Chapter three hundred and forty first cotton for gems
Countess G's maid presented a welcome gift, and Huanong stepped forward to take it. There were several tropical fruits in it.
Lin Wanwan set out the tea set and gave the other party a complete set of tea-making procedures. Don't worry about whether you like to drink it or not. Burning incense and making tea is an elegant thing and is also one of the business cards of the Tang Dynasty nobles. It can't be more honorable to entertain guests.
Countess G was dazzled by the smooth tea-making process, and she was fascinated by it.
The Three Treasures of the Tang Dynasty were particularly popular in maritime trade, namely silk, porcelain and tea.
Countess g may not like drinking tea much, but she is willing to be arty. Tea is loved by everyone in the Tang Dynasty aristocracy, so it is naturally delicious, and she will definitely like it.
"Dear Miss Le'an Xiangjun, this tea is so delicious." When Countess G said a long sentence, there was a strong curry sound, which was Assana's taste.
The Lion Kingdom was the name in the "Book of Liang" in the early Tang Dynasty. A few years later Xuanzang translated it as Sinhala, which is almost the island of Sri Lanka in later generations.
During the Tang Dynasty, the Lion Kingdom was not yet a colony of the Empire on which the Sun Never Sets, nor was it a member of the British Commonwealth, so their current official language is mainly Tamil.
This language belongs to the southern language group of the Dravidian language family and is also one of the official languages of Asan Kingdom, Tianzhu during the Tang Dynasty. Therefore, it naturally smells like curry to Lin Wanwan's ears.
As a mature time-traveler who has mastered the time-space bracelet for a year, Lin Wanwan has done a lot of research on the history of the Tang Dynasty and world historical materials of the same period.
So when I saw this countess who had traveled thousands of miles to do business, the first thought that came to my mind was to exchange cotton for their gems!
Why not replace it with glass? Hey! Isn't it because she didn't bring it with her when she went out this time? Whether it is glass products in the warehouse in Luan County or in the modern shopping mall, for her now, the water cannot quench her thirst.
Although Lin Wanwan is already very rich, no one would dislike money too much. The rich gem resources in the Lion Kingdom are so coveted!
If the carriages and horses of the Tang Dynasty were not too slow and modern customs inspections were too strict, she would have taken a plane and traveled through time and space to buy gems.
Now there was no need for her to run away on her own, but there was a local nobleman who came to her door for free. Lin Wanwan's inner calculations certainly started to jingle.
If God does not take it, you will suffer the consequences!
What could be happier than making money with a huge profit!
Thinking of this, the smile on Lin Wanwan's face became three points sweeter. The other person now looked like a sparkling gem in her eyes!
She wants as many Alexandrite gems, sapphires, opals, moonstones, etc. as she can, and accepts them all!
If it weren't for the fact that the Lion Country itself is a tropical country that produces pepper, they are not as rare as the Tang people.
The pepper that Arab merchants sold to the Tang Dynasty all the way through the Silk Road came from places such as Tianzhu and the Lion Kingdom. Otherwise, what Lin Wanwan would rather do is exchange the pepper for gems with the countess.
She still has a bit of a guilty conscience for cheating the people of the Tang Dynasty, but for this foreign race, she can harvest as much wool as she can without any psychological burden.
Therefore, Lin Wanwan left Countess G to eat lunch in her courtyard. It was a habit of modern Chinese people to discuss business while eating, and Lin Wanwan was no exception.
After taking a short nap after dinner, Lin Wanwan Shi Shiran followed Countess G and went into their fleet to inspect the goods and make transactions.
Foreign aristocrats are not as reserved as Chinese people. When doing business, they have to socialize and cover it up first, as if this way they will not smell so coppery. In fact, it is just a cover-up. Once you start doing business, you cannot ignore it.
As soon as Lin Wanwan came up, she was directly introduced by Countess G to Earl G and his business assistants. Everyone started talking about the business and got straight to the point.
In this era, the world's values have the same view on businessmen - that is, they are inferior, despicable, and philistine, and the noble people are afraid to avoid them.
The exclusivity of power gives the ruling class a natural desire to control capital and cannot allow businessmen to become powerful.
The famous "cutting out a hole" proposed by Guan Zhong is a theoretical summary of power's control over capital.
In the upper classes around the world, let alone doing business yourself, even if one of your relatives is a merchant, that would be a great shame.
Those who have young people waiting to get married at home will feel it even more clearly, because relatives in this business will greatly lower their family standings, which will directly affect their worth in the marriage and love market.
This point has very clear records and comments in historical materials and famous books from around the world.
Therefore, this earl from the Lion Kingdom polishes the earl medal and always declares his title to others on his chest. It is obvious that this is the only way he can gain respect from others.
100% of the foreign aristocrats who would go out to do business in person were from poor family backgrounds. They might even have only a noble title and nothing else.
Otherwise, no matter how shameless a person is, he will not go into battle himself. Most of them will hire people or delegate power to servants to run the business.
If you look at the nobility of the Tang Dynasty, you will know that the people who monopolized most of the industries and shops in the Tang Dynasty were not merchants, but aristocratic families.
But an aristocratic family is first and foremost an aristocratic family, so no matter how many properties and shops their ancestors passed down, they would not be classified as merchants. After all, they all hired people to take care of them.
The real merchants are families with no one in the court. They have no say in politics, so they can only be reduced to lowly households.
To put it simply, this is a double standard, and it is played this way all over the world.
Just as Lin Wanwan now has the status of a township monarch, if she buys a shop and slaves for business, she will not be classified as a merchant.
The status of an official is the best protective umbrella. Having a rank is equivalent to having a ticket to enter their "own" circle.
This time when she came to Haicheng, Yun Shang prepared a box of cotton cloth and a few copper coins for Lin Wanwan as currency.
These pure cotton cloths were bought by Lin Wanwan in Qiongzhou last year. They were originally intended to be given to women in the clan, but clan leader Lin objected, so they were kept there without any use.
This time I had to go out in a hurry, and I was taking a small boat, so it was inconvenient to bring a lot of things. So Yun Shang directly asked someone to carry out the high-value cotton cloth that did not take up a lot of space from the warehouse. It was just in use now.
The other party was not happy to exchange copper coins for precious stones; Lin Wanwan was not happy to exchange silk and gold for precious stones.
Using this kind of cotton cloth, which was only a dozen meters long in modern times but extremely expensive in the Tang Dynasty, was used to barter, and both parties were very satisfied.
Lin Wanwan brought a total of five pieces of off-white cotton cloth from Luan County. After some bargaining, she exchanged it for a small box of various gemstones from the other party.