Chapter 48, the Eight Directions Wind and Rain Meeting Qiongya (2)

On the seventh day of the first month of the fifth year of Chongzhen, Hainan Island, Lingao County, Bopu Port

At present, Bopu Port is a bustling and unprecedentedly noisy scene, with thousands of sailing ships from all over the world simply crowding the huge harbor. The adjective "thousands of sails gathered, masts like forests" is not exaggerated if it is used in the here and now

With the joint diplomatic expeditionary fleet of the three groups of Australia and the Americas, carrying a large amount of money and goods, arrived at the port of Bopu in Lingao County five days ago, plus a large number of Dutch, British, French, Portuguese, Spanish and even Danish merchant ships that came over -- more than 20,000 foreign populations from the Americas, Europe, Africa, Oceania, West Asia and Southeast Asia, and all kinds of rare commodities from dozens of countries on all continents of the world, all at once poured into the Lingao market, making this already very prosperous port city. Instantly, it was filled with unprecedented economic vitality.

As a result, on the temporary expansion of the large square of Bopu Port, a huge market with a lot of people of all colors from all over the world walked, as well as wonderful animals from different continents, and was filled with the cries of various accents.

What's more, at the gate of the bazaar, the exaggerated sign of "The First World Expo in 63" was hung up by the travelers of good deeds.

However, judging from the various goods that appear in the bazaar, today's Bopu Port Bazaar is indeed worthy of the name of "World Expo":

“…… Fine American Sorrel (Mahogany) for sale with excellent texture and limited quantities, want to buy now"

“…… American sea otter skin and bear fur are shiny and shiny, thick and thick, you see, I didn't lie to you, it's definitely the best color."

“…… The finest whale oil harvested and refined from the Southern Ocean can be lit and eaten, and it has a strange fragrance after being lit, which can prolong life and prolong life......"

“… Specialties of the East Coast of the Americas, South American printed alpaca blankets and alpaca fur coats are sold cheaply"

“…… African ivory, rhinoceros horn, good Tianzhu spices, and Western Gems are on sale."

“…… The new Western music alarm clock, music box, gramophone, beautiful shape, melodious music, please don't miss it"

“…… Authentic Australian specialty, cool and cool eucalyptus candy, cool oil cheap sale"

“…… Tianzhu specialty curry rice, Tang Sanzang tasted the exotic flavor, please watch "Journey to the West" guests come to taste......"

“…… Tianzhu Dance Ji Tianfang Music Persian Belly Dance only performs three times a day, outdated and not waiting"

“…… South American Ancient ☆ Keye Western Regions Arabic Tea only needs to be put in the mouth and chewed, it can refresh the eye-catching, nourish the yin and nourish the kidneys......"

“…… Now hold an authentic Australian rare birds and beasts exhibition, today there are ostrich race walking competition, kangaroo boxing competition, giant turtle crawling competition, please watch the officials enthusiastically bet, those who bet on the winner have rich prizes, and those who do not win also have a consolation prize, please pass by, don't miss the ......"

While these foreigners were trying their best to promote the specialties of overseas countries, the local merchants on Hainan Island also heard the wind and organized a large number of traditional oriental specialties such as silk, tea, and porcelain to trade.

Among them, there were not only the cooperatives and trade representatives of the foreign trade department controlled by the Senate of Lingao Traversal, but also the caravans of the local gentry and wealthy families on Hainan Island.

-- Like most of the wealthy people of this era, the gentry on Hainan Island used to buy land as their main means of investment. In their eyes, only good fields that can grow crops are the only stable and reliable property security. Or they would have minted gold or silver into a large ingot of hundreds of pounds each, and hid them in the cellar or secret room of the house, so that the thieves could not be dragged away even if they got in, and of course, if they encountered robbers, they would not be able to do anything.

However, after more contact with the "Australian gentry", the ideas of many "intimate gentry" are gradually changing, and one of the most critical ones is to gradually agree with the financial management concept of "human beings" - only the liquid funds are wealth, and the gold and silver hidden at home are just a pile of dead things. Confidence in the regime led to more and more wealthy local people making commercial investments, buying ships, hiring sailors, and trading overseas...... Although it is still just a bud, it is already quite thriving.

In addition to other groups of traversers from all over the world, as well as the "red-haired people" from Europe and the dwarthy natives of Southeast Asia, there are now many white-turbaned Arabs in Lingao County, which are the real patrons of East Asian trade.

In fact, as early as the distant Han and Tang dynasties, these brave Arabs drove rudimentary boats, opened up the Maritime Silk Road, and started trading with the Chinese, although the Arabs bought the goods here, the ultimate goal was to resell them to Westerners and Africans, and make huge profits from them. But even in the late Ming Dynasty, many Chinese businessmen in Lingnan were still accustomed to trading with them, because the two sides were already old customers who had maintained a cooperative relationship for hundreds of years and several lifetimes, and the credit bonus was extraordinary. Some of them have lived in Lingnan for many years, except for the difference in appearance, in terms of language and habits, they are not much different from the Chinese, only in terms of religious beliefs are still very stubborn, and later they all became Hui.

