How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia

FIVE LEARN FROM A MASTER

TO BE EFFECTIVE, A SELF-HELP BOOK REQUIRES TWO things. First, the help it suggests should be helpful. Obviously. And second, without which the first is impossible, the self it’s trying to help should have some idea of what help is needed. For our collaboration to work, in other words, you must know yourself well enough to understand what you want and where you want to go. Self-help books are two-way streets, after all. Relationships. So be honest here, and ask yourself the following question. Is getting filthy rich still your goal above all goals, your be-all and end-all, the mist-shrouded high-altitude spawning pond to your inner salmon?

In your case, fortunately, it seems to be. Because you have spent the last few years taking the essential next step, learning from a master. Many skills, as every successful entrepreneur knows, cannot be taught in school. They require doing. Sometimes a lifetime of doing. And where moneymaking is concerned, nothing compresses the time frame needed to leap from my-shit-just-sits-there-until-it-rains poverty to which-of-my-toilets-shall-I-use affluence like an apprenticeship with someone who already has the angles all figured out.

The master at whose feet you metaphorically squat is a middle-aged man with the long fingers of an artist and the white-tufted ear hair of a primate resistant to lethal tympanic parasites. He is quick to smile and slow to laugh, and although the skin has begun to sag on his wiry forearms, his sinews remain supple. He owns several secondhand cars, none of them large enough to attract attention, and is habitually to be seen alone in a backseat, immersed in a newspaper, while a driver and sharp-eyed guard ride in front. He cannot himself drive, having come late and suddenly into his prosperity, but he has other offsetting and more lucrative talents, not least his superb numeracy and his keen sensibility for font.

He sits now in a small, windowless room in his factory, an art deco bungalow that has been converted surreptitiously into a manufacturing facility, its boundary wall raised for seclusion in precisely the same manner as those of neighboring private residences. Despite his success, or rather, you have concluded, underpinning it, he oversees the counting of his money himself.

You stand in line, waiting your turn, your pockets bulging with cash and chits of paper bearing mnemonic aids scrawled so illegibly as to be virtually encrypted. When his accountant gestures with his head for you to proceed, you hand over your take and orally present your breakdown, both of which are checked against past figures and inventory records.

“Sales are up,” you conclude.

“Like everybody’s,” the accountant says deprecatingly.

“Mine more than most.”

Your master mentions one of your customers. “Last month you said he didn’t see a market for tuna.”

You nod. “That’s what he said.”

“What changed?”

“I gave him a few free cans.”

“We don’t give anything for free.”

“I paid for them. Personally.”

“I see. And?”

“He sold them. Fast. Now he’s a believer.”

The accountant enters some numbers into his laptop. Your master scrutinizes the result. He grunts and the accountant returns to you a small portion of the bills you brought in. This is your compensation, determined by adding together a notional fixed salary, a percentage commission, and a variable kicker based on how well your master feels business is doing and you are doing within it. You try to gauge the amount by the thickness of the wad and the colors of its constituent notes as you shove it into your pocket. You will count it later.

You are about to leave when your master tells you to ride with him, an unusual and worrisome request. You follow him to his car, where he takes out his phone and dials as he instructs his driver to drive. His guard watches you closely in the rearview mirror.

Your master conducts his telephonic conversation in a rural dialect that he does not realize you, whom he presumes to be a city fellow, understand fluently. Even if your master knew this, however, it would not concern him. He employs the dialect not for privacy but because it puts at ease the supplier he has on the line. Your master has spent time in many of the small towns in the region that forms the economic hinterland to your metropolis, and his chameleon-like ability to match his speech to his surroundings has often worked to his advantage. He would likely be proud of it, if he were the sort of man who was proud of such things. But he is too practical for that.

You sit in silence as your master discusses at length stock movements and delivery dates. The car approaches the outskirts of the city, passing the disinterred earth and linear mounds of vast middle-class housing developments. Rows of electricity poles rise in various stages of completion, some bare, some bridged by taut cables, occasionally one from which wires dangle to the ground.

When your master hangs up he asks what you think of a colleague.

“I think he’s good,” you say.

“The best?”

“One of.”

“Was he stealing from me?”

Everyone steals, at least a little. But you say, “He’s not crazy.”

