We arrived early to the hotel and my boss hurried us up a spiral staircase.  Poorly lit, a bit dingy but not dilapitated.  Well, early isn't entirely appropriate.  We were 5 min late, but we arrived to the meeting room before our counterpart.  The meeting was set in the third room to the right of the staircase as it wound around the lobby- a somewhat cluttered space inhabited intermittenly by faux Roman statues and plausibly operational fountains.  The four of us entered at once, nearly frightening the young man out of his chair as he looked up from his tea and baked sunflower seeds, sunshine forming a kind of endearing halo about his nondescript profile.

The tea wasn't half bad, but I wished they would stop smoking.  It had been about 20 min since arrival and the head guy still wasn't there.  I was beginning to stoop into a food coma, as my subsidized lunch in the cafeteria below our office was heavy on rice and mystery sauce, leaving the willing victims nearly useless from 1-230 each day.  But we were a state-owned investment bank, capable of managing and navigating any of China's multifaceted so-called contradictions to turn a handsome profit to the joy of our beloved Shareholder.  We could push through food comas, late meetings, 2nd-hand death and utterly ambigious meeting agendas to get the job done. 

If, in some unimaginable case, that weren't possible, history had shown that generious bailouts and gentle restructuring were also on the table.  But none of us were cognitively processing that as we sat around the heavily varnished wooden table.  There were now 9 of us- four from my team and five from the regulatory organization. 

Maybe it was the mystical combination of sunlight and heavy cigarette smoke. Maybe it was the 6th cup of tea and jokes about the financial crisis in the US.  Surely if it was liquor rather than tea (and by that I necessarily imply a dinner rather than afternoon meeting), we would have credited it to some kind of ancient magic and started in on our favorite karyoke songs. 

Whatever the factors, it was a legitimately good time and I think we all began to somewhat enjoy ourselves.  After we were rosy and warmed up, Mr Li emerged from another meeting (I can only guess) and we all ushered him in with plentious smiles and handshakes.  I stayed quiet as my boss mentioned that we were thinking of getting involved in helping a state-owned company in a recent case that could lose them 1.3 billion USD to a few greedy western investment banks.  Mr Li, apparently not being one for prolonged chatter, said he already knew about the issue at hand.  "Yeah, I know about what those western banks are trying to do and really support what you're trying to do for them.  Go for it."

With that, we were in the legal clearing to get engaged in what would prove to be a battle more bitter and exhaustive than any of us could have envisioned.  Even in hindsight, though, I think we're all greatful for Mr. Li.  You see, any financial institution and any number of regulatory bodies will almost certainly have a Mr. Li who basically runs most of the show. 

We had one at our investment bank.  There was one at my friend's, there was one at this regulatory body, and any casual scan of a VC/PE roster would probably turn up a number more.  I'll ignore for a brief second that there are only about 100 common last names in Mandarin and instead quietly assemble several consipracy theories to fill in the gaps in evidence.

In the meantime, there is a lesson to be learned about Chinese finance:  Whenever endeavoring to do something significant with a financially-related entity, you can never go wrong by showing up at their offices with a large gift of tea and cigarettes for the "Honorable Mr. Li".  It's nearly guaranteed that a Mr. Li is indeed running the show, regardless of whether or not he actually works there...