Spring Thunder Chapter 0280: Eyes and Yours
After selling the gold for 2.4 million U.S. dollars, he paid the apartment management fee and prepared a year's wages for the servants. He only had 1.8 million U.S. dollars left, and Nan Yi was still a pauper.
Nowadays, if you don’t have three or five million in your pocket, you’d feel embarrassed to go out and you wouldn’t be able to hold your back straight.
Does Nan Yi have three million in his pocket?
No.
Therefore, Nan Yi rarely went out and focused all his attention on taking care of the children and the internal management of Shennong Nanliang Group and Scarlett Grain Group.
The farm and ranch have already been purchased. If you want to recover the investment, you have to grow crops and raise cattle, sheep, horses, pigs and chickens.
This year is also the first year of the two groups. The farms that were acquired will continue to grow the same crops as before, and the ranches will continue to raise the same livestock as before. Nan Yi has not made too many changes.
The two groups threw out a 300 million US dollar purchase order for agricultural machinery in one go. Several agricultural machinery companies and aircraft companies in the United States, Germany, and Italy all heard the news and launched a vigorous bidding and procurement.
July 1st is Fan Hongdou’s birthday.
On this day, Nan Yi and Fan Hongdou signed a share agreement. The two raised 1.6 million US dollars and established an Akesa Vegetable Company with a 50-50 shareholding. Fan Hongdou served as the chairman of the board and Nan Yi as the CEO.
Nan Yi's shares in Akesa Vegetable Company are made public, and it can be found from public channels that he holds 15% of the shares; Fan Hongdou's shares are hidden, and she will return to China for development in the future, so her overseas assets will be kept secret.
The company's funds were mainly used to purchase land in the suburbs, and there was no money to set up an office space. Besides, Nan Yi was too busy to handle all the tasks, so Akesa's office was set up in Nan Yi's study.
Cold Spring Historic District is a literary town located in the upper reaches of the Hudson River. It combines mountain climbing and beautiful small towns in one place. It is a scenic spot within a two-hour drive from New York. There are also a small number of people engaged in agricultural planting in Cold Spring Town.
On the day of Lesser Heat, Nan Yi followed Fan Hongdou here to inspect a small farm.
"Manager Nan, do you think this place is close enough to downtown New York City?"
"Chairman, I carefully checked the road conditions on the way here. The roads from here to New York Grand Central Station are relatively wide and in good condition. I also checked the traffic reports . There are not many traffic jams along this route in the early morning every day. It takes less than an hour to transport vegetables from here to the city."
"Good, Manager Nan, you are very observant. Keep it up." Fan Hongdou patted Nan Yi's belly and praised him.
"Yes, yes, Chairman, I will work hard." Fan Hongdou patted his head, and Nan Yi's back bent, and he nodded and bowed like Ergouzi.
"Okay, make way, we'll talk to the owner of the farm about the price."
"Chairman, there are only a hundred acres of land in total. It can't be called a farm at all."
"Manager Nan, no matter how small a sparrow is, it is still a bird, and no matter how little land you have, it is still a farm."
"Yes, yes, the chairman is right."
Lengquan Town is not big, less than half the size of Wenchangwei, with a population of about two to three hundred people. I guess everyone in the town knows each other.
After buying an ice cream for Fan Hongdou at the ice cream shop in town, Nan Yi and the others continued walking towards the Hudson River. When they reached the river, they went upstream and after a while, they arrived at the door of a lonely building.
If you look down at this area from the air, you can clearly see a U-shaped structure. The missing part is a garden and an open space. Behind the garden is a small house. The U-shaped area is all farmland and vegetable fields.
As soon as they entered the missing area, a dog ran towards them. It didn't bark or bite, but looked at Nan Yi and his group vigilantly.
Nan Yi looked around and found a pole on the left with a sign on it that said "Please ring the bell" in English. He walked over and pressed the doorbell.
About five minutes later, an old man was seen walking out of the building. He was quite old and his legs and feet didn't look very flexible, but he was still holding a Winchester M1887 in his hand.
As soon as they saw the old man had a gun in his hand, the colonel and several others stopped in front of Nan Yi and the other man. The others took out pistols from their arms. Chris even took out his modified M14EBR, which had a foldable buttstock, a shortened barrel, and a lot of tactical parts added.
"First warning, drop your gun," the colonel shouted at the old man.
"Who are you?"
To Nan Yi's great surprise, the old man actually shouted in Chinese.
Of course he knew that the old man was Chinese and that his name was Lin Pingsheng. He had collected information before coming and had contacted him by phone in advance. He just didn't expect that the old man would still speak Chinese at this time.
