Wen | He Bing
Draw | toilet
First acquaintance
There was a man named Keipo, and that's how I met him—
One day in the summer of 2001, I went swimming alone in the Xiang River at night as usual, and when I went to the food stall, there was a man drinking beer alone.
I also ordered a bottle of beer, took two sips, and started changing into my swimming trunks. At this time, a few young men and women came up sporadically.
After drinking, I came to a "swallow-style" diving, but the jump was high and the angle was too large, and when I surfaced, my head was on the big oil drum (used as a pontoon) at the bottom of the row, and I couldn't get out.
I opened my eyes and looked around, found a bright light, swam over, just reached out and took a breath, and suddenly found myself in an extremely awkward position—above was the dressing room, and there were two girls changing clothes. I couldn't go up and down, so I had to wait patiently for them to finish their clothes and go out.
Finally out, I was about to climb up when I suddenly heard someone in the row shouting: The person who just jumped into the water is gone, hurry! Then I heard someone diving.
I thought, this is over, if I go up from here, I can't explain it anyway, gritted my teeth and took a deep breath, dived out again, and finally dived out of the bottom of the row, vaguely heard someone swimming towards me, I had to pretend to be drowning and lie motionless on the surface of the water. The man dragged me back, speed and strength I had never seen before.
Soon when I got to the row, he pushed me up, jumped up himself, threw his hair away, and said to me: Boy, you can't swim and jump in any water, do you want to kill yourself?
I looked at him carefully, and he looked at his face, about fifty years old, his body, no more than thirty, and his upper lip was bearded—this was the typical sign of a young brother in Changsha in the seventies.
This is exactly the full brother who drank beer just now.
I had to justify myself and thank him at the same time.
I said I was going to invite him to a beer, and he didn't hesitate, and when I was ordering a snack, I saw him make a move, and came to a small boat (this is a boat on the Xiang River that does tourist business), and he said to the man on the boat: Little Four, come and have a few plates to drink. The man brought five dishes at once. He pointed at me and said, "This is my friend, accompany him for a few drinks." The man greeted me respectfully, drank a glass of wine, and drove the ship away.
I thought, finished, met the baba, this time he ate it, I came to swim without much money, how to pay for it? He didn't care while greeting me, and while eating and drinking, I had to eat and drink hard.
In the midst of the conversation, I felt that he was a real old Changsha who was preaching righteousness. His first sentence was: Brother, I like to make friends the most, and I can see that you are a friend enough person.
I was still paying for the bill in my heart, and I secretly planned in my heart: it was a big deal to let him pay first, and then go home to withdraw the money to pay him back (I didn't think at the time that he didn't have a penny on him except for a pair of shorts).
After a total of 5 bottles of beer, we began to exchange names.
When he said his name indifferently, I was secretly surprised: he was the "Qingbao" of Changsha's dingding name, the big Yu Yunqing? People in Changsha who are about fifty years old know his name.
Ask again, and sure enough, it was him.
In 1967, at the height of the Cultural Revolution, he gathered 13 people, known as the "Thirteenth Taibao," drove a jeep and carried a gun to attack the Xiangxiu Building. He even took someone to the Zuojiatang Detention Center to rob the prison, hoping to rescue Yang Xiaokai (then named Yang Xiguang) ...
I tentatively mentioned my father's name, and he said lightly: I know, "Xiangjiang Wind and Thunder", it turned out to be the police.
Then it is indeed him, he is still alive!
Because of my father, we talked more and more speculatively, and drank until the early hours of the morning, and I had forgotten to pay the bill.
At this time, he stretched out and said: Brother, drink well, drink again tomorrow, and drink with you. Get up and go. I stood there overwhelmed.
He took a few steps, looked back and saw that I wasn't moving, and shouted: Go!
I said: Money...
He laughed and said, "My friend, they don't take any money."
At this time, the lady boss came out and respectfully said hello: Brother Qing is good to go. Politely greeted me again. I also shouted "Brother Qing". He frowned and went ashore first.
When I went up, he said, "Don't call me Brother Qing, I don't like to hear it, you still call me Qingbao."
I didn't know how good this Qingbao really was until the next day.
The next night, he called me and asked me to go for a drink, in the beer hall downstairs from my house in the Wangyuehu community. I decided to ask him back, so I called my wife down with me.
He came on a broken motorcycle, saying it was given to him by a friend, saying he had a car but wouldn't want to drive it, and that his house was in a garden neighborhood not far away.
Having already ordered the food, he sat with several young men and women who were not in the same way.
