Korean ex-auto man on China's two decades of changes

[Photo provided to China Daily]

Sometime into his stay, Song started to notice many Sonata cars on Beijing roads, but Hyundai hadn't been exporting the mid-sized cars to China back then.

After investigating he found out that the cars had been smuggled to China and were being sold on the black market.

Song thought that the sales of these cars, although illegal, showed the potential of China's auto market.

In the first half of the book, Song recounts his participation in early auto exhibitions in China in the 1990s, and negotiating with government officials on jointly building factories.

These chapters give his readers glimpses of reform in China's automobile market along with the course in which Hyundai's business developed here.

The Asian financial crisis of 1997 slowed down Hyundai's China march, and Song was asked by his headquarters to get back to Seoul in 1999.

But owing to personal reasons he resigned from the company back then.

The second half of the book includes his many business endeavors in China upon his return to Beijing in 1999, and his experiences of living in the fast-changing nation.

"When I go back home on occasions, it seems the only change there is an increase in the number of cafes. But Beijing turns a new face every few months," Song writes in his book.

Before opening Secret Garden, which has become a popular hangout for Korean businesspeople and foreign diplomats near the embassy area in Beijing, Song had tested other waters with limited success such as aluminum trade, importing kimchi and even raising cattle.

"The book records how Song deals with Chinese on different levels, establishes contacts and his thoughts on China," Dong Jianjun, vice-president, Sinotrans & CSC, a Chinese shipping company, writes in the book's recommendation.

Song's 20 years in China are captured in detail in the book.