(The Hui people in Guangxi and Guangdong in modern times, such as the more famous Bai Chongxi, are basically by-products of the Maritime Silk Road.) ）

Prior to this, these Arab merchants, who had been engaged in international trade for generations, had mainly settled in Guangzhou, the largest trading port in Lingnan. However, as Lingao was extremely prosperous by the "Australians", all kinds of "Australian goods" sold well in domestic and foreign markets, and the "Australian warships" swept across the Pearl River, and the Arab businessmen in Guangzhou naturally began to pay attention to this place, and from time to time some people tried to come to Lingao to sell goods and step on the spot. Next, they found that not only was there an abundance of cargo, but also the loading and unloading efficiency of the terminal and the actual amount of taxes and fees were satisfactory, so they came more and more often.

In particular, the "World Expo" gathered with thousands of sails, as early as when the fleets of various countries were still grinding in Batavia, the news had already spread all over the masterpiece of the foreign trade department of the Senate of the Lingao Traveler of Liangguang, because the cost of receiving so many American and Australian compatriots was really huge, and it was impossible to afford it with finance alone, and it was necessary to find a way to do business more or less). As a result, there has been an endless stream of Arab merchants who have come to Lingao recently, including both "close neighbors" from Guangzhou and distant travelers from the Arabian Peninsula, Ottoman Turkey, Egypt, Persia and India following the diplomatic fleets of China and the United States. From Bopu Port to Dongmen City, you can see nests of little white hats drilling around. They haggle in fluent Cantonese, or pick up a critique of goods, and their ability to bargain is far greater than that of their counterparts from Europe.

The trade representatives of the Senate of the Lingao Travelers received several waves of "big customers" from the Arab world in these days, some of whom had dealt with Arab customers in the modern world, and those buyers from the oil-producing countries of the Gulf had traditionally been considered the best customers - they were generous in their money, rarely picky, and with the exception of the occasional minor flaw in their credibility, everything else was perfect.

But the business predecessors of the Arab world in front of them made the travelers almost think that they had run into a group of Wenzhou people - shrewd, calculating, and liked to bargain over every tiny detail, and after several rounds of negotiations, everyone felt deeply unbearable for these calculating Arab businessmen. The originally conceived plan of "slaughtering the desert tyrants" eventually went bankrupt completely, and it was not easy to keep the most basic profits.

-- There is no way, the Arabs in these days are not some wealthy oil tyrants, but hard traders who rely on selling goods between the East and the West, fighting against the storms and waves, and fighting their own lives and even the lives of their whole families in order to get a little hard-earned money. Especially at the beginning of the Age of Discovery, European navigators have squeezed out a lot of their market share, if they are not a little more shrewd, how can they survive this life?

Although there are still some unsatisfactory points, the World Expo in Lingao was still quite successful, and the amount of transactions per day is astronomical according to the standards of this era. Lingao County, which used to have a limited population movement, has suddenly become an exhibition of people of all kinds from all over the world, and a large number of people of all kinds land every day. The port wharf is always full of people day and night, and it has almost become a city that never sleeps. Many people of the Ming Dynasty were amazed by this, and navigators from Europe and the United States from overseas also expressed considerable satisfaction with the port.

“…… The real life at sea is far from being as romantic as in the bullshit novels written by some sour literati, think about it, you are in a small boat, you have to eat pig and dog food that beggars don't want to eat, you fall asleep smelling each other's stinky feet, you are bored looking at the same sky and the same sea every day, and you have to fight the wind and waves, pirates, sharks and sepsis

At this time, suddenly a land appeared like a myth, a port, a prosperous port, as if it was the magic of the Siren, this port has a huge dock neatly clean, the masts of ships moored on the sea are as dense as woods, and the sails are as many as clouds in the sky, Japanese, Chinese, Luzon, Siamese, Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, British, and even distant Americans and mysterious Australians, They are all attracted by this prosperous port, and they carry out all kinds of transactions, sell their goods, buy the goods they need, and search for supplies for navigation, this is Bopu Port, of course, you have to pay a considerable amount of taxes......"

-- This is a letter from a Portuguese merchant who had come to Lingao with a fleet on the east coast to his new wife, along with a silk horse.

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In this bustling and prosperous scene, Xu Xiake, dressed as a Ming scholar, is leisurely holding a glass teapot in his hand, sitting alone in a pavilion on the seaside of Bopu Port, facing the slightly salty sea breeze, looking at the dense ships of various countries in the port in front of him, as well as the business travelers of various countries wandering around, from time to time he picked up the small teapot and took a sip on the spout, looking self-satisfied.