“Where was he today?”

“I didn’t see him.”

He snorts. “You won’t be seeing him.”

The flatness of your master’s tone feels like the side of a blade.

You keep your voice steady. “Yes, sir.”

“You understand me?”

“Yes.”

The car stops and your master indicates that you are to get out. You do so and halt. You imagine the guard staring at your back. You make no sudden movements, keep your hands in plain view. Only when the car drives off do you turn around, standing at the side of the road and waiting in the heat for a passing bus.

On your return journey you find yourself squeezed against a window by the bulk of an overweight and therefore clearly prosperous vegetable farmer whose clan has recently made the first of a lucrative series of sales of their communal land to a refrigerator assembly plant looking to expand its warehousing space. He wears a gold-plated watch and a thick gold ring set with three uncut rubies the brown-black color of coagulated blood. He does not yet own a car. But that will of course change.

Your city is enormous, home to more people than half the countries in the world, to whom every few weeks is added a population equivalent to that of a small, sandy-beached, tropical island republic, a population that arrives, however, not by outrigger canoe or lateen-sailed dhow but by foot and bicycle and scooter and bus. A limited-access ring road is under construction around the place, forming a belt past which its urban belly is already beginning to bulge, and from which ramps soar and arc off in every direction. Your bus barrels along in the shadow of these monuments, dusty new arteries feeding this city, which despite its immensity is only one among many such organs quivering in the torso of rising Asia.

It is evening by the time you reach home. You wash your body with soap, using a plastic bucket to gather water from an almost impossibly unforthcoming tap, and then dress in the black trousers, white shirt, and black clip-on bow tie arranged for you, along with a plastic security pass, by a former schoolmate who works as a waiter for a catering company. You are excited and nervous, but pleased by your appearance when you glimpse yourself in the mirror of your motorcycle, thinking your garb connotes wealth and class.

Your schoolmate meets you as planned outside the service entrance of a private club that is tonight hosting a fashion show in a pair of pavilions on its expansive lawn. You are both screened for weapons by a uniformed gatekeeper brandishing a hoop-ended metal detector, then perfunctorily motioned through. The shirt you are wearing is a half size too tight at the throat and has begun to chafe when you swallow, but you ignore this discomfort. Your thoughts are on the pretty girl.

You are unable to gain access to the runway pavilion, so you wait at the after-party, or after-reception, rather, the actual after-party, of which you are entirely unaware, being scheduled for much later tonight at the home of the designer whose work is on display. There in the second pavilion, with its temporary bars and tables and plush, semi-recessed lounges, you pace about, hoping she will appear, a tray of drinks balanced on your left hand, precariously, it must be noted, for you have never done this before.

The pretty girl is by now a person of some substance in her industry, even if the term is admittedly an odd one in a profession characterized by its less-is-more physical bias. She is not quite a model of the first rank, but she is well known to photographers and designers and other models, and to readers of picture-laden weekend supplements of local newspapers, a group that because of your abiding desire to see her not infrequently includes you. She earns enough to afford an apartment of her own, a modest but reliable car, and a live-in maid who can cook, which is to say she earns as much as a retail banker her age, and perhaps twice as much as you do, even before the gifts she receives from her multiple, high-churn-rate admirers are taken into account.

She enters now at the side of one of these gentlemen, the handsome although late-blooming and aggressively insecure son of a textile magnate, managing as she walks both to slink and to carry her head with her jaw aligned precisely parallel to the floor, creating thereby an effect of imperious carnality that this year is widely sought after.

You do not know how to attract her attention, and for a moment you are gripped by despair, this venture seeming foolish and doomed to failure. But she is as alert as ever, her laconic expression notwithstanding, and she notices the stare of an out-of-place man in his late twenties with something familiar about him. She returns your gaze at once. Detaching herself from her companion, she approaches.

“Is that you?” she asks.

You nod and find yourself swept up in an embrace. The length of her body presses against yours, embarrassing you, this being a public place, but thrilling you as well. Her touch recalls a moonlit rooftop. When she kisses you on the cheek in plain view of all of these hundreds of people, you wonder if she might still be yours.

“I can’t believe it,” she says.

“It’s incredible.”

