Xie Yuxi is still very good at getting things done. With the experience of Beiman Girls' High School, after coming to Tianjin, she also found Chengmei Church, a missionary middle school opened by the Wesleyan Protestant Church in Tianjin from the United States.
This school has also been followed to this day, and its name has become today's Tianjin Huiwen Middle School. Ma Sanli, the master of cross talk, graduated from this school.
The Wesleyan missionaries managed the school well, and it was not as short of money as the Beiman Girls' High School in the capital, so they did not want to go out independently.
However, Wesley Zong recommended to Xie Yuxi people on the board of directors of the British Concession Industry Bureau. Through them, Xie Yuxi finally contacted someone who was interested in selling the land.
——Xu Run, a large real estate developer.
Xu Run knew about Li Yu. He had experienced tragic ups and downs in the business world. After making money for most of his life, he still wanted to do some education and accumulate good deeds.
Xu Run also wanted to meet Li Yu with his own eyes and get to know the most famous Chinese person abroad.
But if Xie Yuxi wants to rent or buy the land he owns, he still needs to get approval from the Tianjin Concession Industry Bureau.
Like Xu Run, Breeden, the director of the British Concession Industrial Bureau, also wanted to meet Li Yu. When the time comes, let him appear and talk to Breton in person, and there will be a certain probability of obtaining the consent of the Industrial Bureau.
Xu Run was a man who knew how to get things done, so he immediately set up a fight at the famous Cheesewood Restaurant in the British Concession, and invited Breeden, director of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce Bureau, Tang Shaoyi from the Tianjin Customs Department, Yan Fansun, and Zhang Boling, celebrities in education, to appear.
Tang Shaoyi came because of Li Yu's sake.
Xu Run knew this, but it would be more beneficial to him to take this opportunity to get to know senior officials.
So Xie Yuxi sent a telegram to Li Yu, inviting him to open the Shilin Restaurant in the British Concession in Tianjin.
After Fengling at home received the telegram, she translated it and immediately gave it to Li Yu. After reading it, Li Yu had nothing to say. Anyway, Tianjin is so close, so just go.
After tidying up a little, he called Zhao Qian and took him to the train station.
After buying the ticket, Li Yu still sighed: "It would be great if I could buy an annual pass now."
Train tickets are not cheap at this time.
Li Yu has been to Tianjin several times and is very familiar with it. According to the address they gave, he found the Chishilin Restaurant.
This restaurant is located at the northeastern end of the famous Tianjin Fifth Avenue, and has been passed down to future generations as a time-honored restaurant.
Chi Shilin Restaurant is one of the earliest Western restaurants and is a very tasteful place in today's Tianjin Concession.
Li Yu came to the door of the restaurant, looked at it, and asked the security guard: "Is this the Qishlin Restaurant?"
The security guard glanced at Li Yu and didn't want to talk to him.
So Li Yu asked again: "Excuse me, is this Qishilin Restaurant?"
The security guard finally raised his eyes and looked at Li Yu: "Yes, what are you doing?"
"That's right."
Li Yu raised his legs and wanted to walk in, but the security guard shouted angrily:
"stop!"
Li Yu was stunned: "Stop?"
The security guard looked at him: "Chinese?"
Li Yu wondered: "Yes, what's wrong?"
The security guard said: "This is a Western restaurant specially opened for foreign adults. Chinese people are not allowed to enter unless they are accompanied by foreign adults."
"Do you need to be accompanied by a foreigner?" Li Yu asked in astonishment, "Where does this ridiculous rule come from?"
The security guard lifted his belt and said, "That's it! Chinese people are too dirty. If you just go in casually, you might disturb the interest of the foreign adults."
Li Yu almost laughed angrily: "Isn't this nonsense!"
The security guard snorted: "I don't have time to talk to you, let's go, let's go!"
Li Yu said: "If Chinese people have to go in accompanied by foreigners, wouldn't they be led in like dogs?"
The security guard said: "You can understand it this way."
"Are you Chinese too?" Li Yu asked.
The security guard said: "Yes."
"You are a watchdog here and you actually stop Chinese people. Don't you feel ashamed?" Li Yu said.
"Who are you scolding! You are the dog!" the security guard said loudly, "Anyway, you have to be led by a foreigner to get in!"
Li Yu asked: "Do you know who I am?"
The security guard said: "I don't care who you are, my duty is to prevent idlers from entering at will. This place is too close to the pier, and Chinese people begging for food often come in, so the hotel has this rule."
"Depend on!"
Li Yu felt like he had met a fool.
But think about it, although Li Yu has already gained a lot of fame, most people who know him are literate, and how many people in China are literate now, and more people don't even know about Li Yu's existence.
.
In other words, most Chinese people basically don’t know anyone other than the county magistrate, the emperor, and their place of residence.