As soon as I sat down, a few middle-aged people came to greet him, the tone was very respectful, these people I almost all know, are neighbors, see me and Qingbao sitting together, all show a look of envy. Much later, this respect for me, caused by Keipo, has been among the neighbors of Lake Wangyue.
He ignored all the people, called him Qingbao, he reluctantly smiled, called him Qingge or Uncle Qing, he did not turn his head back.
Strangely enough, he was very polite and respectful to me and my wife, especially to my wife.
He seemed to enjoy playing with young people, and the people he brought in were of poor quality, including one who made ducks, and they basically used his money. Once, the duck beat a woman, and he started a fire: Lao Tzu is most unaccustomed to men hitting women. Just one word scared the boy away.
Interestingly, my wife also talked very speculatively with him. A year later, when he returned from the United States, he did not forget to bring her gifts, and he always talked to her longer on the phone.
He also really likes to show off like a kid at times. For example, once, my wife curiously asked him if he had any kung fu, he grabbed the two bamboo chopsticks in front of him, poked hard into the throat, snapped, and the chopsticks broke.
Slowly, I learned his true secret from him and others.
Origin of "Keipo"
The first mystery I solved was why he liked to be called "Keho" instead of any other name.
Before liberation, there were many gangs in Changsha, and the biggest dragon head was called "Bao", and Qingbao was this "treasure". The second is "grass", this "grass" is actually a harmonic sound of "groove", and the groove gang in Jiangsu and Zhejiang is a meaning, commonly known as "tong groove", is the grandfather of the Qinghong gang. The third is "Keiko", the fourth is "Liuzi", and the fifth is "Pickpocket". This pickpocket is not an ordinary pickpocket, the pickpockets are called the heads of pickpockets, and they do not pick up money.
In 1989, in the "Louwailou" shooting case of the Xiangjiang Hotel in Changsha, the leader of the case was named Chen Yi, nicknamed "Righteous Pickpocket", but he did not steal money, but was the first person to traffic heroin into Changsha. At that time, the police did not even know much about drugs. The righteous pickpocket is a native of Xiangjiang Orange Island, and Qingbao is a neighbor, but according to the generation, he is four generations behind.
There is another interesting thing. In 2002, celebrating the 60th birthday of Baobao, my wife and I went to set up a banquet at the Burrow Garden Hotel, with a total of 88 tables. This was the hotel of the provincial oil company, at that time in Changsha, it was still a second-rate hotel, and one of Qingbao's apprentices was the manager, but he could not open so many tables, so he had to open the flowing water seats, and even the entertainment hall was put on.
After I went in, I was surprised, I have been in the media for many years, I know a lot of entrepreneurs, but today, I see these cowhide coaxing characters toasting to him one by one, and they are respectfully called "Qingbao".
The most interesting thing is a retired old policeman, no one in the whole of Changsha who has committed crimes does not know him, surnamed Fang, a criminal investigation expert, they call him "Uncle Fang", sitting in the chief today, also took the initiative to toast to Qingbao.
Qingbao is still not humble, and the wine is dry to the cup.
After liberation, Changsha banned all gang organizations, but at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, they revived and still exist today (I have seen several figures later).
Qingbao is just the son of a fisherman in Xiangjiang Orange Island, practicing martial arts since childhood, likes to fight, is a man and righteous, so he has a small reputation in the local area, plus he has natural organizational skills, and people are tough, so others are either afraid of him or obey him. As soon as the Cultural Revolution came, the old gangs of fishermen had a chance for a while, so he launched and organized the "Thirteen taibao", a word change, he was still "bao", the boss.
That's not all he has.
Before I get to Keipoh's second secret, let me talk about his habits.
He soaked in me almost all summer nights, calling me for beer almost every night, and he was also a night owl.
He has only three hobbies: swimming in a water food stall, going to a beer hall for a beer chat, and listening to karaoke.
Keipo himself can't sing, but he likes to listen to men and women who don't sing, always bringing a group of these guys with him every time, and then quietly drinking beer and chatting with me.
His three hobbies coincide with mine. So he pushed back his trip to the United States until the end of November.
Slowly, I also saw that he did not really like those young people, maybe he was afraid of loneliness, maybe he was still reminiscing about the past years?
As for liking to chat with me, there should be many reasons. Qingbao has no culture, talking to me has a fresh feeling, other cultural people either look down on him, or fear him, and he also looks down on them (we have many cultural people in the Wangyue lake community), and I happen to be a half-hanger, not a scholarly disciple, relatively easy to approach, plus have experienced the Cultural Revolution, so the chat is more and more speculative, many secrets are said in this situation.
