Trip to Persimmon Kingdom - Jinhae

To complete one of my sourcing goal, it was my mission to visit the production area for Korean Persimmon. I took a plane to Seoul and transit to Pusan. The next morning, I visited the pack house in Jinhae, which is about 2 hours drive from Pusan.

Buckets of persimmons are being packed. The operation is a rather small one, they only have 5 ladies packing the fruits, plus another 5 for boxing, QC, and stuffing. All these fruits are for me and the fruits are being checked randomly with my presence. 
Since the season just started, we are only loading 1 x 20ft. And this is the truck waiting outside. 

Later, we went to the growing area. It was my first time to see persimmons on trees. It was quite cute because the hill has persimmons growing everywhere. It is pretty hard to tell on this picture because it is too small. But literally, there were orange dots everywhere on this hill. 

It is a joke that I have never really eaten persimmons in my life considering I have been in fruit business for 10 years. LOL... Since I am in the land of persimmon, the fruit taste fantastic. It taste like a blend of apples and pears with sweet honey taste. The host kept on feeding me persimmons, and I think I have like 4 big ones in the entire afternoon. 
This is Mr. Kim, my exporter. He is the same age as my dad and is my dad's old friend. This trip was valuable for both of us because it was his first time to visit the pack house in years, and my first time. We also met people from the government export department as well as the chairman of growers association. It was a eye opener for me to see how Korean conduct business. Everyone was very formal, warm and polite. I had a great time here in Jinhae!

The Chinese wisdom

最近的生活一直在往前進，莫名中有股動力在讓我不斷的向前走。生活多了些新鮮。這個月要去好多地方，澳門，廣州，香港，上海，韓國，菲律賓。雖然大部分是為了工作，但我卻很期待。人一生活一次，或許我扮演的角色中，就是要去不斷的拓展，看看自己到底能夠走得多遠。

回想在澳門的這兩天，令人開了開眼界。雖然跟阿波和老闆出來過好多次了，但是這次才真正的感覺到這群人獨特的地方，縱使他們老說些我聽的很吃力的賭博主題，我卻漸漸明白為甚麼有些人注定能夠成功。他們身上那種精明的特質，腦中飛快的算盤，令我佩服的五體投地。或許做生意的精髓就在他們平時的一字一句中就已經吐露出來。原來中國人的智慧是在賭桌上開發出來的... 呵呵

*DOE Check Point*

One more month to go. 50萬的目標在中秋節前有達不到的可能性很高。南非橙 becomes the weakest link. 收不到好的貨是主因。進了幾櫃雖然有做公證沒有賠錢，但是達不到目標，覺得自己在上面沒放夠精力，今年閏五月，市場一直都不好，就算進了貨，也很難賺到錢，水果生意就是這樣，有時候做也是，不做也不是。除此之外，整個8月其實花了絕大多數的時間在創立衣服的品牌。直到8月底跟老婆討論後才獲得一個總結，就是在浪費時間和金錢。因為整個模式都不對，自己的角色也不對。所以，收。專心在自己水果的領域，在中秋這段時間內加緊腳步將火龍果，台灣的釋迦，西柚，還有澳洲的柑，趕上市，並拓展北京，上海，廣州市場。佈局是現在的重點。9月展覽的這段時間將拓展更多的線路。努力引進更多不同的種類，力求獲利。

攝影10組，只完成了一組。會在10月前完成。

媽媽在北京待了10多天。感覺她來的這段時間滿開心的。雖然甚麼都要別人照顧。但是知道她開了開眼界，讓她一個人在北京逛來逛去，甚至半騙半哄的讓她爬到了長城的最頂端。我想，這將是她生命中難忘的一刻吧！

