1979: Starting Out as a Tricycle Rickshaw Driver by West Lake

[Elements: Jiangnan, Rebirth, Period Setting, Daily Life]

Thirty years of turbulent times, forty years without a word.

Zhao Weiping spent his whole life working in a coal mine. Reborn in 1979, he now had to choose a job through the Hangzhou Youth Office: stay in Jiangnan and pedal a tricycle, or head to the Northeast and become an honorable worker?

When he thought of how the price of homes in his hometown would keep climbing in the future,

Zhao Weiping said, "There's nothing wrong with being a worker, but pedaling a tricycle and helping build my hometown gives me a much broader horizon."

Some time later...

A tricycle company executive said, "A kid named Ma Yun filed a complaint against you. He says you speak English better than foreigners, and suspects you're a spy..."

Twenty-five years later,

Ma Yun said, "Zhao Weiping has always been a great big brother to me. The two of us are representatives of outstanding entrepreneurs from Suzhou and Hangzhou..."