He was completely like an old Changsha, all summer he was a broken motorcycle, a pair of shorts, bare-chested, always on the mouth of the old Changsha young brother's thick black beard, people who did not know him, would treat him as a laid-off worker, no one could have imagined that he had millions of dollars in the bank.
Treating his old brother, his affection was completely from the heart. Once, he solemnly summoned two Taibao and introduced them to me, one of whom was the xiaosi mentioned earlier, who lived on the Xiangjiang River; the other was the chief of the security section of a large hospital. He pointed at me and told them: This is my best friend, and his business will be my business in the future, and I will only look for you. The two of them were very affectionate to me, like brothers. The next year, on Bao's birthday, they also brought a group of people to toast me. However, I never looked for them, and I even forgot their names.
Qingbao's use of money is even more different, he can go a few days without a penny, eat and drink everywhere, and sometimes take out a large amount of money to the boss, anyway, refuse to calculate the account, but from the boss's face at a glance, he knows that there is no loss.
He seemed to think that counting a few pieces of paper in person was the most boring and faceless thing to do.
I saw this in the seventies. In the bones, in fact, this is a manifestation of inferiority. He has to owe no one before he can look up and speak.
In other words, he wants you to owe him. As for often eating and drinking without money, it is even more of a great face, in today's society, there is no money that can not even go out.
A flower in Changsha
Let's talk about the second secret.
Why were people like Qingbao not executed at the end of the Cultural Revolution?
As we all know, after the end of the Cultural Revolution, the "three kinds of people" were liquidated all over the country, and many famous leaders were shot, so why did Qingbao escape this disaster?
There are two reasons for this.
First, there is no blood on Qingbao's hands. Although he led people to fight and kill, he never killed people, and he did not have any political color, it was purely moralistic, and he would help whoever played with him, and there was no factionalism at all. Therefore, as soon as the Cultural Revolution ended, two of his Taibao were killed because of a bloody case, and he was also examined, but he had no unit, belonged to the unemployed vagrants, and was released not long ago.
The second reason is the most important, that is, he is a guest.
At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Qingbao took a group of brothers to another village every day for morning tea, where he met his future parish guests. She was a waiter in another village, and at that time she was known as "a flower in Changsha", plus the Zhishu Dali, gentle and elegant, so that Qing Bao's soul was not guarded. Qingbao then began to pursue her madly, staying in another village all day long, causing the store to be unable to close... To be fair, Qingbao also looked good-looking, plus at that time, carrying a gun was an identity, lang cai female appearance, and it didn't take long for the girl to be moved.
However, she gave Qingbao a condition, that is, to go to Zuojiatang to save Yang Xiaokai, they were classmates and the children of high-ranking cadres. Keipo agreed. However, his few guns could not hit the machine guns of the detention center. The man was not rescued, but the girl agreed to marry him.
In the autumn of 2001, I met his wife at Keipo's house, and I can't describe her in two words, she has a picture with her two daughters, her daughters are very beautiful, but standing together, they are like peacocks with phoenixes, they do not have her charm. And she was in her fifties.
Qingbao's wife, who met all the requirements in 1972, was selected and transferred to Rongyuan, the first guest house of the Hunan Provincial Party Committee, and it is said that she twice received China's number one person.
When I asked her, she smiled and looked at Keho with a very mischievous expression, making Kiyoshi sweat profusely.
However, Keipoh's later fortune was due to his own cause and effect.
His personality of helping others and sticking knives in the ribs of his friends made many friends during the Cultural Revolution, and he never cared about returns.
This is a bit like the American godfather, because he often hangs on his lips: as long as you think of me as a friend...
In the mid-to-late 1980s, many of Keipo's friends had returned to leadership positions, and their return to Keipo was a tight target of planned materials, and Kiyobo easily made millions.
Qingbao is not greedy, he understands that he is not the material for business at all, so he put all the money in the bank for his two daughters to go to college, study abroad, and open a company in the United States, when I knew him, he and his wife had already obtained a green card in the United States, and one of the famous corrupt officials who helped him in Changsha was waiting for him to go fishing in the United States - this person had given him more than a million cigarette program indicators in 88.
The author of this article is He Bing, former vice president of Entrepreneur World magazine who has lived in Wangyue Lake for more than 20 years. When I met Mr. He Bing, he had already been diagnosed with oral cancer, probably two or three years ago, and died. It is said that it is caused by drinking too much inferior liquor. This is the previous episode, tomorrow will launch the next episode, will tell Qingbao's funny American past, as well as the author's combing of some of the old gangs in Changsha, so stay tuned.
Come, Teacher He Bing, wine in the glass.