Battle of the Third Reich Chapter 351: Shanghai Building (2)
The door face of the Shanghai Building is not too big, it is the size of a standard two-bay room. The fixed canopy sticking out of the door covers the entire sidewalk, which looks like those high-end restaurants in Chicago and New York.
The outer edge of the canopy is equipped with a circle of light panels, the background color is festive red, the SHANGHAILO signboard is brushed with white letters, the light bulbs that outline the sideline are yellow, and the letters are white light bulbs, relying on the sidewalk On the side part, there is also a Chinese dragon that seems to be looking back and watching.
This is an apartment building rebuilt after a major earthquake. The standard three-story single-floor concrete-clad brick structure. The entire exterior wall of the street is painted in beige which was popular in the United States at that time, and a foot sticks out from the wall. There are two-story advertising light boards with eight English letters CHOPSUEY written in white on a red background.
This conspicuous sign has been an iconic sight of San Francisco’s Chinatown for half a century, often with the Panlong street lamp on Duban Street and the pagoda-shaped turret of Shengchang Building. Appears on travel postcards.
You may not understand what is written on this sign. In fact, it is a "Chinese dish" popular only in the United States, the legendary "Li Hongzhang miscellaneous".
Like SHANGHAILO, CHOPSUEY is the transliteration of the Taishan dialect of "Miscellaneous", using the popular Weituoma pinyin at the time. In Chinatown in the early twentieth century, there were such things that Americans could not understand. "English" shop name.
The "grills" in it are not the innards of the animal we remember, but a dish made by cutting various meats and vegetables into shreds and then mixing them together.
The exact origin of this dish is nowhere to be found, but it is believed to be a product of the California gold rush. At that time, the cook who cooked for the coolie did not need superb craftsmanship. The "choppy" also reflected this. The professional level of the cook.
As for how to get in touch with Li Hongzhang, it was indeed that Li Hongzhang's visit to the United States in 1869 was sought after by the American press, so some Chinese restaurants changed the name of their dishes to keep up the popularity. The "Li Hongzhang offal" sold in Shanghai buildings in the early twentieth century can be said to be famous throughout San Francisco Chinatown.
Welbet opened the store door with a briefcase, and a front desk dressed in Western-style waiters greeted him.
"Good morning, sir, do you need help." The front desk waiter bowed slightly to greet him.
"Good morning, I have an appointment to meet here." Welbey glanced around the lobby, and then whispered: "The triad is great."
"Wait a minute, sir, what did you just say?" The waiter was stunned, looking at the foreigner in front of him with doubts.
"The triad is super...great?" Welbey was a little confused. Is there a problem with his pronunciation.
"Ah sorry, the triad is great. I thought I had heard it wrong just now. Please come with me, sir, Mr. Zhang has already arrived." The waiter turned around and stood at the front desk. The other two companions on the side yelled a few Cantonese dialects, and then eagerly led Welbey to one side of the stairs.
The overall decoration style of the hotel is close to that of the United States, but there is a Chinese style in every detail. To put it bluntly, it is a combination of Chinese and Western styles. The entire front building on the second floor was opened up, leaving only a few load-bearing columns in the middle, and the back of the floor was partitioned into several boxes. At this time, the morning tea time has ended and the lunch time has not yet begun, so there is not a single guest on the second floor.
There are more than a dozen dining tables in the hall, with small lamps with stained glass lampshades, and small glass bottles filled with various condiments. The ceiling was divided into small squares with wooden strips, and some painted patterns were painted with paint. Before Verbe could tell what the painting was, he was taken to the door of one of the boxes by the waiter.
"Mr. Zhang is waiting for you inside." The waiter finished speaking, raised his hand and knocked on the box door with a special rhythm.
The door was opened immediately, and the one who opened the door was a strong Chinese man in a black suit. He was definitely more than 1.8 meters tall, almost half a head taller than Verbet.
The strong man first glanced at Welbert, then winked at the waiter, who nodded knowingly.
"You are late, Mr. Spear." The strong man stepped back and gave up the door.
