Reborn as King of South America

Chapter 224 The Fisherman's Son

ps: Thanks to classmate Yunhai Shuyou Shitongzhou for the 100 Qidian coins and classmate Zai Kan Haichao for the 100 Qidian coins for their support!
The sky was gray and dawned in Hetao County (Pelotas) in the southern part of the Han Kingdom, a small coastal fishing village.

Yang Kaifu woke up to the creaking sound of his wife weaving. He reached out and picked up a short coat of coarse cloth from the bedside, put it on skillfully, stood up and walked to his wife, and whispered, "Don't be too tired, my son. The money we borrowed from the government has been repaid. We don't have to get up so early in the morning."

"Yes, I know." The woman replied softly, turned her head to look at the three sleeping children, and said softly, "The rice has been washed and put in the pot. You, the head of the family, go and light the fire. When the meal is ready, wake up the eldest child. He has lost a lot of weight recently, so let him sleep more."

"The school's test results will be out soon. If the eldest son does well, the family will prepare tuition for him to attend university preparatory courses."

Instead of lighting the fire and cooking as his wife instructed, Yang Kaifu frowned slightly when he mentioned his eldest son.

"Boss, do you still want the eldest to go to college preparatory school?"

Hearing her husband's words, the woman stopped what she was doing and asked.

"There has not been a scholar in the Yang family for three generations. The eldest son has finally studied for a few years. It would be a pity if he fails to pass the university preparatory course."

"Boss, you know your son's ability well. The eldest son started to learn late, and his academic foundation is not as good as other students. He has to read until very late every day after school. Your son has tried his best to study. If he gets good grades, you should follow his wishes and let him apply for the Naval Military Academy. Don't make things difficult for him."

"Well, I'll listen to you this time. If the eldest brother's grades are higher than those of the Naval Military Academy, let him apply for the Navy."

No one knows a son better than his mother. His wife knows his son's thoughts better than he does. His eldest son is already fifteen years old after the Chinese New Year and has his own ideas. As his father, Yang Kaifu wants his son to go to college preparatory school as he wishes, but his eldest son has difficulty studying. If he is forced to apply for college preparatory school, he may not be able to graduate smoothly during the preparatory period. Therefore, after a difficult choice, Yang Kaifu decided to respect his son's opinion and agreed to let him apply for the Naval Military Academy. ...

The sun was at its zenith, and the bright sunshine sprinkled on the slightly undulating sea, creating layers of golden light.

On the sea illuminated by golden light, hundreds of ships of all sizes dispersed and moved slowly in different directions.

Most of the ships on the offshore waters are wooden fishing boats with a tonnage of no more than 500 tons. A small number of these wooden fishing boats are small fishing boats built by local civilian shipyards in the Han Kingdom. Most of them are merchant ships captured by the National Defense Forces and sold at low prices to Chinese fishermen who immigrated to the Han Kingdom.

There are no particularly large fishing grounds on the southern Atlantic coast of South America, but there are relatively rich fishery resources in the thousands of miles of sea from southern Brazil to the northern coast of Argentina. Therefore, after arriving in the Han country of South America, Chinese immigrants from coastal areas such as Fujian and Zhejiang quickly returned to their old jobs and became fishermen again, using the money earned from fishing as their main source of living.

Yang Kaifu was originally an ordinary fisherman in the coastal area of ​​Fujian Province. After immigrating to Han State, Yang Kaifu's family was allocated 60 mu of land according to the number of people in his family of three. However, two years later, his wife gave birth to two more boys. Influenced by the Han State government and more than a dozen retired soldiers in the surrounding area, Yang Kaifu thought of dividing the 60 mu of land among his three sons, and each son could only get 20 mu of land. In addition, the eldest son had to pay part of the tuition every year for school. The family's expenses were difficult to maintain with the income from farming alone. Therefore, Yang Kaifu decided to continue to be a fisherman and fish. With the guarantee of several familiar neighbors in the town, he borrowed money from the government to buy a small wooden boat, and then fished at the seaside for more than two years. Excluding the tuition for the eldest son's schooling and the family's expenses, Yang Kaifu paid back 90% of the money he owed to the government. According to his usual fishing volume, the remaining money can be paid back in two or three months.

The increasingly prosperous days gave Yang Kaifu the confidence and enthusiasm to support his family through hard work. On the vast ocean, Yang Kaifu separated from the large fleet of fishing boats and headed towards an area with fewer fishing boats.

"Dad, the net is moving!"

Yang Kaifu’s eldest son, Yang Guangzong, saw the fishing net under the boat shaking violently and shouted a warning.

"Hold on to the oars and don't move. I'll go pull in the net!"

Yang Kaifu handed the oar to his son, walked sideways to the bow where the fishing net was, supported his body with his feet, and used both hands to pull the fishing net onto the boat.

"Boss, the boat is shaking too much. Fix the oars on both sides of the bow to stabilize the boat!"

"Hit." Yang Guangzong replied, and skillfully inserted the two oars into the grooves on both sides of the bow. After the oars were fixed, the vibration amplitude of the hull gradually decreased.

