1 - Setting Sail
Kraak Porcelain (2)
Chapter 7
Published December 19th, 2024After Wen Desi returned to the modern day he went to sell the precious metals the group had traded for. Because the gold they obtained wasn’t high in purity, they only got 270,000 yuan in return. Next, he found a small smeltery and asked for their silver to be refined into 925 sterling silver.[1] In the end, all the silver sold for 200,000 yuan.[2]
As for the large straw baskets of porcelain it wasn’t a good idea to leave them lying around in the hotel room, but they also wouldn’t be able to explain how all this extra stuff magically appeared either. So, the three had to extend their booking for a few more days while each of them took turns lugging stuff out inside suitcases every day.
There were a total of 200 pieces of porcelain in total. Most of them were plates, but there were also a mix of bowls and vases. Although the three of them knew that they were all kraak porcelain, they didn’t know much besides this.
Wen Desi thought of a certain Professor Ma he had met in the past, who was a famous collector of antiques and even taught history at a famous local university. After flipping through his business card holder, he found Professor Ma’s number, and soon an arrangement for lunch was made.
“Yes, this is indeed Kraak porcelain,” Professor Ma closely inspected the pate in his hand, “A typical export-grade blue and white porcelain piece. The main characteristics of this type of porcelain are the flared edges and the decorative motifs placed in grids along the inner rim, which would usually be painted with landscapes, figures, flowers, or fruits.”
Wen Desi listened intently.
“Kraak ware can be divided into two broad time periods: Wanli[3] and Kangxi.[4] This piece belongs in the Wanli category. See the pattern here? The outlines of the circles contain two distinct, parallel brush lines; this is a unique characteristic of porcelain made during the late Ming to early Qing dynasties.”
Well, this one is definitely from the years of Tianqi. Wen Desi thought.
“Then, the price must not be low?”
“Don’t think of money the moment you pick up a relic. The true value of such an item is in its history and cultural context.”
Saying this, Professor Ma turned the piece over a few times, and frowned. “The glaze is still very, very fresh on this piece, but there’s no chance this is an imitation right? Where did you get it?”
Wen Desi knew that he couldn’t say that it was a new piece straight out of a Ming dynasty kiln. “When I was doing some errands in the countryside I saw a villager setting up a stall selling some porcelain pieces. Some of them had some rather unusual patterns, so I collected a few.”
“Your eyes are very sharp.” Professor Ma nodded. “Kraak porcelain was actually tailored to overseas markets. The patterns directly catered to the aesthetic senses of Europeans, some of them even directly used European designs for the decoration.”
“Then, is this piece authentic?” Wen Desi eagerly wanted to know.
“Should be.” Professor Ma mused. “But, there really aren’t many specimens of this porcelain here in the mainland. Most of what we have is excavated from the sea floor. But obviously, this plate has never touched any water.”
“If it is authentic, how much could it go for?”
“As for this…the market for porcelain is very complex, and recently has actually been cooling down. However, Kraak ware is popular, having the highest turnover rate within the porcelain world. On the flipside a single piece isn’t worth that much. This plate, maybe, can fetch just three or four thousand yuan.”
“That’s not too bad.” Wen Desi said, as if he had just found the world’s greatest bargain.
“The main thing is that the authenticity isn’t completely clear.” Professor Ma leaned back a little. “This plate has all the typical features of Kraak wares, it’s just that it looks like it has come right off the fire. Speaking of which, it is very rare to see imitations of Kraak porcelain, I have never heard of someone trying to defraud with fake Kraak ware.”
Wen Desi was a little anxious. “Professor Ma, in the end, do you think these are authentic or not?”
Professor Ma thought for a little. “I’ll tell you what, I have a friend who specialises in collecting porcelain. In my circle, he is a real expert. I’ll give you his number, you should ask him to take a look. If it’s authentic, he will definitely want to buy it off you.”
The expert introduced by Professor Ma also had the surname Ma,[5] although they were not related. When Wen Desi brought over all two hundred pieces, Collector Ma immediately bought every single one. The collector suspected that Wen Desi had just dug up a porcelain cellar in Fujian. The reason for this suspicion was that the pieces themselves were not only in excellent condition, but from the sound of their discussion, Wen Desi had even more pieces to come. Given the moderate price and high demand for Kraak ware, Collector Ma was more than eager to buy them all.