Welbey didn't answer. He just looked up at the Asian with a sturdy atmosphere. He believed that this was just a thug or bodyguard, a little bravado.
The area of the box is not large, about ten to twenty square meters. There is a round table in the middle, and the table is covered with white linen tablecloth. Around the room, there are a few grand master’s chairs and wooden shelves with polychrome vases on the wall. There are a few Chinese landscape paintings on the wall pasted with light blue wallpaper, and the white porcelain chandeliers hanging from the ceiling are in the room. Sprinkled a piece of orange light.
In addition to the dysplastic bodyguard, there are three Chinese men in the room.
A young man in his twenties looks like the second bodyguard. He is wearing a black Chinese jacket with a buckle. The placket is open to reveal a moon-white shirt, and a waist is exposed. It has a black belt with the width of an adult's palm. The young man stood with his hands behind his back like a javelin in the corner of the room.
The other two people were sitting at the round table, both in their thirties and forties, and Verbe could only tell the status of the two from their outfits.
The one on the right should be the subordinate, with a pair of round-framed glasses on his thin face, and waxed hair on his combed hair, and he is wearing a blue-gray gown and mantle, which is the Tang suit among the Chinese population. .
The man on the left looks obviously more magnificent. His appearance is not outstanding in Welby’s eyes. He also has an ordinary round face, but from those small eyes, The shrewdness and toughness revealed will make people naturally feel a special majesty.
It is also stylishly combed, but not waxed, wearing a three-piece gray suit. Although the style is a bit outdated, the materials and craftsmanship are definitely not ordinary goods. The front is open, and the suit has a vest pocket. The golden bracelet is exceptionally conspicuous under the orange light.
It can be seen that the people in the room were drinking tea and chatting before Verbé arrived. There were two square Chinese teapots and polychrome tea cups on the table.
Seeing Welby walking towards the round table, the two men also stood up.
"Sorry for being late, there was a traffic jam on the road, I am Spear, I don't know which of you is Mr. Zhang." Spear put the briefcase on the table, took off the top hat and asked, with gentleness on his face. Smile.
"It's okay. Fortunately, I am Zhang Weixin." The man in the suit smiled heartily and stretched out his right hand towards Verbe.
"Fortunately, Mr. Zhang." Welbey shook the opponent's hand vigorously.
"This is my secretary, Chen Donglai."
"Good meeting, Mr. Spear." Chen Donglai picked up a folding fan from the table with one hand, and reached out to Welby with the other.
"Fortunately meeting, Mr. Chen." Welbey also smiled and shook hands with each other.
"Please sit down, Mr. Spear." Zhang Weixin motioned for Welby to sit next to him.
"Do you like tea or coffee?" Zhang Weixin asked.
"Coffee bar, thank you." Welby put the top hat on the table.
"Tell them to bring up a pot of coffee, and then ask them to prepare some snacks." Zhang Weixin instructed the strong man at the door in Chinese.
"Okay, big man." The strong man agreed and turned and opened the door.
"San Francisco is a good place. Everyone wants to make a fortune here. When there are more people, there will be more cars." Zhang Weixin opened the silver cigarette case studded with ivory and handed it to Welbey.
"Thank you. This is the first time I have come to San Francisco. I thought it would be blocked like that only in New York, but I didn't expect it..." Welby took out a cigarette from the cigarette case and then gathered I ignited a cigarette on Zhang Weixin’s lighter~IndoMTL.com~ I don’t feel anything when I get used to some things. "Zhang Weixin lit the cigarette on his mouth, and then closed the lighter's buckle with a fancy gesture.
"What you said makes sense, Mr. Zhang."
"You can call me Vincent, this is my English name." Zhang Weixin said with a smile.
"Okay Vincent, you can call me Tony instead." Welbey showed the other party a standard commercial smile.
"I like you very much, Tony, we are friends now." Zhang Weixin patted Welbey's arm.
"Of course, we are already friends." Welbey replied happily.
The two laughed relative to each other for a long time, Zhang Weixin suddenly put away his smile, and asked with a serious face: "Well, friend, please tell me now, what do you want from me."
PS: Thank you for your support, the author will continue to work hard.