On February 10, 1668, Zhongying Township Railway Station, Hualong County.

Goshkin took a claw hammer, pried open the tightly sealed wooden barrel lid, then took a knife, cut a small piece of marinated bacon from the barrel, put it in his mouth and chewed it, and then let out a long sigh, saying, "It tastes pretty good and acceptable, especially when the price is still so low. We can only afford this beef produced in the Patagonian platform, but meat is meat, which is better than a sawdust-flavored black bread, right?"

With a "clang", he put down the knife in his hand. In recent years, Goshkin, who has become more and more eager to be fat in his body, turned to face a group of Russian labor workers standing with disheveled hair behind him. With a wave of his hand, he said with great momentum: "Do work!"

With his order, the foreman who had followed him for many years, the supervisors also took their place, urging their workers to pick up tools and start the work of leveling the roadbed. The project they undertake is a section of railway from Conghualong County to Zuocheng County, which is part of the forest railway. The specific starting and ending point is from Zhongying Township to Wanting Township, with a length of about 90 kilometers, a single line. It is worth mentioning that since the hot*na (Asian) people have been persuaded to invest in the construction of this section of railway about 48 kilometers from Conghualong Town to Zhongying Township, for financial reasons, they are not willing to continue investing in infrastructure, but are preparing to start collecting money through a dock at hand (Qingshan Township Wharf) and a section of railway (Forest Railway Wooden Pai-Zhongying Section, 184 kilometers) to recover funds as soon as possible.

Although the Italians in the Forest Development Company do not agree with this idea, the East Coast people expressed their understanding, because they are here to make money, not to give you free services. Recovering funds and controlling expenditures is extremely important to the investors of the Forest Development Company. The large amount of wood, food, cereals, building materials and even personnel transported through the docks and railways every year can already make them profitable. So what are you still in a hurry to spend a large amount of money? Once you really spend five million or ten million lira, how long will it take to recover your capital? You must know that the agreements signed by the East Coast people and the Forest Development Company have a term. Once you cannot make up for the investment and sufficient returns within the contract period, will you let everyone drink the northwest wind?

After learning that the forest development company was unwilling to continue investing in the railway, the people on the east coast had to find a way. Especially the Jiaohe Regional Administrative Office, which was closely related to their interests, they tried every means to continue to attract investment and sponsorship to board the railway, but unfortunately they always had little effect. In the end, Xu Xin, a veteran cadre who was in office, made up his own decision and made up his own determination to build the railway from Zhongying to Wanting, and extend the forest railway for about 90 kilometers westward, because they felt that this section was the most urgent.

By the way, I have to explain it here. Recently, in addition to Jiaohe County and Hualong, the Jiaohe Regional Administration has added another Zuocheng County, which is the 76th county-level administrative unit in the country. It has five townships, namely Zuocheng Town, Wanting Township, Nanhua Township, Didao Township and Chengshi Township, with a considerable area. In addition, some other scattered settlements nearby are also divided into each place. Among them, Houying Township belongs to Jiaohe County, Fufeng Township, Tonggu Township and Chongxin Township, unified the TL County area. The population and economic strength have increased significantly. The ranking among the fifteen counties directly under the central government (the central government recalled the Grassland Regional Administration at the beginning of this year and brought the five counties of Shangcheng, Yongjin, Guangling, Minghe and Taoyuan under the direct jurisdiction) has also risen rapidly.

Well, let's get back to the story and turn to the Forest Railway. The ninety-kilometer-long railway is really a heavy burden for a Jiaohe area, which has only three counties and is quite limited in terms of economy and population. Because normally, the exploration and design costs, equipment procurement costs, engineering construction costs, transportation costs, personnel training costs, etc., which add up to more than one million yuan. Moreover, when a large number of non-national labor workers are used to participate in engineering construction, the cost may be more than normal routines.

The cost of more than one million yuan is indeed too much for the Jiaohe area, which has a total population of only 70,000 to 80,000. Even though their financial situation has improved greatly over the years, such as the handicraft production in Jiaohe County, the forest industry has become a trend, such as the grain planting industry in Hualong County, and the central government has given a large part of the land sales income to the local government, which has greatly increased the fiscal revenue of the county-level government due to "land finance", but the money they can spend in a year to build railways will definitely not exceed 100,000 yuan. After three years of accumulation, they have only saved more than 300,000 yuan, which is almost a full million yuan short of the gap.

Fortunately, Xu Xin, an old cadre like Xu Xin, has a strong ability to move and has a wide connection. After several trips to Beijing, under the background of the Executive Committee's substantial reduction in railway investment, he actually asked for about 100,000 yuan of special funds from the Ministry of Transport, which is also very magical. In fact, according to the normal routine, the Executive Committee would not build the railway in Jiaohe area wherever it is built, because the priority here is too low. But who makes the veteran cadre have strong ability to move? And the most important thing is that the regional administration and three county governments are willing to tighten their belts to pay for money. Are you willing to do anything else? So, don't always blame the overbearing, it's because they are more determined!

In addition, when the state-owned Central Railway Company saw that some local governments were willing to pay part of the money to build the railway (Isn’t this stupid...). Although they asked for dividends in the future of the railway (the specific dividend ratio needs to be negotiated, and the dividend period will not exceed twenty years), it is still a big profit for China Railway Company, and it can also allow them to reach into the forest railway system that they have never entered before. Why not do it?

