Ok, here's the rest of the story on my job in Beijing. My work went about the same as it had for the first several weeks. I gave a couple English trainings, edited documents, translated emails and notifications and lists of evidence, and generally spent half my time surfing the Internet and the other half being a super efficient/effective translator and editor. I eventually got to be pretty good friends with one guy who sat next to me, Michael Liang (梁硕), and we went to lunch together most days.
One experience in particular was kind of cool. I asked 易律师 if I could attend a court case before I left, so a few weeks ago she helped me apply for and attend a case at the Beijing High People's Court. It was a trademark violation retrial case where we were representing a Hong Kong-based manufacturer against a mainland company that had basically copied their goods. It took a few hours in the afternoon; I headed to the court early and waited around for the lunch break to be over. The building itself was huge and imposing, like nearly every public building in China. I had to leave my phone outside in a locker, and then we all went into a smallish courtroom. There were three judges sitting in front; a woman and two men flanking her. Then there were 蒋律师 and 左律师 and our three clients from HK on our side and two lawyers and the defendant sitting on the other side. The two partners from our firm had stacks and stacks of documents, and they were furiously highlighting and scribbling notes before the hearing started; the lawyers on the other side had a noticeable paucity of materials and didn't seem very enthusiastic.
It took about 2 hours - there were initial arguments and discussion and counterarguments and closing arguments and questions from the judge (the two men didn't say much; they were there for show, it seemed), and we completely dominated. The other side tried to make a few procedural objections - something about the wrong person signing a petition document and another objection about new evidence - but it was halfhearted and they didn't have any substantial arguments. It was ridiculously hot in the courtroom. I followed the lead of one of our clients in taking my jacket off about halfway through the hearing, and I nearly fell asleep from the heat once or twice. The content of the hearing wasn't terribly interesting to me, but it was gratifying to understand a good portion of what was going on, and that kept me engaged.
The second-to-last day on the job, the senior partners all took me to lunch at a nice restaurant in the building. They made me sit in the seat of honor and order nearly everything and eat first, and none of them drank because I don't drink, so we got this sweet warm corn smoothie stuff that was surprisingly delicious. The food was great, and conversation happened, but it was slightly forced and awkward. Still, it was a nice gesture. 易律师 gave me some nice pens on my last day at work, and 梁硕 wants to keep in contact; I was very happy to be done with that internship, but I learned a lot, and I'm grateful for the experience.
One experience in particular was kind of cool. I asked 易律师 if I could attend a court case before I left, so a few weeks ago she helped me apply for and attend a case at the Beijing High People's Court. It was a trademark violation retrial case where we were representing a Hong Kong-based manufacturer against a mainland company that had basically copied their goods. It took a few hours in the afternoon; I headed to the court early and waited around for the lunch break to be over. The building itself was huge and imposing, like nearly every public building in China. I had to leave my phone outside in a locker, and then we all went into a smallish courtroom. There were three judges sitting in front; a woman and two men flanking her. Then there were 蒋律师 and 左律师 and our three clients from HK on our side and two lawyers and the defendant sitting on the other side. The two partners from our firm had stacks and stacks of documents, and they were furiously highlighting and scribbling notes before the hearing started; the lawyers on the other side had a noticeable paucity of materials and didn't seem very enthusiastic.
It took about 2 hours - there were initial arguments and discussion and counterarguments and closing arguments and questions from the judge (the two men didn't say much; they were there for show, it seemed), and we completely dominated. The other side tried to make a few procedural objections - something about the wrong person signing a petition document and another objection about new evidence - but it was halfhearted and they didn't have any substantial arguments. It was ridiculously hot in the courtroom. I followed the lead of one of our clients in taking my jacket off about halfway through the hearing, and I nearly fell asleep from the heat once or twice. The content of the hearing wasn't terribly interesting to me, but it was gratifying to understand a good portion of what was going on, and that kept me engaged.
The second-to-last day on the job, the senior partners all took me to lunch at a nice restaurant in the building. They made me sit in the seat of honor and order nearly everything and eat first, and none of them drank because I don't drink, so we got this sweet warm corn smoothie stuff that was surprisingly delicious. The food was great, and conversation happened, but it was slightly forced and awkward. Still, it was a nice gesture. 易律师 gave me some nice pens on my last day at work, and 梁硕 wants to keep in contact; I was very happy to be done with that internship, but I learned a lot, and I'm grateful for the experience.
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