During the Gengzi National Disaster, the Eight-Power Allied Forces caused chaos in Beijing and Tianjin. Many farmers fled to relatively safe concessions.
Unexpectedly, not long after, many foreign venues have set up strange regulations.
Li Yu once saw the so-called "Chinese people and dogs are not allowed" shameful sign on TV, but he didn't expect that it would actually happen to him.
The key lies in the Chinese territory.
The saddest thing is that the person who stopped him turned out to be a Chinese!
Discrimination is not terrible, but the strange looks from compatriots are the most harmful.
If Li Yu hadn't wanted to keep the appointment, he would have turned around and left long ago. He had to endure the explanation again, but before he could speak, two more children begging came over and said to the security guard:
"Master, please do me a favor. Do you have any leftover food? Give us two bites."
The security guard was extremely annoyed: "This is the third time today, don't you bother me! Don't delay the hotel's business!"
The older children said: "Master, can you just let my brother eat two bites? We have been hungry for four days and we really can't stand it anymore!"
"Get out of here, get out of here, if the foreigners see it, I will be punished too!" The security guard immediately drove them away.
Li Yu didn't want to explain who he was now, and the security guard might not be able to understand his explanation, and thought he was fooling him.
Li Yu looked around and saw that there seemed to be a bun shop along the street in the distance, so he said to the two beggars, "Come on, I'll take you to eat buns."
The Haihe River in Tianjin was dredged three years ago. There are many people coming along the canal and Haihe River. However, affected by the Gengzi Incident, their lives are very difficult, and beggars are common.
The two little beggars immediately said to Li Yu: "You are the great master, you are the great master!"
Li Yu sighed, said nothing more, and led them to the bun shop.
I looked up and saw the signboard of "De Ju Hao". So, if this is not the Goubuli bun shop founded by Gao Guiyou, it is at least his branch shop.
Gao Guiyou has been running a steamed bun shop for decades, and his steamed buns have long been famous in Tianjin. Even Yuan Shikai knew about his steamed buns when he was training the Beiyang New Army in Tianjin.
In this era, there is no advertising. It is not easy to be known on the streets. It depends entirely on your true skills.
As for the origin of the name "Goubuli Steamed Buns", it is actually because Gao Guiyou's nickname was "Gouzi". His business was so popular that he had no time to collect money, so he asked people to throw the money into the bowl. So everyone spread the word
: "If a dog sells buns, he won't pay any attention to them." From time to time, it becomes like a dog ignoring the buns.
The two little beggars looked at the buns eagerly and drooled.
When the shop owner saw it, he said, "Wait a moment. I've specially steamed some glutinous rice noodles and brought some to you."
The shop owner was also kind-hearted, but he felt it was too much for him to give them steamed buns. Moreover, for beggars, eating glutinous rice bran is no different from eating yeast buns, as long as it can quench hunger.
Li Yu understood what he meant, so he said: "No, boss, I will let them eat steamed buns this time. I will pay for how much they eat. In addition, give me a few."
As soon as the two beggars heard what Li Yu said, they couldn't wait for the shop owner to agree. They grabbed seven or eight buns with four hands and started to devour them.
The shop owner didn't know whether to laugh or cry: "There is water next to you, just scoop it up and drink it yourself."
Then he served Li Yu a plate and said, "My guest, please use it slowly."
Li Yu tasted it and found it tasted pretty good.
The shop owner said: "In this world, good people like you are rare."
Li Yu smiled bitterly and said: "It helped me for a while, but I don't know what will happen tomorrow."
There are too many street children nowadays, and there are even more on the other side of the Haihe River. Some of them risk their lives swimming over every day.
The shop owner said: "From what you said, you have returned from studying abroad, right?"
Li Yu nodded: "Yes. May I ask if your surname is Gao?"
The shop owner said: "Yes, I am Gao Jinming."
It turns out that he is the son of Gao Guiyou, the founder of Goubuli Baozi. To be precise, he is an adopted son. He used to be a clerk in the store.
"Is it good business to open a shop in the concession?" Li Yu asked casually when he had nothing to do.
Gao Jinming said: "It's really good. I didn't expect that foreigners also like to eat this. In the beginning, our business in the French Concession was only okay. After moving to the British Concession this year, it has become extremely good."
Li Yu smiled and said: "This feeling is good."
Gao Jinming said: "It's really strange. You said these foreigners are so rich, why do they still like to eat our steamed buns?"
Li Yu said: "If you eat British food a few times, you may understand that they don't understand what food is at all."
Gao Jinming didn't know the British food culture. He just thought that foreigners were so good, and they must eat better.
In fact, nowadays in foreign countries, they also love Chinese soup dumplings very much.
Li Yu's buns are delicious here, but it's different in Qi Shilin Restaurant.