"Mr. Lin, I'm Nan Yi from Akesa Vegetable Company. We talked on the phone this morning."
"It's you, come here."
Lin Pingsheng said this and leaned the gun in his hand against the corner.
After he finished his action, Nan Yi's bodyguard put away his gun, but he was still on guard. The colonel made a gesture, and Chris quietly left, probably to find a high point with a good view.
Nan Yi and Fan Hongdou were escorted forward. When they reached Lin Pingsheng's side, the bodyguards had already covered several blind spots. Dewen also poked his head into the room.
"Nan boy, are you afraid of death?"
"Yes, Mr. Lin, I haven't lived enough."
"Very honest."
"I don't think it's shameful to be afraid of death." Nan Yi didn't want to continue this topic, so he said, "Mr. Lin, are you the only one here?"
"And my wife, she went to town to do some shopping."
“You didn’t hire any workers?”
"We don't have permanent workers. We only hire temporary workers when we're busy. Two people can take care of it. Come on, I'll take you to see it."
Lin Pingsheng said this, stood up, and walked in front, his back looking a little desolate.
Nan Yi and the others followed, and Lin Pingsheng led them to the vegetable garden. "Now there are water spinach, cucumbers, tomatoes, beans, eggplants, green peppers, amaranth, pumpkins, loofahs, watermelons... These are all seasonal vegetables this month, and they can be picked now."
Following Lin Pingsheng's introduction, Nan Yi saw rows of vegetables, and also saw the two closest rows of watermelons, many of which were cracked.
Nan Yi went to the watermelon and looked inside through the crack. Most of the watermelon was still white. He looked up at the sun and then looked at the area of the watermelon field.
"Mr. Lin, it's a pity to lose these watermelons. You didn't use enough potassium fertilizer last month, you watered too frequently, and you served the water too evenly in a bowl."
"Do you know how to farm?" Lin Pingsheng asked in surprise.
"Look at what you said, you dare to open a vegetable company if you don't know how to farm?"
"Then tell me, why do you say I water too diligently, and why do you say I water too evenly?"
"They say you water too often. Just look at this field. Water is all over the ridges. If it rains, all the melons will be ruined. They say you water too evenly. Although all the melons are in the same field, you didn't choose the right place when you dug the ridges.
You see, the light conditions of these two ridges are very different, half of them are blocked by the fruit trees, and the other half are not. This causes some melons to lack water, while others do not.
If you balance the water level, the ones that are not short of water will become flooded, and after a night, when the sun shines on them, they will crack."
"It seems that you really know how to farm. It's not a big deal if I sell the farm to you."
"Haha, Mr. Lin, let's take a look at other things."
"good."
Chen Pingsheng's farm has been on the market for a long time, but he has been procrastinating on selling it because he wants to find a buyer who is truly interested in running the farm rather than buying it back for tourism.
100 acres of land sounds like a lot, but it actually doesn't take long to actually look at it. It's just an area of 300 meters by 222 meters. Even if Nan Yi looked more carefully, he had already walked around the entire farm in two hours and took several soil samples.
After the viewing, Lin Pingsheng led Nan Yi and others to his living room.
"Mr. Lin, how long have you been running this farm?"
"I came to China in 1945 and bought this place in 1946. It has been thirty-seven years now. That was taken when I just bought this place." Lin Pingsheng said, pointing to the photo on the wall.
Following the direction he pointed, Nan Yi looked over and saw a photo frame on the wall. The photo in the middle showed a young couple smiling happily, and the background of the photo was a wasteland.
On the left side of the photo, there is another photo, a photo of a man who looks very similar to Lin Pingsheng and a Western woman; on the right side is a family photo, with a middle-aged man and woman standing on the left and right of Lin Pingsheng and his wife.
"Mr. Lin, is that your father?"
"Yes, my father and mother. My father was a Chinese laborer in France. My mother's ex-husband died on the front line. Later, she met my father and gave birth to me."
Nan Yi knew something about this period of history. During World War I, Chinese workers serving France were in high demand in the marriage market.
First, many French men died in the war, leaving behind many widows; second, many Chinese workers did not drink or fight, so French girls liked to marry them, believing that they would definitely live a happy life if they married them.
From this we can infer that although the French men were not good at fighting, they were probably good at beating their wives.
It is said that there were more than 3,000 Chinese workers who stayed in France at that time, and it seems that Lin Pingsheng's father was one of them.
"Oh, then Mr. Lin, why are you here again?"