After completing the work assigned by his father, Yang Guangzong saw that several big fish in the fishing net were still rushing around. He quickly picked up the harpoon placed in the middle of the cabin and walked to the fishing net in three or two steps. Just when he was about to stab the big fish with the harpoon as usual, Yang Kaifu's voice rang out in time, "Boss, keep them alive. Don't kill them!" "Got it." Yang Guangzong quickly put away the harpoon. After putting the harpoon in place, he immediately came to his father and helped his father to pull up the fishing net.

The strength of several large fish in the fishing net was gradually consumed in the collision with the fishing net. After more than an hour, the large sea fish that were no longer moving violently were wrapped in the fishing net and pulled into the cabin.

"Boss, you see these two fish are big tuna. I estimate the largest one weighs 200 kilograms, and the slightly smaller one weighs more than 100 kilograms."

Yang Kaifu was lying in the cabin, his body soaked with sweat, panting.

"Dad, how much can this boatload of fish sell for?"

Although he was very tired, Yang Guangzong asked with joy on his face when he saw the boat full of fish and the two larger tunas.

"Hey, ordinary tuna is sold at one tael of silver per catty, and high-quality tuna is sold at two taels of silver per catty. We caught two tunas this time, and the big one is a bluefin tuna. You can see that its belly is very big. This kind of tuna is called big-bellied tuna, and it is more expensive. One catty of tuna costs three taels of silver. This tuna alone can be sold for six or seven hundred taels of silver, and the smaller one can also be sold for more than one hundred taels of silver. When all the fish in this boat are sold, we can get more than seven or eight hundred taels of silver."

Yang Kaifu said happily.

"Dad, can our family pay off the money we owe to the government?" Yang Guangzong asked happily.

"Ten taels of silver can be exchanged for eighteen Han yuan. My family owes the government six hundred Han yuan. After paying off eight hundred taels of silver, there will still be more than half left."

The Han Yuan was the legal tender of the Han State and was officially issued in 1877 to replace silver.

The Han Dynasty implemented a gold standard monetary policy. After the gold treasures obtained from Peru were exhausted, Li Mingyuan took the risk of sending people disguised as black tea merchants to enter India in search of the famous Padmanabhaswamy Temple treasure.

At this time, India had completely fallen into the hands of the British, and sending men into India to search for treasures was very risky. However, in 1877, the Peruvian treasures were exhausted, and the establishment of Han's own monetary policy could not be postponed any longer. So, as a last resort, Li Mingyuan first announced that Han would implement a gold standard monetary policy, stipulating that one Han yuan was equivalent to one gram of gold. Citizens with Han yuan could go to designated branches of the National Bank to exchange their Han yuan currency for an equivalent amount of gold. At the same time, silver was allowed to circulate as a transitional currency within five years. After five years, ordinary people could exchange Han yuan currency for silver at a silver-to-gold exchange rate of twenty to one.

With the location provided by Li Mingyuan and the reputation of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple in India, it was not difficult to find the treasure of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple. The difficulty lay in avoiding the British inspection and transporting the treasure to the Han Kingdom.

After finding the treasure in the basement of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple, the treasure hunting team first secretly packed up the gold and precious items in the basement and shipped them out in batches at night. Then, under the cover of hired white merchants, they dispersed the treasure in tea, coal and other goods and smuggled it out of the country. Finally, they arrived in China at the end of 1877.

Although the value of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple treasure is not as great as the treasure discovered by Li Mingyuan in Peru, it is equally valuable.

After looting all the collections in the six basements under the temple and selling some unimportant diamonds, jewels and accessories, a total of 25 tons of gold was obtained.

25 tons of gold were placed in the National Bank of the Han Dynasty as reserves, and except for a few precious treasures that were sent to the palace by officials, the rest were placed in the Ministry of Finance to be used as reserve funds for the development of the Han Dynasty.

Searching for treasure is a shortcut to gain wealth. Li Ming knows that searching for treasure is not a long-term solution, but as the ruler of a country, he has to use various methods to obtain funds for the smooth development and growth of the Han State.

With the addition of 25 tons of gold, the total gold reserves in the treasury of the Han National Bank, together with the remaining gold, reached 30 tons. Relying on the 30 tons of gold reserves, the monetary policy of the Han Dynasty was gradually accepted by ordinary people one year after its implementation. In addition to still using silver as the exchange currency, more and more people used Han Yuan banknotes to purchase goods.

Moreover, because Western countries all used the gold standard system, after the Chinese Yuan was linked to gold, the exchange rate between the Chinese Yuan and the currencies of Western countries also stabilized. For example, one pound was equivalent to 7.3 grams of gold, so the exchange rate between the Chinese Yuan and the British Pound was
1英镑=7.3汉元，同样的汉国与其他几个主要的国家货币汇率也能够通过黄金结算，1法郎=0.29汉元，1美元=1.5汉元，1德国金马克=10德国马克=3.58汉元，1卢布=0.77汉元。

(End of this chapter)