesting work in the past. Alas, for this class, they're paying only a rock bottom rate. And (contrary to what they'd suggested to me before I started - based on frantic, uninformed back-of-an-envelope calculations!) I am being taxed on it not at 10% but at a swingeing 16%. This is supposed to be high-end business training for a prestigious MNC. Kindergarten teachers earn more.

No guanxi. My main interest in taking the gig was to try to establish some contacts with this very big, very famous company. But it turns out the training has been set up independently by one of the small work teams there; it's nothing to do with any of the senior managers, nor even with the HR & Training Dept. Very frustrating. Boo!

My contact there is the most annoying person I have ever met: she has quite good English, but otherwise appears to be a complete moron. She takes the Chinese predisposition towards inappropriate laughter to extraordinary new levels, being apparently incapable of opening her mouth to say anything without giggling. I am probably going to KILL her before this course is through. Or at least put duct tape over her mouth...

But wait, it gets worse....