5. The Stock Market Crash (2)
I had spent nearly two months in a boarding house room in Myeongdong.
My body was restless and itching, but if the wait was for a stroke of luck I had never even imagined, it was thoroughly enjoyable.
In that time, I had nearly made the original Lee Dong-ho’s memories my own.
A delinquent—they say delinquent, but I never thought he’d be this bad.
That Kim Min-su guy was basically a lackey by the original world’s standards. To Lee Dong-ho, the very concept of a “friend” hardly held any meaning. His two younger brothers were just subordinates who obeyed orders at home.
Only his much younger sister had been rather cute.
They call it boiling youth, don’t they?
This guy’s body itself was bubbling, boiling lava.
When he woke up in the morning, he ran an hour every day just to contain that boiling energy. The reincarnated me was no different.
The original me had hardly exercised except for the occasional round of golf. But when I skipped a day because I was annoyed—what do you know? Everyone on the streets started to look like sandbags I wanted to pummel.
Thankfully, sprinting at full power for about an hour would more or less subdue my body’s energy; otherwise, I might have kept living as a delinquent after reincarnating as one.
In any case, a reincarnation into the middle of a stock market crash I had never even imagined.
The tedious boarding house life in Myeongdong would also end today.
Today was the day I liquidated my securities.
“Please sell all of my Daejeungju shares here.”
A few men behind me heard what I said at the counter and started snickering.
“Well, well, that young lad still doesn’t know a thing.”
“Leave him be. Stocks aren’t something young punks like that can handle anyway.”
“Heh heh, I feel sorry for him. He’s going to regret the day he sold for a long, long time.”
“Still, seeing the fire in his eyes, seems like that kid made quite a bit too.”
I saw three men wearing suits that, while countrified to my eyes, were smartly dressed in their own way.
Stock speculators.
It was a term for the investors who had flocked to Myeongdong looking to strike it rich in stocks—and these men were exactly “stock speculators.”
Investors cannot beat speculators, and speculators cannot beat the powers that be.
These foolish men probably had families too.
Men in the same situation as the dead Lee Dong-ho looked pitiable at a glance, but I decided not to stick my nose in.
That is simply the nature of investment.
You start off swayed by others’ words, and when one or two lucky punches of beginner’s fortune work out, that’s when things go wrong.
The countless people filling the stock exchange right now were in exactly that situation.
They had rushed in hearing rumors, wondering if they were late, and cautiously dipped their toes in the water—what do you know? It keeps rising! Then they start thinking it’s because they’re so good, and from then on they don’t listen to anyone.
Today is Monday, April 30th.
Daejeungju had risen like madness, as if the trends until February had been nothing but small ripples.
And starting from today, April 30th, it begins to crash.
What is both funny and frightening about this kind of investing is that without accurate information or insight, you cannot escape even on the downhill, and only when you are drowning do you scream for help.
If you look at the graphs of most crash markets, before the fall they show warning signs with one or two small drops and slight rebounds.
Those who get out even at this point are experts; miss this timing and you become a mark forever.
Of course, most are marks.
“Still, guys like that need to vomit up their shares so people like us can buy more stocks. What a grateful fellow.”
“Heh. That’s true.”
Ignoring the men’s chatter, I continued urging the counter employee.
It was still the time when Ilheung Securities, Dongmyeong Securities, and others were continuously buying shares of Daejeungju.
“Shall I deposit it in the bank? Or would you like cash?”
The lady at the securities counter asked.
The initial investment capital I had brought was 5 million hwan.
The Daejeungju price I had scraped together with that was 95 jeon.
Daejeungju, which had been priced at 95 jeon—not even a full hwan—was now 41 hwan.
Even a rough calculation showed I had gained fortyfold.
To be exact, I had bought 5.26 million shares, achieving a return of 4,200%.
Five million hwan had become 210,648,000 hwan.
Since one million hwan corresponded roughly to ten million won in today’s money, in just over two months since reincarnating, I had turned fifty million won into over two billion won. Moreover, since taxes on stock trading were unclear at this time, the entire amount could be considered my profit.
Given the prices of the era, the perceived amount was much larger; if I simply took this back to my hometown, I could live out my whole life swaggering as a wealthy landowner.
“Please deposit it all in the bank. Give me exactly ten million hwan in cash.”
I filled the bag I had prepared in advance with one hundred bundles of thousand-hwan bills, then stood up holding it.
***
“Did you see that tall, strapping young fellow who just left?”
“Yes.”
“There wasn’t any leak of information, was there?”
Greed was plastered all over the face of the man who said this, looking at the man beside him.
“No! Absolutely not. He was probably just scared because it rose too much, that young fellow.”
“Hmm… but the timing is too perfect for that…”
The man tilted his head, looking toward the door Lee Dong-ho had exited, then soon turned his eyes away.
‘Well, I suppose it’s beginner’s luck or something.’
A large man with his hair neatly slicked back with pomade, wearing horn-rimmed glasses.
One of the villains who had caused the current stock frenzy and would create the coming stock market crash. The era’s swindler who had once been called a genius of investment—Yoon Eung-sang.
And one more person.
Far away, there was a man glaring at Yoon Eung-sang, stomping his feet in frustration.
Park Wan-sik.
He was there.
Following Yoon Eung-sang’s gaze, there was the young man he had met at Coffee Caramel.
‘Judging by the heavy bag, he seems to have withdrawn his investment. Did he have information? Or did he listen to what I said? Either way, it’s a relief.’