“Haha.” Lin Pingsheng smiled and said, “Back then, I found my old wife in Savage Mountain and carried her out of the mountain. She insisted on marrying me.
Later, after we won, I took her to Paris. My parents had passed away at the same time, but her family was still there, so we sold our belongings in Paris and came to the United States together. ”
"Mr. Lin also participated in the expeditionary army?"
"I guess so. I returned to China in 1939 and was first assigned to the Sichuan Army. Later, I was sent to Burma by mistake. I was lucky. I fought for seven years without any serious injuries."
Nan Yi was in awe. Although Lin Pingsheng's words were a bit concise, he still understood them. He and his wife were overseas Chinese from France and China respectively. They were called upon to go back to fight against the Japanese invaders, survived most of the war, and wrote a romantic song on the battlefield.
The wallet in his pocket was upset. Lin Pingsheng was such a person. How could Nan Yi have the nerve to bargain for him? His wallet would definitely suffer a little.
"Mr. Lin, where are you going to go after you sell this place? Are you going to live with your son? The other photo shows your son and his wife, right?"
After Nan Yi finished speaking, Lin Pingsheng's face turned gloomy, "My eldest daughter and second son, my son is not married yet, ah...
I don't want to live with him. Let's sell this place. My wife and I plan to take the money and go out for a walk. We are already this old and don't know how long we can live. We should see more of the world."
After Lin Pingsheng said this, Nan Yi didn't want to ask any more questions, so he said, "Then Mr. Lin, let's talk about the price."
"Just give me 300,000 for the house and the land outside."
"Okay, 300,000."
"You don't bargain?" Lin Pingsheng asked in surprise.
"No need to return it, this price is worth it."
Lin Pingsheng's asking price was indeed the market price. Lengquan Town is also a tourist area, so it is reasonable that the price is a bit higher than other places. But in fact, there is room for bargaining, and it is possible to lower the price by 20,000.
"You'd better bargain. I feel uneasy if you do this."
"Haha, Mr. Lin, it's really not necessary. I've also checked. The land outside is well taken care of. As for the house..." Nan Yi turned around and took another look. "The house has termites. It needs to be repaired."
"You figured it out. I wanted to tell you." Lin Pingsheng said a little embarrassedly: "How about this, I'll reduce it by 10,000, to 290,000."
"Really, it's not necessary. Just 300,000 yuan."
"290,000."
"No, 300,000."
"Then let's each make some concessions and I'll add 5,000."
"Okay, as you say, 295,000."
This was the first time that such a thing happened to Nan Yi. He actually raised the price when buying something.
Nan Yi and Lin Pingsheng smiled at each other and reached a deal.
Just as Nan Yi took out a contract and prepared to let Lin Pingsheng review it first, and then sign it another day with a lawyer present, a voice came into his ears.
"Dad, why are there so many people at the door?"
"Nan boy, let me introduce you, this is my daughter Lin Shuyi." Lin Pingsheng pointed at the owner of the voice and said, "Daughter, this is Nan Yi, he is here to buy our farm."
"Hello, Ms. Lin, my name is Nan Yi, and I'm from Akesa Vegetable Company."
"Hello." Lin Shuyi responded lightly, and then said to Lin Pingsheng: "Dad, why do you still want to sell the farm? Didn't I tell you that if you and mom want to go on a trip, David and I will pay for you."
"Why would I keep it if you don't sell it? Do you know how to farm?" Lin Pingsheng said unhappily, "Nan Yi knows how to farm. I believe he can take good care of this land."
"Okay, okay, I won't argue with you. Mr. Nan, have you guys agreed on the price?"
"It's settled, 295,000."
"Dad, isn't it 300,000?" Lin Shuyi said with a frown.
"Don't worry about it. I took the initiative to reduce the salary for Nan. Just help me look at the contract." Lin Pingsheng handed the contract in his hand to Lin Shuyi.
Lin Shuyi looked very young at first glance, but Nan Yi, who had “seen countless people”, could tell that she was definitely forty years old. The photo of her he had just seen was probably from five or six years ago.
Although Lin Shuyi is pretty, Nan Yi would not pay much attention to her due to her age. But her eyes made Nan Yi unable to help but look at them a few more times. He had a very familiar feeling about these eyes.
While Lin Shuyi was looking at the contract, Nan Yi looked at her eyes a few more times, but still couldn't remember where he had seen them before.
Until he made an appointment to go to the law firm to sign the contract tomorrow, and until he left Lengquan, Nan Yi still couldn't remember it.
"Godfather, the eyes of that aunt just now are similar to yours." Fan Hongdou suddenly said after getting in the car.
