Crazy Electronic Table

  "Brother, do you know what this is?" Lin Fanghua said discontentedly. "This thing is called an electronic watch. It can keep running forever without winding it up. And it's only 8 yuan. Think about it, a normal watch would cost at least over 40 yuan."

  "Cough cough, have your classmates bought any?" Lin Zhenhua asked.

  "Of course," said Lin Fanghua, "but it's just that families with slightly better economic conditions would agree to let them buy one. Because we're in high school now and the studies are intense, our teacher said that if possible, we can prepare a watch so that we can keep track of time during exams."

  "Where did you buy this watch?"

  "It's right at the entrance of our school, every day after school, there's a young man carrying a canvas bag standing there selling it secretly, afraid to be seen. Many people go to buy it. Now many people in Fenghua County are buying this watch, brother, do you want to go and buy one too? I saw they have men's watches, which look really nice."

  Lin Zhenhua had a feeling of wanting to laugh: "Xiao Fang, do you know how much this watch on your hand sells for in Guangzhou?"

  "How much?"

  "Two dollars."

  "2 kuài!" Lin Fanghua was almost furious, "Then I've been cheated? Brother, if it's 2 yuan, why didn't you buy a few more? You one piece, me one piece, Yang Xin one piece, and we can even give one to Yang Tao..."

  Lin Zhenhua chuckled and said, "Sister, do you think your brother is such a foolish person? To be honest with you, I bought 5,000 of these watches in Guangzhou and hired a brother to sell them in Fenghua County. The one you bought was from my wholesale batch."

  "So you're saying that the young man selling electronic watches is your employee?"

  "Yes, that's Lan Wufeng. Didn't I tell you about him?" Lin Zhenhua said. He used to take some things over to the Lan family from time to time, and he had mentioned these things to Lin Fanghua before, but Lan Wufeng had never been to Lin Zhenhua's home, so Lin Fanghua didn't know him.

  "Hum, he's dead set," Lin Fanghua said in annoyance. "I asked him if he could make it cheaper, but he refused to agree. He even said he was already losing money. Honestly, what is he losing? He made a profit of 6 yuan on just one watch."

  "It wasn't him, I earned the 6 dollars." Lin Zhenhua corrected, "He is someone I hired to sell goods for me, the money he earns is all mine...... Listen, there's a knock on the door, it should be him arriving."

  Lin Fanghua put down her bowl and went to open the door. At the entrance stood the young man who had sold electronic watches that day.

  "Excuse me, is this Mr. Lin's home?" Lan Wufeng asked.

  "Return the money!" Lin Fanghua didn't respond, but stretched out her hand instead.

  "How much money will be returned?"

  "Is this watch the one you sold to me?" Lin Fanghua held up the electronic watch and asked, "You bought it for 2 yuan and actually sold it to me for 8 yuan. Return my money quickly."

  "This......" Lan Wufeng was stunned and didn't know what to say.

  Lin Fanghua saw Lan Wufeng's silly expression and couldn't help but burst out laughing: "Alright, alright, considering you're helping my brother with things, hurry up and come in."

  Lan Wufeng only then discovered that Lin Zhenhua was standing right behind Lin Fanghua. He pointed at Lin Fanghua and asked Lin Zhenhua, "Lin Ge, who is this..."

  "This is my sister Xiaofang," said Lin Zhenhua. "She's just kidding you. However, that watch of hers, you should return the money to her and exchange it for a multi-functional one."

  "No problem, no problem, I brought them over." Lan Wufeng said repeatedly, handing a canvas bag in his hand to Lin Fanghua and saying: "Little sister Fang, there are various styles of watches inside, you can choose whatever you like, take whichever one you like... after all, they're all your brother's things."

  Lin Zhenhua patted Xiaofang's shoulder and said, "Xiaofang, you stay here and keep watch. I'll go to your house with Fengzi to discuss something. Can you help us keep an eye on the door and not let anyone barge in?"

