Rebirth: Outstanding

Moruo Street, located west of Central, was originally a street, but it was divided into two streets by Le Gu Road in the middle. It became Moruo Shang Street and Moruo Xia Street, although the map or the government’s municipal administration The planning drawings will indicate that these are two streets, but if pedestrians walk on these two streets, they will definitely not feel any difference.

No one remembers the original name of this street. Moro Street is a conventional name. Moro is a popular name for locals who wear heavy cloth towels and believe in Sikh Indians or Palestinians. India was not independent before. Many Indians come to Hong Kong to make a living. Except for a small number of Indian merchants who sell South Asian spices or coffee, most Indians work in Hong Kong as soldiers, police, watchmen, security guards, seamen, and open Indian snack shops, etc. To make ends meet, you can only be regarded as the middle and lower class in Hong Kong. These Indians who live in the middle and lower classes in Hong Kong lived in Morro Street. Sikhs in white clothes wrapped in towels, so it is called Moro Street.

After India split and became two countries of India and Pakistan in 1947, many Indians in Hong Kong either returned to their hometowns in India, or married local women and had children, and moved out of Moro Street. Nowadays, the real Indians on Moro Street are only There are more than 30 households left, and the remaining houses and shops are all redeemed by small businessmen who came from the mainland to escape the civil war. At first they were a few shops that sold paint, paper, pen and ink as well as old paintings. Merchants including writing brushes, clocks, antiques, furniture, second-hand goods, etc. have moved in. Now, it has become an antique market in Hong Kong. The Indian shop that originally ran Indian snack shops saw Chinese people selling antiques and second-hand goods. Turned the food store into a thrift store, and asked relatives to collect some rare-looking antiques from India and display them for sale.

"How? It feels good, right?" Song Tianyao asked Angie Peris, who was cautiously holding a rococo-style ink bottle in a silver rococo style from the Georgian period. .

Angie Peris carefully put the ink bottle into her handbag: "This is a huge treasure. This silver ink bottle was only owned by nobles at that time, and the Indian owner of this shop only accepted it. I am four hundred Hong Kong dollars. Although it is indeed a little damaged, there is no problem in using it as a collection."

"Four hundred Hong Kong dollars can be exchanged for a lot of silver, miss. Senior British officials are not interested in coming to the flea market opened by Indians and Chinese. They prefer to go to the first department store you mentioned, but seeing your current expression, I think they should also like the gifts here." Song Tianyao said.

After he and Angie Periss came to Morro Street, they had no interest in the shops opened by the Chinese, and went straight into the thrift shops opened by the Indians. Counting from the time when the British East India Company entered India, the British had already colonized the country. The two hundred years of British colonial rule on the Indian mainland allowed these Indians to collect a lot of British Queen Anne, King George, and Victorian silverware or other antiques in their hometowns.

As soon as she entered the first store, Angie Peris selected a box of Dunning Earl Grey tea from London, which was sealed intact. She has not been able to smell the authentic London tea for a long time, although she now lives in England. There is no shortage of English afternoon tea in hotels, but Dunning has only one store in London, and most of its collections also serve royal and aristocratic Earl Grey tea, which is far from being available in a Far Eastern city like Hong Kong. .

When I visited the third store, I bought the so-called Georgian sterling silver ink bottle in her handbag at this time.

Looking at the appearance of Angie Peris, it seems that she can't get out of this street without spending all the money Song Tianyao gave her. Sure enough, even a ladylike woman is fanatical in the face of shopping. of.

In an Indian thrift store, Song Tianyao picked a mahogany wood inlaid silver Roman totem with a cigar humidor with the Fox-Lewis logo engraved under the base. The dust on the surface was wiped off, and the lid was opened. The thick and delicate wooden box body is equipped with a hygrometer specially used to measure the humidity in the box.

He didn't know how much this cigar humidor would sell in London in 1951, but he went shopping in London in his previous life. He saw a similar cigar humidor at the Fox-Lewis cigar shop, which is known as a two-hundred-year-old cigar store, and offered two prices. Thousands of pounds.

Without knowing the taste of the other party, it is a bit impolite to give a British man cigar when you meet for the first time, but for the first time you meet a cigar humidor from an old cigar brand, it is barely good and practical. .

And the Indian shopkeeper on the opposite side stretched ten fingers towards him, repeating in half-baked Cantonese: "One hundred, one hundred Hong Kong dollars, those patterns are made of silver."

This made Song Tianyao have a good impression of the Asan store owner. He wanted to buy it and left, but now he stopped for the store owner’s cheap sales. He continued to walk a few more steps towards the curry-flavored store and continued to look at the old things, and chose another one. Set of old-fashioned British flower arranging tools as a meeting ceremony for the lady stone.

Finally, in the smile of the shopkeeper Ahsan, Song Tianyao dragged Angie Peris, who was unwilling to leave, out of Morro Street with difficulty: "Ghost girl, you are a lady lawyer, not a human figure who will grab the treasure when she sees it. Mother dragon."

...

Chu Xiaozhong walked out of the door of Sincere Department Store together with the secretary. The driver who had been waiting in the parking lot got out of the car and ran all the way to pick up the gifts that Chu Xiaozhong had wrapped in his hands. Then he hurried back to help Chu Xiaozhong open the back seat door. .

After Chu Xiaozhong and the capable female secretary sat firmly in the back seat of Rolls-Royce, the driver asked from the rearview mirror: "Mr. Chu, where are we going?"