Therefore, they also took out some railway equipment (equivalent to about 200,000 yuan) and planned to use it for the construction of the Zhongying-Wanting section of the Forest Railway. By the way, they also waived some of the preliminary exploration and design costs, which saved the Jiaohe Regional Administration a lot of money. So, with so many efforts, the railway was started stumblingly, and the construction company of Goshkin also undertakes some of the engineering construction projects.

The situation in Russia is becoming more and more chaotic. Now the population that Goshkin can reap is increasing. Especially after the local order was greatly damaged by several rebel troops, many herders and serfs were freed from their restrained state. A considerable number of them took a risk to go out from the mouth of the Don River, took a boat to Haji Port for a temporary stay, and then took the merchant ship of the South China Sea Transport Company to return to the east coast.

In this way, there were at least 3,000 Russian immigrants to the east coast last year. If Russian laborers who went out from traditional channels (mostly from poor northern provinces, usually from the two major ports of Saint Nicholas and Arkhangelsk), the total number of last year exceeded 6,000, which is the most in history. Naturally, Goshkin Construction Company has also become more and more prosperous with the joining of a large number of non-national labor workers. Otherwise, do you think their team is still in the Inan Railway, Iguazu County and other places, and can they still go to the Jiaohe area to undertake the projects?

But to be honest, although there are many other labor companies, such as Battino's company, which is mainly Italian, has even surpassed Goshin, but the speed of construction and the number of projects undertaken by Goshin Construction Company has been compared by Goshin Construction Company. The reason for this is that although Goshin is more good at doing things and is related to the proper management, the bigger reason is that Goshin, who was a carpenter, acts more authentically and does not exploit his subordinates so much, and he will also package himself. Therefore, his reputation among the workers is not bad, so the efficiency of doing work is naturally not bad.

Just look at the marinated beef I just bought from outside! In fact, it doesn’t cost much money, because there are too many bisons living on the La Plata prairie and they can’t kill them. If it weren’t for the huge demand in China, perhaps the East Coast people would have just taken horns, cowhide, beef tongue, beef, and beef, just like the Spanish in history, because the beef was almost vomited! However, the two million citizens of the East Coast are not as luxurious as the Spanish colonists in history. In addition, the existence of 200,000 non-national labor workers, those who are engaged in heavy physical labor need beef to supplement nutrition and physical strength, which has created a huge demand for cheap beef, which has led to the cattle hunting team also trying to marinate the beef on the spot and transport it back to China for sale by boat!

To be honest, corned beef from Patagonia is really a cheap and overly expensive food, so that people with slightly better local conditions on the east coast will choose to raise fresh beef locally, such as chickens, ducks, geese, ostrich, llama, capybara or pigs and sheep, rather than the Patagonian corned beef on the streets. Because there are too many meat products that have greatly impacted the domestic market in recent years - more than 20 million Andalusian black beefs on the grassland are waiting for you to hunt - the "quality" will naturally decline. Therefore, this beef has almost become "bad meat" on the east coast, and its price is not high, and sellers generally make profits by raising volume.

Therefore, to a certain extent, this Patagonian corned beef is actually the best "friend" of the poor and is also the most suitable food for non-national labor workers to supplement fat and protein. But even this cheap food, Batino and Mendes are rarely willing to buy it. They have learned some of the so-called business theory of "controlling costs and expenditures" on the East Coast, and began to strictly reduce "unnecessary" expenses and squeeze their workers to the greatest extent. Therefore, it is not surprising that they were compared by the people of Goshkin when they were working on construction projects.

"Father, I heard from some friends that the follow-up funds for this section of the railway have not yet been settled, and the start-up funds are even less than half of the entire project cost. If this is the case, can we really receive the subsequent project payment in this way? Moreover, the regional administration commissioner who originally decided on this project has retired. Will this abandon the railway construction halfway? To be honest, I am really a little worried now." Ivan, the son of Goshkin, who had already graduated from Qingdao Road and Bridge School, whispered to his father when he saw no one around him.

"Dear Ivan, my son." Goshkin wiped his oil-stained hands on the towel, then picked up a piece of golden honey date cake and said while eating: "When Shirlov, Petkov, and Sarkovic and I first undertake projects on the East Coast, we could only eat black bread with maggots and drink raw water. Occasionally, people in the East Coast would give some salted fish, cured meat or poor wine, which was delicious at that time. And in that era, because of the lack of funds - you should know, the local government officials at that time were construction madmen, and the local governments were far from being as rich as they are now - arrears of project payments were commonplace. We were once so poor that we could only fish in the river and hunt wild animals in the woods to survive.

He was like a savage, and he often had no meals. At that time, Mendes and Valentino often laughed at us, believing that we were 'barbarians' and were not much nobler than the Indians. He overestimated his ability to take on projects and do projects, and sooner or later he would go bankrupt! But we finally survived. His good reputation made many local government officials kind to us. So after the tax reform was completed and the local government revenue increased greatly, our company's development went on the fast lane, leaving the Italians far behind. So, Ivan, my child, don't be afraid of not being able to recover the project payment. I earned more than 20,000 rubles a year, and I also settled several projects on hand last year. Now the company is full of cash, which is not a problem at all."
Chapter completed!