Having offloaded all the gold, silver and porcelain, the proceeds of their single adventure totaled to about 3 million yuan.[6] Setting this sum aside as start-up capital, the Executive Committee started planning out their next step.[7]
It wouldn’t be right to continue renting a hotel room of course. So Wen Desi decided to set up a company. After he spent twenty thousand to get through all the formalities, out came a freshly minted commodity trading company.[8] Xiao Zishan had already received notice from his old company that they wouldn’t renew his contract. Thus, he simply now became the administrative director at the group’s new company. Wen Desi also wanted to resign from his actual job, but his company still had a lot of work and his superiors were actually quite nice to him. After some discussion, he promised to resign after another three months. Wang Luobin was even more ballsy, he sent a resignation letter and ran straight over to Guangzhou.
Currently, their company had nothing to it except for a name: The Crossing Company. Luckily, Xiao Zishan had worked in Guangzhou for many years, and through his work in sales he had made contact with a wide range of people. With the capital they had built up it would be easy to get stuff done.
First things first, for their office space they decided to permanently lease a business suite from the hotel they were staying at. These suites were independent from the hotel itself. Not only was the entrance and exit separate from the hotel lobby, they also had their own underground parking space. This would make their time travelling work much more convenient. Inside the underground space Xiao Zishan placed the wormhole entrance inside a small storage room, and installed a separate security door to make sure no one would stumble across it. In order to handle the large volume of goods that would soon flow through the wormhole he also bought a hydraulic trolley.[9]
The first major disagreement the executive committee had was on the topic of the company car. Xiao Zishan’s opinion was to buy a seven-seater mini-bus like the Star of Chang’an.[10] It was cheap, could hold a lot of people or cargo, and also very fuel efficient. However, Wang Luobin disagreed, as in the 17th century they would definitely not be able to use such a vehicle. There was no gasoline in the Ming dynasty, and the roads would definitely be too poor. Luobin suggested instead a 4WD diesel off-roader. Compared to gasoline, it would be much easier to come across fuels that could replace diesel.[11]
After hours of discussion on the subject, the three men of the executive committee finally settled on an SUV.[12] The salesperson at the dealership was very puzzled by the choice of the men. They firmly rejected the new, more fuel-efficient cars and instead bought an old Cherokee Jeep:[13] four-wheel drive, manual transmission, diesel engine, and equipped with a winch at the front.[14]
With a car and a source of income, what would be next? The executive committee convened in a conference room and discussed the next step of their plan.
925 silver, also known as sterling silver, is an alloy of 92.5% silver and 7.5% other metals (usually copper or zinc). This alloying is done because pure silver is too soft for practical use (especially for jewellery). Such sterling silver pieces would be stamped with ‘925’ to mark their authenticity. In the original, the author actually says “925 industrial grade silver”. ↩︎
The gold grossed them about 40,000 USD and the silver about 30,000 USD. ↩︎
1573-1619 ↩︎
1661-1722 ↩︎
The exact same character Ma in fact, which is why Boaster clarifies that they’re not related. Not a case of simple homophones. ↩︎
About 420,000 USD. Which doesn’t sound like a lot to start a company with in 2024, but remember this is 2009 money. ↩︎
The Executive Committee currently consists of our three main characters: Xiao Zishan, Wen Desi and Wang Luobin. ↩︎
Companies that specialise in selling physical products. ↩︎
The ones that have a hydraulic scissor jack that makes moving stuff vertically easier. ↩︎
I’m not a big car guy, but in a pinch apparently diesel engines can run on a huge range of oils, like kerosene or even vegetable oils. It wouldn’t be good in the long term as it would damage your filters, but it would work in an emergency. The more you know. ↩︎
Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV). Do I need to explain what they are? ↩︎
When Boaster says ‘old’ I’m not sure exactly how far back we are talking. Perhaps a Jeep Grand Cherokee dating around the turn of the millennium? ↩︎
This car isn’t brought up ever again… ↩︎
