Max and Chinese character

Hi.
I’ve checked this forum in the recent years to find solution to my pipeline problem. But until now, I’ve always found an already written solution.

I was sent .max files from china.

The max files referenced textures in absolute path (I have them but not in the same directory)
Usually, when I opened these kind of files, I got a warning that the texture couldn’t be found, but not with these particular meshes.

In the material, I don’t see the name of the texture, just “targa image file”.
I can change it, but I have to guess the name of the file.

If I export the (unchanged) file into collada (dae) file, the name of the texture is exported, and I see that there a chinese character after the extension. (images/sq_men01_d.tgaæ…§)
That could explain the problem.
Now I tried to reproduce this by switching my computer locale and keyboard to chinese.
But 3dsmax refuse to save or use any file that has a chinese character in it ( or in its path).

Should I have a chinese 3dsmax or something ?
Does anyone know how to create that character with the extension? (or why is that for that matter)
And more importantly, how can I get rid of these problems ? (possibly by asking my contact to do something in its computer ?)

Hope that someone can help me.