Suwon, South Korea

After a 2-week "break" in Taiwan, today we crossed the moat one more time, passed through the front gate, not in my best mood I entered the Suwon complex of S-company, again. This is my third would-be the last visit here.

Soon after we set up the environment we were shocked to know that the Koreans are going to have 5 holidays in a row from tomorrow on!! Wondering about their plot of calling us here during the vacation, we joined a group discussion, got the pending issues sorted out, at the end their manager gave a standard routine sorry-for- dragging-your-arses-here-again talk.

Immediately followed was a small party with non-alcohol soft drink(RARE!), an assort of dessert and a big chocolate cake -- a decent afternoon tea-break combination, only it took place on 11:30 AM. I thought we were going to have the cake and cookies for lunch.

There were laughter and jokes, everybody seemed to be enjoying this layed back atmosphere after enduring hours of shelling in the meeting. After a few rounds of drinking, the manager told us he's gonna say something to motivate his fellow engineers to work harder, with a "they're gonna love this" grin on his face. As he began to talk in Korean language, I took my time fed myself up with whatever in-range and soon felt more then satiate over the butter and chocolate. He concluded the speech with a paramilitary tone.

Then there was pure silence. Some played with their fingers, some just looked down at the table, nobody spoke nothing. Though I don't understand the language, I'm pretty sure I did not/wasn't able to pick up any hint of love at the moment. Yet he looked a bit frustrated and confused about the steep atmosphere change in the room, oh yes please allow me to explain the situation, Comrade Chief Manager, that's because you’ve just deprived their holidays, and OURS!!

The gathering lasted 30min, ended by 12:00 sharp, everybody got a considerable calorie intake....yet they are going to lunch. How they manage to keep their rather slim figure is a real mystery. Maybe it's the kimchi, maybe it's the soju, or more likely,
the idea of screw-your-vacation-come-work-on-holidays.