Ryan's Welcome Dinner

Last week I traveled to Houjie in mainland China for a work dinner that was being thrown to celebrate Ryan officially starting his position as the manager of the motors team. It was quite the journey, which gave me an appreciation for Ryan's weekly commute he makes. For those who don't know, Ryan lives in a manager dorm on the company's factory compound during the week and then comes here to Hong Kong on the weekends as the commute is around 3 hours. It consists of trains, buses, cars and trolleys all to get from point A to point B.

A= Hong Kong, B= Houjie

Once I arrived, I was able to tour the factory and see the production of Milwaukee tools by all of the employees. It was amazing to see so many people working so fast to make all of the tools. Many of the employees seemed shocked to see me there, some even taking out their phones and snapping pictures. This is something I've oddly become used to while being in China. 

Outside of the TTI compound

The dinner was a traditional 'family style' Chinese dinner. We had a private room with around 30 of Ryan's co-workers. Once dinner began, Ryan wanted to introduce me to everyone and do a traditional 'toast' with each person. In China, a common toast to have with a person is to say 'Ganbei', which translates to 'dry cup'. This means 'bottoms up' and finish your drink. For one person, that may not be bad, but for Ryan and I, we were pretty full after doing it wish several people. We finally modified to doing only partial glasses, but it still was a lot. It was great to see where Ryan is during the week and meet the people he is working with.

Beginning of the dinner

Each with our bottles for our toasts

Cheers...

And more cheers...

and more..

...

...and the end, finally.