Fuddland

The rumours were true! After a last-ditch two-pronged-pincer-movement strike, I finally have my year-long Chinese work visa. The last few days of warfare went like this.

Firstly, I called in reinforcements I had been reluctant to fall back on up to now, in the form of an acquaintance I made last year. He’s an Irishman, the boss of a clothing company based here in Sūzhōu (苏州), with several key strengths:

• He’s a very nice man and offered to help me out when I talked to him ages ago about possible visa problems should I resign from my [now former] employer.

• He knows my ex-manager personally, and is as much a fan of her as I am.

• But he also knows, and is on very good terms with, her brother-in-law — a very handy mediation route here.

• By lovely coincidence, he is also good friends with the Irish owner of my ex-company — in other words, he’s pals with my ex-boss’s boss.

All of which add up to some substantial guānxi (关系), the deadliest weapon in modern China’s business world. So he set about talking to the brother-in-law, to find out of there was some kind of give-and-take that would get me the letter of release I so desperately needed to secure my work visa.

He called back later to see what I thought of a peace offering: in return for a letter of release, I would agree to not harm the reputation of the company by going on the record [that is, contacting newspapers etc.] about their recent treatment of me [and other employees in the past]. I agreed in principle to this idea, and the brother-in-law was given the go-ahead to approach my ex-manager.

The very day I set these events in motion, a new hope appeared on the horizon. My new employer told me — and I was highly dubious given the lack of success of their efforts to date — that all I needed to provide the authorities with was a photocopy of my original letter of release — that is, the one I got when I left Běnxī. As highly-organised-person would have it, I did indeed keep a photocopy of that letter before handing it over to the police when I first arrived in Sūzhōu.

It turned out that the photocopy was enough, and it was this that got me my visa. Which is just as well, as the go-between route went rather quiet at my end after the initial contact was made. I’m not sure what transpired between my ex-manager and the brother-in-law, but what I do know is, soon after she was contacted, my ex-manager arranged to have a meeting with my new manager.

She tried to insist that I also attend this meeting — a request that my new manager refused, much to my relief. At the meeting, she demanded that my new manager fire me. She told him I had a habit of breaking contracts early. Unfortunately for her I’d already been open with my new manager about my reasons for leaving Běnxī and her comany, and he sympathised with both situations. It also kind of blunts her point when you know that she asked me, on my last day and in two subsequent email messages, to stay on with her company.

Nevertheless, she clearly didn’t want me working for anyone else, and even went so far as to offer to transfer one of her current teachers to replace me. This says a lot about how much she values the services of her teachers, if she’s willing to send one over to a new employer simply to get back at someone who dared to resign from her company.

But it appears to be all over: I have my visa, and that’s all I really care about. I think a celebratory drink might be in order.

#1

Thanatos | 2007 / 04 / 18 – 21:39

Comment deleted because of grammatical errors and general obseleteness…

[Edited by commenter — 21:44]

#2

Thanatos | 2007 / 04 / 18 – 21:40

And congratulations to you, sir!

Good God, that’s a tangled web that’s woven itself around you…

Wait until I finally get around to telling everyone about organising a wedding in China…

#3

Julia | 2007 / 04 / 20 – 22:07

Congratulations. Must a be a weight off your mind. All sounds very complicated!

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