First week at work

Its been a good first week. I've just about settled into the flat and have overcome the time difference I think. Its a lot more tiring now that i've started work though so hope I'm not speaking too soon. Working hours over here a little different. In Leeds I'd genereally get in to the office for 7.30-8am - over here people turn up between 9.30 and 10! I spend the first hour or so caching up on emails from england sent over night and then start work proper. England starts work at 4pm our time so this means we usually get some enquiries coming in about 5pm, this means that you still end up staying quite late and this week I've been leaving on average about 8/9pm. In keeping with my behaviour habits in the Leeds office i managed to loose my pass on the first day which I don't think they were too pleased about!

One of the things I don't like about the training contract process is that just as you get to know everyone in your department well and start to really like everyone you then have to move on to somewhere new. It usually take a few weeks for you to really find your feet and start getting good work and start making friends. Luckily, I seem to have hit the ground running in Shanghai though and seem to get on with people quite well all ready and even over this first week have done a wide range of good work.

The office is quite small. I think there is about 9 lawyers in the office - 2 of which are australian, 1 of which is italian, the rest chinese. There are then secretaries and HR etc which probably brings the total number up to about 15 people in full - a start constrast to the 700 or so in Leeds! This makes for quite a small friendly team where everyone gets on. The office managing partner is Australian and he is really laid back so that makes for a really nice environment to work in. The core of the office is basically young chinese girls. The receptionist, trainee solicitors, secretaries and finance people are all between 22 and 30 - they're all good fun and have enjoyed trying to weasle some chinese out of me and are currently in process of conjuring up a chinese name for me. I'll let you know what they come up with.

Becuase the office is so small people are expected to pick up whatever comes in, this means that one day you can be doing one subject and the next you are doing something utterly different. This certainly makes for an interesting life but I think i'd prefer to be an expert in one thing rather than just a general good all rounder - although I'm some way off that even at the moment! This week I've done work on Competition and Antitrust, Emplyment law, Intellectual property and also got involved on a massive Biofuels project. I'm not too sure what i'll be doing this next week, but I think i've been drafted in as some kind of project manager on the biofuels thing so that will be interesting. The meeting lasted 8 hours so theres a lot of work to do on the back of that.

I'm lucky that I've got experience in Competition law and Projects from the UK as these seem to be too really big areas out here at the moment. The first competition laws came into effect here last August so its a great time to be here to see how it develops. I wrote an article last week on a recent decision and this has been published on our website and is to be put in a magazine so I'll see if I can put it up on here. One of the best things about being an international trainee is that I get wheeled out for clients everytime they come - this has meant that i've been taken out for lunch all but one day this week- the other I ordered some fried rice to come to my desk (for 80p - excellent!).

We set up our Hong Kong office around 2 weeks ago and this week the two managing partners came to shanghai to see how we are doing here and see what improvements need making. One of the guys I know from Leeds so it has been good to have someone I know about the office. Tuesday night we went out for a big meal to welcome then to the office and then went out to an Irish Pub for St Patrick's day. It was possibly the strangest St Patrick's day I've ever had and Guiness was £6.50 a pint! Luckily I only had to buy two pints!

I know from last time that Chinese girls are not really big drinkers , and the girls from the office had never tried Guiness before but I think they enjoyed their first St Paddy's. The bar was good fun and they had a "traditional irish" band playing "traditional irish" songs - such as Fields of Athenrei and Bye Bye American Pie?! They also played various bar games like mini skittles to win prizes. Of course the place was mainly expats but there was still quite a few chinese getting into the spirit of things - This girl (Monica) clearly has some work to do on her two handed drinking technique.

The morning after the night before I was feeling quite roung and woke up to some strange banging and shouting. I really couldn't work out what it was. I jumped out of bed to investigate what was going out - in a state of undress - pulled back the curtains and was greeted by the following site. All I can say is that I hope the privacy glass on the window was working properly.