Story of a Big Player from Gangnam

Gun-Ho and Mori Aikko walked out of Keio Plaza Hotel later in the afternoon. After taking a walk on the street of Shinjuku for a while, they went into the Marui Department Store and bought several clothes that Mori Aikko found pretty. Marui Department Store mostly carried items targeting young people, but they did have some products for old people as well. When Gun-Ho saw Mori Aikko fiddling with a hat for old people, he asked, “You want to buy it for your grandmother?”

Mori Aikko nodded her head with a smile.

Gun-Ho bought the hat and also purchased some healthy foods for her grandmother as well. Realizing that she was shopping for only herself and her grandmother, Mori Aikko dragged Gun-Ho to the men’s department store. There, she picked several shirts and ties for Gun-Ho.

After shopping at Marui Department Store, Gun-Ho and Mori Aikko had their dinner at the restaurant inside the department store. After coming back to the hotel, Gun-Ho wanted to purchase a flight ticket for Sapporo City for Mori Aikko. Since he had his returning ticket for Korea already purchased when he had left Korea, he just needed to buy one ticket for Mori Aikko. The flight tickets for Sapporo City scheduled for the next day were all booked, so he had to buy a seat for business class.

Gun-Ho had another fantastic night with Mori Aikko. After having breakfast at the hotel, they prepared to check out of the hotel. Gun-Ho picked up the shopping bag that contained the t-shirts and ties that Mori Aikko selected for him at the department store. He then pulled out two envelopes from the inner pocket of his jacket.

“This one is for your living expenses.”

“Thank you.”

Mori Aikko took the envelope with two hands.

“And, I want you to buy an air conditioner with this.”

“I don’t need an air conditioner…”

“I really want you to buy one. It’s too hot. I will have to say good-bye here.”

“My flight for Sapporo City is in the afternoon. I will stop by the condo at Daikanyama before heading to the airport. I have things at home that I want to bring to my grandma anyway.”

“Okay. I guess you won’t be able to stay long with your grandmother this time since you have to get back to work soon.”

“I think I will talk to Mama-san to extend my vacation. Since she knew that I spent some of my vacation with my sponsor, she will understand.”

“I see. Okay, I have to go now. You take care of yourself, okay?”

Gun-Ho hugged Mori Aikko for a long moment and gave a kiss to her.

Gun-Ho arrived at the Gimpo International Airport.

Chan-Ho Eum was waiting for him with Gun-Ho’s Bentley. When Gun-Ho got in the car, he could smell the flowery scent. The car looked super clean as well.

“Did you wash the car?”

“Yes, sir. I cleaned the car this morning before coming to the airport to pick you up.”

“Good.”

While passing the riverside road, Chan-Ho looked at Gun-Ho’s face, who was sitting in the rear seat, through the rearview mirror, and said, “Sir, you look like you lost some weight during the trip to Japan.”

“You think so? I’ve been there for only two days. How is it possible to lose enough weights to be visible?”

“I don’ know, sir, but you did lose some weight.”

Gun-Ho laughed, but he was thinking, ‘I guess you are right. I’ve been with Mori Aikko in a hotel for two nights. Is it that obvious?’

Chan-Ho said while looking at Gun-Ho through the rearview mirror, “Even though you look like you lost some weight, you look better, I mean I have to say that you look more vigorous. I guess the business went very well in Japan.”

“Of course. It went very well.”

“Where are we heading to? It’s still early to go home, sir. Would you like to stop by your office in the building in Sinsa Town??”

“Nah. I will just go home. I feel tired.”

“Okay, sir. I’m heading to the TowerPalace then.”

The following day, Gun-Ho went to work at GH Mobile in Jiksan Town.

Before going to his office, he stopped by the production site where Director Jong-Suk Park was working. Usually, at the production site, not all of the machines were working, but a few machines were at rest, but now every single machine in the production site was fully working.

When Director Jong-Suk Park saw Gun-Ho at the production site, he ran to him.

Gun-Ho asked, “I see the machines are fully working right now. Is that because of A Electronics’ product orders?”

“Yeah, we are working overnight as well.”

“You must be very tired these days at work.”

“No, it’s okay. I don’t have to work more than I can handle. I just need to assign someone to stay overnight, like a team lead or above. The production workers are willing to work at night because they are making more money by doing it. Some of them even prefer to work at night.”

“Really?”

“President Song was here earlier. He told me to hang in there just for a few more days because he is actively looking for more production workers. He already posted job openings.”

“We need to get more machines too, right?”

“According to President Song, we will get injection molding machines, extruder machines, and hydraulic press machines by lease, five more machines for each.”

“Really?”

“People from Capital came here the other day because of the lease deal that President Song is working on with them.”

“Do we have enough space here to accommodate all additional machines?”

“We can squeeze them to our current site for now, but if we will have to bring more machines later, then we will definitely need to build an additional production site, or rent another factory nearby to install those machines.”

“How was A Electronics’ factory in Dangjin City? Was it huge?”

“It’s enormous. But their plant manager was impressed by our factory. He came here to conduct some investigation before placing their product order. He highly spoke of our production site. He said it’s organized very efficiently.”

“Really? Well, since you are our plant manager, and he is A Electronics’ plant manager, you two probably hit it off.”

“Well, he has been in the management from the beginning of his career while I started from the bottom position working with my hands. So, we have different backgrounds even though we both are holding the same position title.”

“I see. Is that Manager Chang-Hoon Seo from the sales department?” Gun-Ho said when he found someone walking toward them.

“Manager Seo swings by the production site pretty often these days. He said that he has to get familiar with what’s going on in the production site in order to effectively do his sales work. He is always asking me to have a drink in the evening lately.”

Manager Seo seemed to recoil when he saw Gun-Ho standing at the production site, and he turned around and left after giving Gun-Ho a deep bow.

“He is turning around, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess he doesn’t feel comfortable around you, bro. He is walking off very quickly. Hahaha.”

“Hmm, I guess Manager Seo is working hard at his position.”

“I heard that President Song reprimands him a lot lately like on a daily basis. Well, actually most people in the management had been reprimanded by President Song. I used to be one of them in the beginning.”

“You are good now?”

“Yeah. I guess he took his attention away from me. I was thinking about even quitting the job when he kept nagging me.”

“Haha, really?”

“But, now, I know that he is not a bad person. At least, he doesn’t talk bad about anyone behind their backs. When I worked at a factory in Yangju City and Pocheon City, those in the management like a plant manager or executive officers often spoke badly about the workers behind their backs even though they were nice to them face-to-face. President Song is different. Maybe he is on another level. He has been working in a large company for a long time after all. Well, you picked him yourself, bro. There must be a reason for it.”

“I guess that you and President Song will have to run this company in the future.”

“Me… I don’t know anything about management or running a company.”

“You are graduating from Polytechnics College this year, right?”

“Yeah, I’m graduating this year.”

“Are you going to transfer to a four-year college?”

“I’m still thinking about it, but I’m leaning on studying more.”

“What happened to you? You used to hate studying.”

“Haha. Ever since I became a father, I have become soft, I guess.”

“You didn’t become soft. You became hard and strong.”

“You think so?”

“Well, I have to go now. Keep up the good work.”

“Okay, bro. I will talk to you later.”