“So you’re a waiter now?”

“What? No, I just… I borrowed this.”

She smiles.

“I’m in business,” you explain.

“Sounds mysterious.”

“Sales, actually. I make a lot of money.”

“I’m happy to hear that.”

She glances around. The two of you are garnering considerable interest because such an enthusiastic meeting of a model and a waiter is unusual, and also because you are on the verge of dropping your tray. The pretty girl has no compunction about causing a scene, but she is aware of the gap in social status between you, and of the questions perhaps beginning to form in the minds of her colleagues and clients.

“Here,” she says, “put that down and follow me.”

She leads you to the main pavilion, past the now-abandoned runway, and out a backstage entrance, shaking her head at a security official who bars your way. She waves hello to a small knot of people from the fashion world, but otherwise the two of you are alone under the starless sky. A hot breeze, gently perfumed with diesel, tugs at your clothing. She lights a cigarette and looks you over.

“You’ve grown up,” she says.

“So have you.”

“Do you still watch movies?”

“Not that much. Sometimes.”

“I’m an addict. I go to sleep in front of the DVD player every night.”

“Every night?”

She raises an eyebrow and smiles inscrutably. “Not every night. Often. When I’m alone.”

“I live with my father. Well, he lives with me. But I have my own place now.”

“Are you married?”

“No. Are you?”

She laughs. “No. I’m not sure I’m the type men marry.”

“I’d marry you.”

“You’re adorable. Maybe I meant I’m not the type men should marry.”

“Why not?”

“I change.”

“Everybody changes.”

“When I change, I let myself change.”

“I know. You wanted to leave the neighborhood and now you’ve done it. You’re famous.”

“And you?”

“I want to be rich.”

She laughs again. “It’s that simple?”

“Yes.”

“Well, tell me when you are.”

“I will. But I don’t have your number anymore.”

She gives you her phone and you dial yourself, letting it ring twice and saving it under her name. The glow of her cigarette has reached the filter.

“I should get inside,” she says.

“I’ll call you.”

“I know. Take care of yourself.”

She kisses you afresh on the cheek, placing her hand at the small of your back. You feel the graze of her breasts against your chest, and then she is gone.

As the pretty girl rejoins her world, she finds her poise somewhat undermined by your encounter. You are like a living memory and she, who is implacably resistant to remembering, is unsettled by you. Your manner of speech, even though it has evolved in the decade since the two of you last spoke, still carries the cadences of how she once spoke, more than the cadences, the perspectives, the outlook of the neighborhood she once belonged to, a neighborhood she is glad to have fled and to which she does not want to return, even for a moment, even in passing. She tries to focus on her companion, the textile scion, but she is blurry at first, not entirely present, and this alarms her to the extent that she makes a conscious and ultimately successful effort to clear her mind.

You call her that night but she does not answer. You try again the following day with the same result. Later in the week you get hold of her, finally, yet she is distracted, busy getting ready for a shoot. Occasionally thereafter, when you manage to speak with her, you are able to have a brief conversation, but she is always occupied when you suggest meeting. You find this perplexing, and consider how best to proceed. You do not know much about women, but you know a fair bit about sales, and it is apparent to you that this is a case when you must let the customer seek you out, lest you devalue your product completely. So you wait. And she does call. Not often. Not even every month. But sometimes, and usually late in the evening, after she has watched a film, and her voice is languid with impending sleep, and perhaps with alcohol as well, and she speaks to you softly for a few wonderful minutes from the comfort of her bed. She does not invite you over, or propose an encounter elsewhere, but she keeps in touch with you and your life, and this, while at times quietly painful, gives you a measure of hope.

At work you join the scramble for your former colleague’s accounts. One prospect rejects your advances, but you have internalized the principle of perseverance and accordingly you revisit him the following season. The man in question runs a shop in a formerly desirable residential area near a much-revered tomb, now choked with traffic by day and scented with marijuana by night.

You arrive on your motorcycle with the strap of your satchel slung bandolier-style across your chest. Your target sits behind the cash register.

“I’m not interested,” he says.

“You were before.”

“What happened to the other one?”

“I replaced him.”

“I didn’t trust him.”

“You should be happy then.”

“I don’t trust you either.”