"Go to the restaurant on the top of the mountain and take Miss Yong En and me to Queen's Road. You are waiting in the car." Chu Xiaozhong ordered the driver.

When the car started slowly, the female secretary called Miss Yong En by Chu Xiaozhong said: "The deputy director of the mountain top restaurant Shi Zhiyi has an appointment with five people tonight. In addition to you, Mr. Chu, there are also Liu Guanchun’s five. The son of Liu Fuzhao, he just obtained an MBA degree from the Walton Business School in Pennsylvania, USA six months ago. After returning to Hong Kong, he did not enter the family business to compete with his four brothers. He had already met the Deputy Director Shi Zhiyi at the Yacht Club before. In addition to him, there are Ji Yueyang, the third son of Mr. Ji Dongpu, Gu Dexiang, the fourth son of the taxi king Gu Zhong, and the last one is your younger brother, Chu Xiaoxin and Xin Shao."

"Axin?" Chu Xiaozhong was taken aback for a moment.

During this period of time, Shi Zhiyi met many businessmen before dinner every day. The last few nights were older people who were in their thirties and forties. The last two days , They are the next generations of the big Chinese business families. Originally, if Chu Xiaozhong was just keeping his success and inheriting his father’s business, he would not have to come to see the new deputy director, but he obviously didn’t want to rely on his father’s shadow to survive. New businesses such as warehouses opened by friends and blow molding are at the time when they need to deal with the industrial and commercial management office. Therefore, Chu Xiaozhong wants to get acquainted with the deputy director first. Start communication.

These people tonight, whether it is Liu Fuzhao, the fifth son of the Liu family, one of the four major families in Hong Kong in the eyes of the British, or Ji Yueyang, the third youngest of the Ji family of the Bank of East Asia, or even Gu Dexiang, the concubine of the upstart Gu Zhong, and Chu Xiaozhong. Not surprisingly, these three people are somewhat unstable in the family. To put it bluntly, the future heirs of the family will not be these few, but these few have some abilities, so the family can provide a certain amount of financial support. , Let them come out and open up new territories by themselves. This kind of people are most eager to see Shi Zhiyi. They want to accumulate wealth as soon as possible, so that their parents can see their abilities and efforts, hoping to regain some initiative in the future family heirs.

The strangest thing is his half-brother, Chu Xiaoxin.

"His recent Likang is not planning to do the prohibited goods business, and that kind of business is also used to talk to the deputy chief? Nonsense!" Thoughts flashed in Chu Xiaozhong's mind, cold sweat was about to drip from his forehead.

In the business of prohibited goods, find some intermediate British officials of the Customs and get through all the joints, and then the ship can be safely sailed out of Hong Kong waters. Whether it is a Hong Kong governor or an ordinary British sailor, everyone will not care about it. Xuan, but there must not be a smuggling business hall and rush to discuss with a British ghost who has stepped into the ranks of the Hong Kong colonial government. "Success".

This matter is not because Chu Xiaoxin was outside because the woman was jealous of other incompetent sons and brothers. Chu Xiaozhong ridiculed a few words beside him. In the end, it was nothing more than spending a few money to solve it. Chu Xiaoxin gained a dull reputation.

If this incident were to spread out, even if it did not have much impact on Chu's other business, it would probably become a laughing stock for a while. Even if he and his father went out to meet guests, they would not laugh in front of them, and their eyes would be weird. Whispering teasing behind them would be inevitable.

"Help me right now..." Chu Xiaozhong's first reaction was not to let Chu Xiaoxin stray, he wanted to ask the driver to drive to the Taipingshan cable car boarding point and try to stop Chu Xiaoxin from there, but he was half talking, Chu Xiaozhong After stopping again, the young man standing behind Chu Xiaoxin with a smile on his face suddenly flashed in his mind.

It is impossible for Chu Xiaoxin to think of meeting Shi Zhiyi himself. How could a young man who couldn't even understand the accounts of the business bank be interested in communicating with a stodgy Englishman?

If Song Tianyao arranged it, he should know that as long as his boss speaks in front of Shi Zhiyi, all the details will be exposed. Then he should be prepared. He has just taken the position of Chu Xiaoxin’s secretary. Pushing down the cliff hard, unless he is also ready to be crushed.

Chu Xiaozhong breathed out slowly, leaned his upper body back on the seat, and said to the driver who was waiting for instructions with his ears up: "Nothing, just drive to Queen's Road as usual."

The secretary next to him, Miss Yong En, was a little curious about what Chu Xiaozhong did just now, and asked: "Mr. Chu is worried about the lack of faith?"

"Want to worry, but realized that it was unnecessary. Do you know that I didn't want to hire a secretary casually, but paid a high salary to invite you from the Hong Kong Institute of Chartered Secretaries, Miss Jiang Yongen, a professional company secretary?" Chu Xiaozhongqing Rubbing his eyebrows twice, he turned his face to look at the capable female secretary beside him: "It is because my brother is so lucky that he only spends more than 200 yuan a month in salary, he hired someone to remind me of the past. As for the secretary who was guilty of the cold, I had already made moves to him and Ashin, but I almost fell myself down, and he has not yet returned the blow."

"What's the name of Xin Shao's secretary?" Jiang Yongen asked calmly.

Chu Xiaozhong lowered his hand from his eyebrows and looked out the car window: "His name is Song Tianyao."