I am the first batch of overseas Chinese who have come to Romania for more than 20 years, living and starting a business in this beautiful and magical land of Romania, hearing and witnessing almost all the journeys of the Chinese in Romania, witnessing the various failures and successes of the Chinese in Romania, and also experiencing various heartache pains and happiness, here I talk bit by bit about the various experiences and feelings and feelings in Romania in the past 30 years.
The Chinese emperor of the 1990s was a messenger who brought happiness and satisfaction to the peoples of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
Here's an example:
After we arrived in Moscow, we stayed in an Aihua Hotel managed by Chinese, because the locals knew that this was a concentration of Chinese with goods, so every day from dawn, many Soviets came with large bags and bundles of cash to buy. Once, after two Russian uncles of about forty years old entered our room, they saw that the down jacket had also negotiated the price, so they opened a large bag, pulled out bundles of new and green Soviet currency rubles, and counted the amount on the ground. The two of them were kneeling on the carpet of the room for more than half an hour, while we were both sitting in chairs or on the bed waiting for them to pay the money. We were the oldest in our 30s at the time, watching the bearded Soviet big brothers religiously counting the banknotes and handing them to us with both hands, and everyone unanimously sighed: The big brother of the Soviet Union has now become our Chinese subjects...
Our original destination was Budapest, the capital of Hungary. When he left Beijing, he went to the Romanian Embassy in China to apply for a Romanian transit visa for only four days, because at that time, Hungary was the only one in the world who gave visa-free treatment to Chinese mainland people because of private passports (later in 1992, because hundreds of thousands of Chinese poured in at once forced the Hungarian government to cancel it), and there were two railways from Moscow to Hungary, passing through Ukraine in the Soviet Union or through Romania. At that time, because Romania has always been a comrade and brother in the minds of Chinese, we wanted to use a transit visa to pass by.
After we arrived at an apartment arranged by a Chinese person, we began to go to shops and markets the next day to buy food and vegetables. It was the severe winter of December 1991, and the shops in Romania, like the entire former Soviet Union and the socialist countries of Eastern Europe, emphasized accumulation over development, resulting in the development of heavy industry and the extreme shortage of light industrial products, especially civilian products.
It did happen that a pair of Chinese jeans was exchanged for two Su-European refrigerators, a box of big Shanghai-made bubble gum for a marmot hat, a down jacket or leather jacket for two genuine new military coats, a cheap pearl necklace from Beijing's Silk Market for a 14K rose gold ring.
We had this on the train from Moscow to Romania.
The Romanians on the train knew we had Chinese down jackets in our bags and insisted on buying them for $80. We were buying from Beijing's Xiushui Market for around $12. Unable to resist the pleas of the Romanians, we had to sell them a few pieces. We thought: give us such a high price on the train, and the price will definitely be higher in Luo. So the next day we arrived in the capital, we carried a large bag of down jackets to the free market stalls and began to sell.
I remember very clearly that the first stop was the pedestrian street in the center of Bucharest. (Of course, this is also the sales place recommended to us by a Romanian traveler friend on the train). At that time, we were indeed the first Chinese to enter Romania and start selling Chinese goods, and then we gradually learned that the Chinese mainland people who entered Romania at the end of 1991 were only a few dozen. As soon as we opened a few large bags, we were immediately surrounded by a group of locals. When they saw that the quality and style of our Duck duck down jackets were really good, they frantically paid for them. It's a fantasy: they snapped up our down jackets like an auction. Starting at $100, the last few pieces were sold to us for $150 and were robbed. And these duck brand down jackets produced by Jiangxi Communist Youth League Farm were purchased for $12 a piece at the Xiushui Market in Beijing.
I worked as an English teacher at the university for two years after graduating from college. According to the family, how can a scholar do business? We went abroad at that time with a fearless spirit of adventure, because we knew that we could not change our lives without breaking in!
Several of my male and female Beijing friends who came to Romania with me were ordinary workers in state-run units in China, with a monthly salary of less than 80 yuan, and I was a state cadre assigned to work in a ministry, and the salary was only about 120 yuan at that time. At that time, the official exchange rate of the US dollar was about 5.4 yuan, and on the black market it was about 7 yuan. That is to say, the profit we make from selling a down jacket is equivalent to our salary for more than a month in China. Even the most stupid person will understand how huge the profits are.
At that time, due to food shortages, shops and free markets were lined up to buy. Without exception, we also consciously stood at the end of the line and began to wait patiently.
Not long after, I saw that the salesman in front of us seemed to be waving at us, and after confirming, I walked to the front of the line on behalf of everyone. She asked me in basic English if I Chinese. I replied: Yes, from Beijing, China. Haha, to my surprise, she actually told us not to queue up and go directly to the front to buy food.
I couldn't believe my ears: we were all powerless grass people at home and abroad, and we had never encountered such preferential treatment anywhere without queuing, especially if it was a foreign country, and we didn't have any friendship with them! I asked her a few times in English in confusion, and she smiled and said that there was really no need to queue, just because you are Chinese, are our good friends and good brothers, I don't believe we can ask all the people in line if they agree. To my surprise again, those people really smiled very enthusiastically and said: Chinese are our good friends, no need to queue. And they actually took the initiative to take a step back, please a few of us in the queue at the end of the line Chinese to the front to buy directly.
What is flattery? What does it mean to be at home? What is respected? What is warm as spring?
After we all walked to the front of the line to buy the food and vegetables, we already felt that this place was no longer a strange foreign country.
There is a huge spread of money that can be easily earned, there are such kind and warm and friendly Romanian people who treat us as distinguished guests, there is such a comfortable country to live in... And for me almost everyone here can communicate in English, and all the text is written in the Latin alphabet, as long as you can read it, you can say what it means. Compared with the self-employed and upside-down grandfathers who are actually looked down upon by the mainstream society in China...
After such a comparison, it is no matter how stupid and stupid Chinese and I have to find a way to stay and start a business and life here!