  "Got it." Lin Fanghua said with a smile, she knew that these canvas bag electronic watches were all her brother's property, and she could naturally pick them at will. She had also thought about helping Yang Xin choose one, as well as Yang Tao, and her own deskmate, and who else... anyway, her brother said that the wholesale price of these watches was only 2 yuan each.

  Lin Zhenhua pulled Lan Wufeng into another room. After making sure no one was eavesdropping or peeking from outside the window, Lan Wufeng took out a large bundle of cloth from his clothes and handed it to Lin Zhenhua: "Brother Lin, this is the income from selling goods over the past few days, totaling 6,467 yuan. The receipt is also inside."

  "How much did you sell it for?"

  "Isn't it?" Lan Wufeng said excitedly, "You don't know how hot our electronic watches are selling. In just three days, I've sold over 600 watches. However, the calculators and microscopes aren't selling well, not many have been sold."

  "The calculator wants to find a unit to sell, personally I won't buy it. As for the Macbook, we still have to wait two months." Lin Zhenhua said.

  "On our side, I don't dare go," Lan Wufeng said. "Lin Ge, you don't know, it's just selling these electronic watches, I'm forcing myself to do it, I really won't haggle with people."

  "Haha, Xiaofang said you're quite good at bargaining, didn't she buy that for 8 yuan?"

  "I sweat every time I negotiate prices with these people. Lin Ge, you don't know, selling these watches doesn't make me tired, but negotiating prices is really exhausting." Lan Wu Feng sighed and said.

  Lin Zhenhua opened the cloth package and first picked up the bill to take a look. Lan Wufeng was not good at keeping accounts, but he had written down how much they sold each day and how much money they received. It could be seen that Lan Wufeng was very clear about money matters, and did not want to mix up even one cent or one tenth of a cent.

  Lin Zhenhua looked at the bill again, picked up that stack of cash, counted out 100 big yuan bills, and handed them to Lan Wufeng, saying: "Fengzi, this is your share."

  "Lin Ge, I really can't take so much." Lan Wufeng retreated hastily, as if he had been scalded by fire.

  "We didn't agree on this beforehand? All the income, after deducting costs, you take 20% and I take 80%. This time it's over 6,000 yuan, you first take 1,000 yuan and we'll settle the rest later."

  "I can't take that much." Lan Wufeng insisted, "Lin Ge, when you first told me, I thought it would take a month to earn a few hundred yuan. I thought taking 20% was already quite a lot. Who knew this watch would sell so well and make money so quickly? I just put in some effort, how can I suddenly take 1000 yuan?"

  Lin Zhenhua smiled and said, "Fengzi, we are friends, sharing good fortune and bad. I've discovered this way to make money, of course, everyone will make it together. I didn't exert any effort, but still took the biggest share. If you can't even take a small share, do you still consider me, Lin Zhenhua, as your friend?"

  "But this is 1,000 yuan!" Lan Wufeng said with a trembling heart. No matter how good the relationship between friends is, it's not to the point where you can casually lend someone 1,000 yuan, right?

  10,000 yuan was equivalent to 20 months' salary for a state-owned enterprise employee at that time. If converted to today's salary of 2,000 yuan per month for state-owned enterprise employees, 20,000 yuan back then would be equivalent to 400,000 yuan now.

  "What's 1,000 yuan? In the future when our business expands, we'll be making tens of millions. At that time, you'll think 1,000 yuan is too little." Lin Zhenhua said.

  "But I have 1,000 yuan, what should I do with it?" Lan Wufeng took the money and was a bit dazed. In the past few days, he had handled six or seven thousand yuan, but he always thought that this money didn't belong to him, so in his mind there was only a concept of numbers. Now, Lin Zhenhua personally handed over 1,000 yuan to him, and he became the owner of this 1,000 yuan. For a moment, he actually didn't know how to spend such a sum of money.

  "First buy your mom some clothes and whatnot, think about eating something good too, go buy it." Lin Zhenhua suggested.