This round glass teapot was newly bought by him in the cooperative of the "Australian Beard" in Lingao East Gate City. Although according to the aunt in the cooperative, it is not very good to use a glass pot to make tea, and the tea is far less authentic than the purple clay pot, Xu Xiake still likes to use this new thing - Yixing, Jiangsu, which produces purple clay pots, is near Xu Xiake's hometown. What's more fun than this crystal clear glass teapot? Even just watching the tea leaves soak and bloom in the boiling water little by little, and the tea soup slowly changing color, is also a novel pleasure for Xu Xiake, which makes him happy.

And what he saw and heard on this trip to Lingao made Xu Xiake, the "first donkey passenger in the late Ming Dynasty", feel that his life was wonderful and worthy of his life - after walking around the Lingao market before, watching a series of "Australian scenes" such as cinemas, department stores, telegraph offices, steamboats, street lighting systems, railway trains, etc., Xu Xiake and the brother who accompanied him to the south already felt that the trip was eye-opening and worthwhile. Who knew that after their brothers finished their visit to Lingao County, and followed the caravan of the "Australian Beards" to the village, deep in the mountains of the island, they actually caught up with the fleet of the "descendants of the Great Song Dynasty" from all over the world, broke through the barrier of thousands of miles of sea waves, and joined the unprecedented event in Lingao County

Looking at these "descendants of the Great Song Dynasty" from different distant and exotic lands such as the Americas and Australia, with almost the same "short hair", wearing similar styles of fancy clothes (modern clothes), and even speaking with a similar accent (Mandarin), driving a huge ship like a mountain across the sea to come here, showing off their might, so that those Tianzhu people, Persians, big cannibals, Nanyang people, and red-haired people all bow their heads and worship from the heart. As for the famous Japanese who were once famous in the coastal areas of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, they were driven like servants, Xu Xiake couldn't help but sigh from the bottom of his heart:

“…… Huamei, East Coast, Australia...... Hey, I can't imagine that after the fall of the Great Song Dynasty in Yashan in the past, there were still so many remnants scattered overseas, and the life was so developed and prosperous.

However, as soon as he remembered that out of curiosity about his "distant compatriots" in these days, he had heard from the officers and soldiers of the Huamei fleet and the merchants that he had heard about the country's domestic affairs, especially those things that completely violated the concept of Ming Dynasty scholars, Xu Xiake's expression gradually became solemn.

-- On the stone table in front of Xu Xiake, a slightly yellowed diary was spread out, the last few pages of which recorded that he had just heard rumors about China and the United States. From the perspective of the Da Ming people, this country simply does not have half of the charm of the Tang and Song dynasties, and has lost all the glory of etiquette, righteousness and shame:

“…… Huamei, the country of tigers and wolves, Huamei established the country with war, destroyed countless countries, dominated the land of northern America, the vast area was taken also, at the beginning of the founding of the country, it was only a corner of Manchester City, and now it is the overlord of North America, taking advantage of coastal water transportation, traversing the north and south, the land is wide and thousands of miles is especially small, and the east and west are endless, and the greed is insatiable. Although the government is said to be beautiful, there is no extra land, and there is nothing more greedy than this. However, the beauty praised it deeply.

Last year, the American government of China called for westward expansion, the people and the landless people enthusiastic, the people who went west with guns, the army was postponed, the native people suffered this catastrophe, killed Yingye, because the beauty asked for the land, the American soldiers were tyrannical and thirsty to kill, the common people of the country were happy when they heard the war, and they had no scruples, the newspaper news advocated every day, ten cities today, five cities tomorrow, captured the enemy soldiers as slaves, bought and Taixi Zhuyi as coolies, labor and abuse to the dead do not know how many, the beauties only asked how much profit from selling slaves, the local people did not care about life and death, and those who made less profits were stunned and beat their chests, and they were extremely annoyed. Those who profit more are smiling and happy.

The beauty is so belligerent and tyrannical, because the American soldiers are brave and good at fighting, the number of people who kill the enemy and the loss of soldiers and horses is few and near, the enemy is killed by thousands and the soldiers are few and dozens, the people call it a peaceful battle, although the domestic industry is prosperous, food and clothing are worry-free, every year the recruitment is still crowded, the young and strong only hate not to take, and the country is very different, and the selected are elite. In addition, the Chinese and beautiful people are still martial, and everyone enlists in the army, because of the generous military salary, and they are all treated preferentially when they travel and buy, the so-called iron law of military priority, the people and gentry are respected, and they are the loveliest people, and the squire owners are happy to marry women and officers, which can be seen......

Yu Siguo's courtiers and doctors despise the warriors, and they are especially sad. Woohoo, Huamei originated from the former Song Dynasty, but the atmosphere is very different, light literature and heavy martial arts, especially heavy objects, disdain shì benevolence and righteousness, and the former Song Dynasty is very different, it can be described as the opposite of each other, more like the violent Qin. Yu Zeng watched several beautiful newspapers, the Song poetry on it is almost extinct, all the publications are vernacular, the style of writing is rough and unsightly, there are many articles advocating killing and slaughter, the so-called orange is born in Huainan and is the orange, Yu Jinxin ......"