Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Vietnam.
As soon as Hyunwoo came out of the entrance, he noticed a big piece of paper with the Korean character Hyunwoo. A middle-aged man, who looked old but not enough to be called a senior, was standing there holding that paper. He was a short man with the impression of stubborness. He was consistent with the impression of the person that he had heard from Dukwoo.
Hyunwoo approached that man.
"How are you? My name is Jang Hyunwoo with Aurum's purchase team. You must be president Na Sungji, right?"
"Yes, I'm. Thanks for your long trip here."
Na treated Hyunwoo dearly from the bottom of his heart. Though he was more than 30 years his senior, he was crawling to Hyunwoo.
"Don't do that, Mr. Na. I'm just 30 years old. Just treat me comfortably like your nephew."
"No, I can't. Don't feel burdened about it."
Na didn't stop his subservient attitude, and he now tried to get cute with him.
"As it's too late today, just take a break first and check out my factory tomorrow."
When Hyunwoo checked his watch, it was still early in the afternoon. He wasn't sure how far Na's firm was from the airport, but Na's mention of "too late" didn't make any sense.
When Hyunwoo made a perplexed expression, Na pulled away his collar and said,
"As you've come to Vietnam like this, you have to experience the local drinking culture. People say that the K-pop wave is in full swing, so the Vietnamese ladies have a crush on Korean men."
He then led Hyunwoo to a high-end bar.
Hyunwoo was very disappointed. If Na treated him like this, it looked as if the quality of the parts produced by his company weren't worth even taking a look at.
Hyunwoo said with a serious look,
"Mr. Jang Dukwoo told me you were a good man, and I thought as such. But I'm very disappointed. I heard your company was in financial trouble, but do you have money to spend at the bar?"
"No..that's not what I…"
"That's enough. If I have my own way, I would like to go back to Korea, but as I got here like this, I can't. I don't feel like eating right now, so let's go directly to your factory."
Na was nervous at Hyunwoo's icy tone, and he guided him with a subservient attitude, and his shoulders were shrunk back.
It took him about two hours from the airport to get to Na's factory. Though it wasn't that far, the heavy traffic congestion made their car stop repeatedly when going to the factory.
While driving, Na kept reading his countenance constantly to the point that he might have a car accident.
Then, Na began to utter cautiously,
"I'm sorry. As it is sort of established culture here, I tried to escort you there. As a matter of fact, it's almost impossible to pull off a contract without treating potential buyers to such places."
Hyunwoo could understand it.
Entertaining buyers with wine and fine dining was a frequent occurrence in Korea, and it could be even more so in Vietnam.
Hyunwoo said definitely, though,
"At least I don't like it. So, never treat me with this kind of stuff."
"Of course not. Why would I like to do so either? Because the other party wanted it, I had no other choice. I'm so thankful that you think like this."
Na smiled brightly, but Hyunwoo didn't feel like his smile was bright.
Hyunwoo still felt like Na's smile was fake, hiding his real self.
Maybe it was because of his prejudice toward Na. Once he was disappointed at Na, he felt Na's behavior was fake. However, Hyunwoo had to stay calm because what he had to look for was the castor produced by Na's factory, not the man himself.
"This is my factory."
The company name, N & C, was nicely inscribed on the nameplate at the entrance.
"It means Na Sungji and Castor. Ha ha ha."
Hyunwoo took out his digital camera and said, "Can I take a picture?"
"Of course, you can take pictures of anything except for the research room."
Hyunwoo began to release the shutter, determined to take pictures of all the stuff before his eyes. The factory was larger than he expected. The empty place in the center was large enough to be used as a soccer ground, and there were one small building and four large buildings. It seemed Na expanded the size of the factory drastically when he had great success in the initial stages. There weren't many employees. The number of production workers was less than 70, which meant that the factory was almost sitting idle.
"Looks like the size of the factory is larger than I expected."
"It used to run at full capacity."
"It's been cleaned up here."
"The number one factor that determines the quality of the product is cleanness. Even if you have great skill, you can't expect to produce quality products if the factory isn't clean."
"Can I see the products?"
Na took him to the product warehouse. Even the warehouse was cleaned. It looked as if it had been cleaned up in preparation of Hyunwoo's visit.
There were various types of wheels, and he noticed some for chairs among them.
"They have a good design."
Hyunwoo spoke his mind. At least there was little difference between the products of Korea and Taiwan.
"As far as the quality is concerned, it's the best in Vietnam. The problem is the cover and the frame. What's lacking is their durability."
Usually they tended to exaggerate the quality of their products, but Na was the opposite. He began pointing out the problems of his products.
However, Hyunwoo couldn't find a particular problem. He twisted a wheel forcefully here and there, and he then threw it on the floor to check its strength. However, it was very resilient.
Na grinned at that.
"You can't check its durability like that. Only a sophisticated test device can tell."
"Do you have your own test room?"
"Of course we do. Let me show you. Come this way," Na said confidently as if he was proud of the test room.
With elated expectation, Hyunwoo accompanied Na to the test room.
As soon as he entered it, he opened his eyes wide. He thought there would only be a couple of test devices in the room, but it was full of test equipment.
"I brought all this stuff from Korea. I purchased them one by one from the factories that went bankrupt."
Hyunwoo's expectations were going as high as they could because the quality of parts couldn't be bad with this test equipment.
"With such good equipment as this, why is the quality still low?"