健身真是徹底的失敗啊，連安排的時間都沒有安排。

總之…  還有1個月。努力吧！

DOE 2009/07/01 to 2009/10/01

智利的季節差不多要結束了。今年花了差不多3個月的時間跑完所有的貨。比起之前還長了許多。這三個月發生了許多事，家裡的，公司的，個人的。我不斷的在修正自己的目標，進而達到自己心目中想要的未來。Randy Pausch 在最後的演講說到：「我們面前的障礙不會平白無故的跑出來。他存在的目的並不是阻礙我們，而是讓我們有另一個機會去證明我們到底有多想要障礙後面的寶藏。」這句話就像是飛鏢打靶似的命中紅心。我放下心來問問自己，原來自己最想要的是能夠賺到錢。我是一個很喜歡把責任往自己身上背的人。是腦子裡隱藏著這樣基因吧！當我覺得能夠讓身邊的人過的無憂無慮，就是自己最大的成就。 當我不斷的在修正目標的同時，我給他人傳達的訊息是三心二意。 我想這我必經的一個過程。Joan發了個email，上面說「每個人都有兩個生命，一個是現實，一個是夢想。」是不是有了現實就不能有夢想，或是有了夢想就不能有現實，我想這不是絕對，因為外面兩者兼備的人多的是。如何讓兩者並存是我需要去解決的棘手問題。很多人覺得現實跟夢想只能取一，但是我並不這麼覺得。我相信這兩者一定有一個雙贏的局面。幾個月的醞釀，終於讓我有點頭緒了。下面就是我七月一號到十月一號的DOE。

－ 擴展水果貿易，在七月到十月加入澳洲及南非柑橘的進口。目標賺進50萬RMB。

－ 參加暗房基礎課程。實際操作並真正了解印刷的原理。

－ 拍攝10組人像，城市，或靜物的作品。從練習中學習，在不斷的拍攝中找到自己的風格。

－ 與老婆去帛琉潛水。放鬆心情並促進感情。

－ 協助老婆的DOE，每個禮拜最少和老婆 deep talk 一次。

－ 九月底帶媽媽到北京玩最少一個星期。增加家人感情。

－ 研究北京潛在的商機。開發未來在京獲利的機會。

－ 和老婆在家裡舉辦 House Warming。為家裡沖一沖人氣。

烤肉店

I was watching 新聞挖挖哇 last night and they were interviewing this 烤肉達人. This dude has been in the industry for 10 years. Starting from a waiter and worked his way up to manager position in a falling 烤肉店. 他不管薪水的多少 (當時拿的是 27,000 NT) 他就苦心研究，將所有缺點改進。在烤肉店經營不下去的情況下，他花了 70 萬NT買下所有股份。開始自己的創業之路。他在食材上不斷的研究，從豬的每一個部位，到不同品種的豬，黑豬，白豬，甚至是各國的豬，美國豬，日本豬. He carefully choose the best ingredients to serve his customers. Moreover, he holds meeting with staff to invent different sauces and ways to cook the food. Now, he owns 6 shops and 開發銀行 is offering 400 million NT to buy 30% of the company’s share because they foresee its potential to grow to 40 to 60 shops across Taiwan. He refuses the offer simply because he is not ready yet. “There are still a lot of rooms to improve and he needs to develop a system where management can be well controlled”, he said. Currently, he is sharing 30% of the monthly profit with the employees and the employ turn over is almost zero for senior staff. He said “don’t ask how much you get paid, but ask yourself how much you can give in cuz eventually, your hard work will get paid off. 少說多做，這樣的理念希望當下人可以做為借鏡.

I went to this 烤肉店 the next day because I was eager to try after watching the interview. It was not cheap, 2,000 NT for 3 people and I think my expectation was too high. The service was so so… and food was not superb as I imagined. Over rated…

They do give out rebate tho, I think that is one of the way that keeps on attracting the customers to come back.

Dragon fruit Promotion

Been busy with our dragon fruit promotion lately. Dragon fruit?!?!? I know... I know... it's probably one of the weirdest thing to promote with regard to its exotic touch. But that's what pays the bills. =]

We are handling flyers out in 15 locations across HK. People who are interested in the prizes will have to collect 12 stickers and mail it back with the slip that we distribute out. Today, 14 flyers came back to the mail box. They got me pretty excited. Yes... but only 14 flyers. Hopefull there will be couple of thousands coming in for the next few weeks.