  "Come to think of it, when I was in Guangzhou, I saw a type of sweater called cashmere that I thought my mom would definitely like," said Lan Wufeng. "However, one piece of clothing costs over 70 yuan, and at the time, I didn't even think I could afford it. Now that I have money, I must buy one for my mom."

  "You can buy two, let your mom wear one and hang the other on the wall to appreciate." Lin Zhenhua came up with a silly idea.

  "You're right, I'll buy two for my mom, one red and one blue."

  "Also, you can buy a washing machine for your mom. It's very convenient to wash clothes with it. Just throw them in and press the button, and they'll be clean without getting her hands wet. Your mom has rheumatism, don't let her get her hands wet often."

  "Washing machine? Where is it? Is it expensive?" Lan Wufeng was really moved.

  Lin Zhenhua said, "Fenghua County definitely doesn't have it, and Nanshan City may not have it either. Next time we go to Guangzhou, let's take a look. As for the money, don't worry about it at all, you've earned enough."

  "Great, I'll definitely go buy it."

  "Also, when you have more money, you should take your mom to Beijing or Shanghai for treatment. She has rheumatism, not some kind of difficult disease. If we find a big hospital, it should be curable."

  "Really?" Lan Wu Feng suddenly stood up, "Lin Ge, how much will it cost to cure my mother's illness?"

  "I think 10,000 or 20,000 yuan should be enough, right?" Lin Zhenhua said casually, but in fact, treating rheumatism wouldn't cost that much.

  "One or two hundred thousand? Alright, I'll start saving from now on." Lan Wufeng made up his mind.

  "So, will you still refuse to share the profits now?" Lin Zhenhua asked. He had given Lan Wufeng so many ideas, actually just to firm up his idea of participating in sharing the profits. Lin Zhenhua didn't want to monopolize the benefits for himself; when there was a chance to make money, it was better for everyone to get rich together.

  Lan Wufeng shook his head and said, "Lin Ge, I know you're taking care of me. To be honest, I shouldn't have taken so much money. How about this? I'll consider it a debt to you, and in the future, I'll work harder to make up for it."

  "Alright, let's talk about it later." Lin Zhenhua said. He believed that as income continued to increase, Lan Wufeng should gradually accept the current arrangement. At the same time, he was also very pleased that his choice of Lan Wufeng to help him had not been wrong, this young man was poor but ambitious, and not a person who forgets righteousness for profit.

  "Fengzi, I want to talk to you about something. Our business is now up and running, and we've made our first pot of gold. Can't you consider opening a store in the county town? It would save us from carrying this big canvas bag every day, like we're smuggling something." Lin Zhenhua suggested.

  "Lin Ge, I was just about to tell you this," said Lan Wufeng. "You mentioned renting a storefront before. These past two days, I've been looking around the county town and found a house on a neighboring street that's willing to be rented out, and the rent isn't expensive either. However, there's one troublesome matter - I'm having trouble getting an individual business license."

  "Why?"

  "My household registration is still in the farm in Yunnan. I've contacted them many times, but most of the people there have left, and the few remaining ones don't want to deal with it. Plus, I ran away back then, they said the matter hasn't been settled yet, so they can't handle my household registration for now." Lan Wufeng said with a worried tone.

  "This is a troublesome matter." Lin Zhenhua really didn't think of this, in his mind, there was no such concept as household registration, who knew that at that time household registration had such a big role.

  "Fengzi, if we use your mother's identity to do it, will it work?" Lin Zhenhua suddenly thought of another plan. Lan Wufeng's household registration is not in Fenghua, but Lan Dama has an identity.

  Lan Wufeng shook his head: "I also asked, they said no. The Industrial and Commercial Bureau said that now allowing individual businesses is to solve the employment problem of young people who are waiting for employment, so only young people who are waiting for employment can apply for an individual business license, my mother does not fall within this scope."

  "Then where can we find another unemployed young man?" Lin Zhenhua was getting a headache.