"Because there aren't skilled personnel. Although this looks like nothing, it needs lots of dexterity."
"Are there no such skilled workers in Vietnam?"
"No. There are lots of skillful men in Korea whose factories went bankrupt. If we can bring two or three of them, we can immediately catch up with the quality of Taiwanese products," Na said, complaining.
At that moment, he thought of what old man Song had told him.
'He was a very good man with excellent skill. He was too greedy. Though Aurum asked to adjust the price, he didn't budge at all, arguing the quality was more important than the price.'
Hyunwoo liked his good character, skill, and tenacity to put quality before price.
However, there was one problem, which was that he was Song's friend. That meant he was as old as Song.
Though he wasn't sure of Song's exact age, he looked almost 70 at a glance. There was no reason for his friend to desert his hometown and come to Vietnam for work.
Like Na said, however, there must be a lot of skilled men in Korea who were skilled and ambitious but out of work because they couldn't find jobs. If the conditions were right, some of them could come to Vietnam.
"Why don't you invite them over here?" Hyunwoo asked.
"Who would come here unless they wanted to set up their own factories? Don't you know that many people in Korea would never find jobs in the so-called 3D (dirty, difficult, and dangerous) workplaces?"
Come to think of it, Na was right.
Though the working conditions in Korea weren't that bad, it was much worse in Vietnam.
Hot weather was one of the problems, but a swarm of mosquitoes tormented them as well. To make matters worse, the language and food were different. Without the guarantee of a good salary, there would be very few who could come over here to work.
I think I have to check it out when I go back to Korea, Hyunwoo thought to himself.
Hyunwoo showed Na the structure diagram of the chair used by Aurum currently. There were six types of chairs including the latest model.
"These are the wheels used for the chairs produced by Aurum. Assuming that you pass the quality standard and make the contract with us, how much can you adjust the price?"
Checking the structure diagram, a deep wrinkle appeared on his face, and he said,
"It isn't that easy to calculate the unit price. We have to figure out cost accounting first. May I email you when I get the result?"
"Sure. As I have to compile a trip report, can you have it ready a little faster?"
"Of course. If you place an order for enough parts, let me even bring some skilled men from Korea and adjust the quality and price that you want. So, please make a positive recommendation for us."
"Looks like your products are better than expected. Let me say something positive about you, but if you send us some samples, our management will review them positively."
"Thank you. Thanks so much."
Guided by Na, Hyunwoo looked around other parts factories, and he found that the products were better than he had thought.
However, the problem was the wheel. As far as the wheel was concerned, the core issue was the lack of the skilled men, not money or equipment.
"Okay, then. Please collect the samples and send them to us at Aurum."
"Will do. I'll be in your good hands," Na said.
Finishing his business trip in Vietnam, he came back to Korea. It was early Friday morning when he left for Vietnam, and it was Tuesday morning when he arrived at Incheon International Airport.
Taking a brief shower, he headed to the office directly, arriving there just before lunch time.
When Hyunwoo entered the office, the manager welcomed him.
"Oh, Hyunwoo, how was your trip?"
"The products were better than I expected. In my opinion, we can replace our Taiwanese imports with them easily. I asked them to send us some samples, so we can verify the quality through a quality test here."
The manager smiled from ear to ear at Hyunwoo's response. If things work out as Hyunwoo said, there could be an enormous cost reduction. It would be much bigger than the refund.
"But we need to review the wheel part a little more, which accounts for our biggest payment. It looks good to me, but the president of that factory says its durability is rather poor."
"Did you ask him to send that sample, too?"
"Yes, they will be able to arrive here within one month."
"Great. After we test the samples and find out the result, let's report it to the president. Nice job!"
The manager encouraged him, patting him on the shoulder. Hyunwoo felt good about the manager's praise.
Suddenly, Yonggu's eyes came into view. When looking at him, there was some discontent in his eyes. He avoided him when Hyunwoo's eyes met his. Hyunwoo thought to himself that he was a man of poor caliber. There are some who can grow together with their colleagues, but there were also others who think they can succeed only by trampling on their colleagues. Hyunwoo decided to ignore Yonggu's narrow-mindedness. Of course, he would treat him as a superior because he was ranked higher at the office.
"Here is a gift for you, Yonggu."
Hyunwoo brought a cookie box to him, which he had bought in Vietnam.
"What's this?"
"Coconut cookies. They taste good."
Yonggu reluctantly received the gift with the impression that he was accepting it even though he didn't like it.
Leaving the office early that day, Hyunwoo was wandering around his house as if he was waiting for someone.
Some old men in his neighborhood greeted him.
"What are you doing here?"
"How are you? Have you seen Mr. Song?"
"Mr Song? I saw him collecting waste paper over there."
"Really? Thanks."
Hyunwoo headed to the place that the old man pointed him to, where he found Song sorting out waste paper from a trash heap.
"How are you, sir? Are you busy right now?"
"Oh, it's you, Hyunwoo. As an old man, I have no reason to be busy."
Hyunwoo helped him sort out waste paper, but Song stopped him and said,
"Stop it, dude. You'll get your hands dirty."
"I can wash my hands. You mentioned your friend before? I mean the person who went bankrupt after supplying parts to Aurum."
"Ah! You're talking about Kwon Sangtaek. Sure, I did mention him. Why?"
"I would like to see him. Do you have his contact number?"