Park Wan-sik thought so and pressed the shutter of the camera hanging at his chest.
Since it was a film camera, each shot was precious, but before he knew it, he captured a shot of Lee Dong-ho’s back as he left through the door.
‘Now, stock investment has become a train departing for hell. Poor people…’
***
“When will the boat depart?”
“It will leave before the sun sets, so don’t worry too much.”
Hearing the boatman’s words, I sat down on the ground at the edge of the ferry landing.
To use the ferry boat, people had to gather first before it would depart, but perhaps because the timing was off, there was no one but me.
The land visible small across the river.
Beyond the river’s horizon, plains stretched endlessly.
It was a place I absolutely had to visit at least once.
Gangnam.
Until now, before being incorporated into Seoul, it was called Yeongdong.
Meaning it was east of Yeongdeungpo. In the future, it would be the most prime of prime real estate, with a tiny plot of land costing tens of millions of won, but only half a century ago it had been nothing but rice paddies, fields, or orchards—an astonishing fact.
Moreover, the future Gangnam was not even Seoul right now.
At this time, Seoul only included the Yeongdeungpo area south of the Han River. Korea’s spine that distinguishes Seoul from non-Seoul.
The Han River.
To cross this Han River and travel between Seoul and the Yeongdong region, one had to use the Hangang Bridge, called the First Han River Bridge, or a ferry boat.
People from the Yeongdong region commuting to Seoul still commuted by ferry at this time, so it was indeed worthy of being called the Miracle of the Han River.
Wanting to capture the scenery of this ferry at least once, this time I chose this ferry landing instead of the Hangang Bridge.
Money is easy to make if you know how. Usually, you cannot make it because you do not know.
Real estate is the way to safely make the most money going forward from this era. Isn’t it said that land never betrays you?
The story that someone just farmed, but that land was Gangnam, and they woke up to find it had risen so much they were too scared to sell, and then it rose without knowing the sky’s height—this was not a story that came from nowhere.
“What business does a young man I’ve never seen have in Yeongdong?”
As I sat looking across the river, the boatman spoke to me.
Continuing to look at the Gangnam area visible far away, I answered.
“I wanted to visit at least once.”
“In Yeongdong there’s nothing but rice paddies, fields, and orchards. What is there to see?”
“If not now, I won’t be able to see them. Those rice paddies and orchards.”
“Hmm…? What do you mean, what will become of those paddies and orchards?”
I raised my head and looked at the boatman’s face.
Dark skin tanned by the sun.
Solid arms visible inside his sleeves.
But looking at his eyes, I felt a little strange.
How to put it…
They were clear.
And deep.
A feeling as if a scholar who had studied his entire life was strangely working as a boatman?
Looking only at his face, he had the air of a man born to live by the pen, yet strangely he was a boatman.
Didn’t someone say?
That at forty, one must take responsibility for one’s face.
Having lived, I realized the face does not change tremendously, but the eyes change and the wrinkles differ.
“They say even mountains and rivers change in ten years; they will change into whatever they change into.”
Setting aside my curiosity, I just mumbled vaguely.
It was not like I was going to advertise that I had come to buy land.
Curiosity bloomed on the old boatman’s face, but I had no intention of answering further.
The old man, as people happened to rush over all at once as if it were quitting time, took them aboard and silently rowed the ferry forward.
“Wow…”
Nothing but admiration came out.
Arriving at the ferry landing and walking for a while, it really was all rice paddies and fields.
A plain with not a single tall lookout tower in sight stretched out, along with expansive rice paddies and fields, and far away, a small village with only a few houses was visible.
There was definitely a difference between seeing it in photos and seeing it in person.
Who would imagine that this place, with scenery like any common countryside, would later become the center of Korea?
Where there is land, there is always a bokdeokbang—a real estate agency.
It is called real estate, but I find the word bokdeokbang endearing.
Doesn’t the name mean it mediates fortune and virtue?
More than the stiff feeling of “real estate,” somehow a warmth seeps out.
Putting aside the brief sentiment, I went straight to a real estate agency.
Though called a real estate agency, I entered a place where not even the paint was properly done, with only the words
“Excuse me.”
“Who is it?”
“I’ve come to look at some land.”
“Land?”
The old man playing janggi raised his head and looked at me with a strange expression.
“Why would a young person come here for land? You don’t look like someone who farms.”
There was still a long way to go before Yeongdong was developed into Gangnam. There was not even a sign of land prices rising, so I seemed to have come too early. The fact that the real estate owner thought it strange a customer had come to look at land proved this.
“My parents will do the farming. Since they live in the countryside, I came first to look at the land.”
“Is that so? How much land are you looking at?”
“The more land, the better. We’re going to farm on a large scale.”
“Hey young man, do you have the money?”
Clunk.
I placed the bag I had brought on a table and opened it.
Seeing the bundles of cash inside the bag, the male owner of the real estate agency’s face brightened with color—he who had looked at me as if I were nobody.
It was an impoverished era, so he had probably never properly seen a customer carrying this much cash.
“Oh my goodness, sir! Young sir, you already carried yourself with such nobility from the moment you entered.”
Clack!
“Check!”
“Ah, you old man. A customer finally came, what check are you talking about?”
The old man glanced at the janggi board, scattered the pieces haphazardly, and rose from his seat.
“President Kim!”
“Oh-ho. It’s just janggi, we can play again. Why are you shouting?”
The old man’s face was all smiles. He seemed happier to have found an excuse to mess up the janggi board he was losing than because a customer had arrived.
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