Xu Run and Tang Shaoyi were already in Tianjin and had arrived early.
Even if Breeden, the director of the Tianjin British Concession Industry Bureau, did not come with him, the security guards would not dare to stop the dignified Tianjin Customs Commissioner.
To put it bluntly, it’s up to people to order the dishes.
Xu Run wanted to curry favor with Tang Shaoyi and said politely: "Tang Daotai, I am really honored that you can come today."
Tang Shaoyi smoked a cigar in his iconic manner and said, "It's also for education."
Xu Run immediately praised: "Tang Daotai is righteous!"
Tang Shaoyi asked: "Your business seems to be improving recently?"
Xu Run smiled and said: "Doing a small business can't be compared with Tang Daotai."
Tang Shaoyi puffed out his cigarette: "If you call it a small business, there will be no big business."
Xu Run was a super real estate developer in Shanghai back then. It should be said that he was the first generation of big real estate developers in Shanghai, earlier than Hartung.
Xu Run was one of the four major compradors in the late Qing Dynasty. He started in the tea business and became very successful. He was known as the "Shanghai Tea King".
Later, when Shanghai opened as a port, Xu Run had a very sharp vision. He saw early on the popularity of real estate in Shanghai in the future, so he spent all his wealth to buy real estate in the Yangzijiang Road area, reaching the point where "you can buy as much as you can".
For more than a hundred years, the model of real estate speculation has been like that. Xu Run’s model may sound familiar to everyone:
Xu Run used the money he earned from his own tea business to purchase land and real estate; then he mortgaged the real estate, borrowed money from banks or banks, and continued to purchase real estate... and the cycle continued.
The key is that this person saw it very accurately. He had a thorough understanding of the expansion trend of Shanghai's concessions, and then bought land at a low price in a traffic thoroughfare. After operating it to a semi-developed state, he sold it at a high price, and then purchased more land from other places.
On the eve of the Sino-French War, he already owned more than 3,000 acres of land in his name. 300 acres of it had already built houses, with a total of more than 2,000 rooms. Xu Rung collected 120,000 taels of silver in house rent alone every year.
Therefore Xu Run is also known as the "Shanghai Real Estate King".
However, after the Sino-French War, housing prices in Shanghai hit rock bottom, and he suffered heavy losses. A large number of assets were forced to be sold to Hartung at a low price.
It can be said that "Xu Run is down, and Ha is full".
In the same year, another Anhui businessman Hu Xueyan also encountered similar problems. He was completely defeated in a "raw silk war" and suffered a huge loss of 10 million taels of silver. He has never recovered from the fall.
However, Xu Run was not discouraged and instead took a fancy to Tianjin real estate and purchased nearly 2,000 acres of land at a low price.
After 1900, as the Haihe River channel was dredged and the excavated sand filled up large swamps in the concessions of various countries, Tianjin's investment environment was greatly improved. Business activities in Tianjin's concessions also became more prosperous, driving the real estate industry.
It starts to get hot.
Xu Run once again made a lot of money.
This person can be called a wizard in business.
In addition, he also founded China's first insurance company; he also participated in the establishment of the Steamship Merchants Bureau and Kaiping Coal Mine.
Real estate is naturally booming, and Tianjin concessions are also expanding.
Tang Shaoyi whispered worriedly: "Britain and France are both trying their best to expand the scope of the concession. The British succeeded at the beginning of this year, and I am afraid France is not far behind."
Last year, the French Consul in Tianjin, Luo Tuge, sent a note to Tang Shaoyi of the Tianjin Customs Department, requesting that the Laoxikai area with an area of 4,000 acres be included in the French Concession. Tang Shaoyi ignored it and made no reply.
However, at the beginning of this year, the British Concession was the first to expand, acquiring almost 4,000 acres of land. Affected by this, France is eager to try again.
Xu Run also replied: "Indeed, a lot of land in my hands did not originally belong to the concession. Now it has been forcibly managed by the concession. If you want to sell it, you must obtain the approval of the board of directors of the concession industry bureau."
But as a businessman, Xu Run was actually already happy. When he bought the land, he was sure that the concession area would expand.
However, although the Concession Ministry of Industry and Commerce Bureau did not take back his land, any further transactions would require the approval of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce Bureau.
To put it bluntly, you have to pay taxes to the Ministry of Industry.
They chatted for a long time, waiting here and there but couldn't wait for Li Yu, and they were puzzled.
Tang Shaoyi asked Xie Yuxi: "Is the time agreed upon?"
Xie Yuxi nodded: "We made an agreement yesterday to set it at 12 noon today. We can't go wrong."
Xu Run said: "Is the train delayed?"
Tang Shaoyi said: "Even if it's delayed, it's still time to arrive. We can't let the train explode."