He shouts at his assistant, who has knocked over a stack of breakfast cereal boxes. You glance at the shelves. They are stocked with a mix of foreign and domestically produced goods, foodstuffs mainly, but also cleaning supplies, lightbulbs, cigarettes, and, unexpectedly, a pair of unboxed air conditioners.

You point to the last. “You sell those?”

“They’re used. There’s demand for them.”

You open your satchel and slowly tap half a dozen cans and bottles down on his counter. “Tuna.” Tap. “Soup.” Tap. “Olives.” Tap. “Soy sauce.” Tap. “Ketchup.” Tap tap tap. “Lychee juice.” Tap. “All imported.”

“I already have all this.”

“I know. That’s why I’m showing these to you. How much are you paying?”

He looks at you with disgust. “Tell me this. Why are you cheaper?”

“We’re a big outfit.”

He sneers. “You? I’m sure.”

“Our owner has contacts at customs. He gets stuff through without paying duty.”

“So does everybody else.”

“Why don’t you want a good deal?”

“Because I don’t like good deals I don’t understand.”

“It’s not stolen.”

“I’m not buying it.”

“Really, it’s not stolen.”

“You think I’m deaf?” He spits on the floor at your feet. “Get out.”

“There’s no reason for…”

“Get out, dirty pimp motherfucker.”

You stare at him, taking in his potbelly, his flimsy little mouth, his weak, breakable wrists. But you are also aware he keeps his right hand low, under the counter, out of sight. And you sense shoppers taking notice, his assistant lingering at the entrance, passersby pausing outside. Mobs form quickly in these insecure times, and mobs can be merciless. You stand your ground for a moment. Then you garrote your anger, pack your samples, and leave without another word.

“I know all about your scam,” he yells out behind you.

You try not to dwell on this incident as you ride back home through the still, smoky dusk. Your costs are low because your master sources recently expired goods at scrap prices, erases the expiry date from the packaging, and reprints a later date instead. This is not as simple as it sounds, there being a number of tricks to removing ink unnoticeably and requiring great attention to detail in the printing process. Products do have built-in safety margins, and inventory turnover in the city is usually high, so for the most part there should be limited risk to consuming what you sell. You are simply increasing the efficiency of the market, ensuring goods that would otherwise be wasted find buyers at reduced price points. You have never heard of anyone dying as a result.

Your work is a far cry from your father’s simple trade, but despite your misgivings, you would not consider changing places with him, not at his prime, when he traveled to and from his employer’s premises in generally good spirits and good health, and certainly not now, when he is easily exhausted and can no longer stand in the kitchen for more than an hour at a stretch. He has secured a job with a couple returned from abroad who do not like having servants in the house. He wheezes his way over to them every second morning, as they are leaving for work, cooks and refrigerates their dinner for two nights, and takes a bus home by midday. In the afternoons and on alternate days he recovers from his exertions.

The pair of you have moved to slightly larger accommodations, and you have told your father he no longer needs to earn a wage. But he does not desire to be a burden, and in any case he feels employment is the natural state of a man. He would do more if he could, but he cannot.

Your father suffers from a broken heart, both literally and figuratively. He misses your mother intensely, yearning for her even more after her passing than ever during her life. Also his genes and the cholesterol-laden cuisine he has prepared and eaten in wealthy homes for decades have conspired to give him recurring bouts of angina. The damage to his muscle tissue is now irreversible, and although episodes of actual pain are brief, there is no escaping the pressure on his chest or his shortness of breath.

His faith is strong and idiosyncratic, manifesting itself in prayer, visits to shrines, religious music, and sacred verses written on paper and worn as amulets. All of these comfort him. He fears death, but not terribly so, and he awaits the opportunity to be reunited with his beloved much as certain young girls await, with a trepidation that does not quite exceed their longing, the loss of their virginity.

You find him lying on his cot, listening to a tinny yet soulful voice on a battery-powered radio because the electricity is gone and with it the power for your television. He is covered in a shawl, despite the heat, and he sweats lightly from his forehead. You bring him a cup of water and sit beside him, and he pats your hand, his callused palm leathery and almost soft. He whispers a benediction and breathes it into the air, spreading his hopes for you with a contraction of the lungs.