This is the story of the 783rd real person we tell
My name is Chen Hongyu
(My beautiful wife and me)
I am the only child in the family, and my parents are both ordinary workers.
I have been a left-behind child since I was a child and have been living with my grandparents. It was not until the age of 12 that my parents took me to Changchun to go to school. At this point, the family of three finally reunited.
Our family’s economic conditions can only be said to be not very bad, but they are definitely not good. My parents have taught me since I was a child to love my family and make myself stronger. Only in this way can I protect the people you want to protect and the people you want to love. I have always kept this sentence
in my heart and is also the motivation for my future hard work.
I was naughty when I was a child and never was a good student in the eyes of teachers. Despite this, there are many friends around me. Whether I like to study or hate to study, I can be friends with them. This also became a significant advantage in my later entrepreneurship.
19 years old, I had already started working. At that time, I worked in China for KFC -hour worker. Later, I went to Japan to work as a convenience store cashier, kitchen dishwasher, barbecue restaurant waiter, bar bartender , etc.
I was definitely accidental when I went abroad, without any signs. It’s really because I don’t study well in China, so I guess I can only live my life in vain when I grow up.
(I was working)
just happened to catch up with the neighbors discussing going abroad, so I followed the crowd. The reason why I didn’t choose to go to developed countries in Europe and the United States is that the cost there is too high and my family can’t afford it.
wants to go abroad without overpaying too much costs. After choosing, Japan is the only one. After simple preparation of
, I took a flight to Japan on October 2008. When I first got on the plane, I felt very nervous. Because I have never traveled far, I really didn't expect that the first time I left my hometown, I went abroad to Japan.
At that moment, I embarked on the journey with dreams and hopes in my heart! But dreams and reality are always far from each other. After several hours of flight, I finally landed.
Just got off the plane, the scene in front of me made me completely stunned. is too far from Japan on TV, let alone whether it fits what I imagined.
Although I am not from a big city like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, even in 2008, the skyscrapers in Changchun were everywhere. However, after landing, I felt like I had arrived in a small county in China.
There are few people here, there are few buildings, and there are small bungalows everywhere.
(When I was traveling)
This scene made me feel cold. Is this Japan on TV? Didn't I come to the wrong place, right? Where are those neon lights flashing and crowded cities?
Then I thought, I am here to study, and I have to earn money after graduation. What does the quality of the environment have to do with me?
When I came to a strange country, my ears were filled with chattering Japanese. In order to adapt to the environment here as soon as possible, I could only study hard. I spent almost every day in the first half of the year, forcing myself to memorize words, and persisted until late at night every day.
However, this looks very hard, but the effect is not obvious.
plus I was young and had a lot of fun at that time, so I really couldn't remember it! Later I accidentally heard that watching Japanese TV was very good at listening. However, I really couldn't watch TV, so I chose to watch Japanese movies and TV series with Chinese subtitles.
In this process, I found that it is useless to force myself. If you want to truly learn Japanese well, you must integrate into your life. So, I started to slowly get involved in anime, and at the same time, I also went out to work to create opportunities to get more contact with Japanese people.
(Summit of Mount Fuji)
Because I can't understand Japanese, I am simply a monk who can't touch my mind when I work. They couldn't understand what I said, so they suffered a lot of grievances.I often cry silently myself.
I remember that I applied for a dishwasher in a Japanese Izakaya . Because this job doesn't require Japanese, but suddenly one weekend, the store was very busy. The used bowls were piled up in front of me one after another, and it seemed that they would never be washed.
I was so tired that I couldn't straighten my waist, but I still insisted on washing it as soon as possible. Suddenly, the store manager called my name and said something. But I didn't understand, so he hurried away with an impatient look on his face.
I originally thought that things were over, but, after , when all the guests left, the store manager called me over and scolded me. I was so scared that I was confused, not knowing what I did wrong and would be scolded.
Of course I can't understand what he said, but I can understand what he scolded me (Baga). Later, someone told me that it was because when I was very busy just now, he asked me to go to the hall to clean up the table, pick up bowls, and clean. But I didn't understand because my job was to wash dishes, so I didn't think about it there either.
(participate in the local cosplay)
I really felt very wronged at the time. Thinking about it, I am also in my 20s. If I were in my own country, how could someone say something that I couldn’t understand? How could others not understand what they say?
I feel really mixed feelings and feel helpless.
The manager's scolding made me cry on the spot. The same thing happened to me at least four or five times. Every time, I am like a helpless abandoned child, not knowing who to ask for help, so I can only stand there in isolation and slaughter.
I have been active since I was a child, probably because I am not a person who follows the rules in my heart. In the three years since I arrived in Japan, I have worked hard to learn language every day. After graduation, I did find a stable job and was responsible for purchasing and translating documents in the office of a restaurant chain.
At that time, the same day was repeated every day, and it was very comfortable to have 8 am and 5 pm. But this is not the life I want, and I have not forgotten my original intention. What I yearn for is freedom, a broader world, and I am unwilling to be locked in such a cage.
quotes a more fashionable saying, "The world is so big, I have to go and take a look."
So, in the third year, I resolutely quit my originally comfortable job. I chose a path of no return - start my own business!
(watch the women's volleyball game on site)
As for what to do, I was also confused at the beginning. I just yearn for freedom and don’t want to be bound by rules and regulations. Later, during continuous investigation and exploration, I accidentally came into contact with a tourist. He said: "Now many people in China have a lot of demand for Japanese small commodities and daily necessities, and the market is large enough." The sentence
gave me inspiration and inspiration. Since there is demand in the market, I might as well try it. Because I have nothing, I am not afraid even if I fail.
So, starting from 2015, I started to do purchasing agents. A new journey in life has also opened up.
During those days, I really worked day and night. The day before, I calculated what domestic customers needed, and the next day I immediately ran to various supermarkets in Japan.
The pace of life in Japan and China is different. Their drugstores only open at 10:00 am. Whenever the door is opened, I rush in and start shopping. At that time, we often carried all kinds of products on our backs and shuttled through different cities and shops.
After a day of busy traveling, I only started to go home at five or six o'clock in the evening. After arriving at home, classify everything, check the information one by one, and finally pack it. This busyness lasted until two or three in the morning. After everything is cleaned up in , I have to go to the post office that is open 24 hours a day and send the package back to China.
(This is the item I have to send when I buy on my own)
and then the last package is sent out, so I can go home to take a shower and sleep. When I lay down, it was dawn. I have severe lack of sleep every day. Even so, before the supermarket opened in the morning, I had to rush in to sweep the goods again.
My life seems to be pressed by the copy-paste key, and it repeats every day. has been around for more than half a year. After I lie down, I want to sleep quickly, so that I can sleep for three or four hours. If I don’t sleep, I will have no time. accompanied by this highly stressful stress, I began to suffer from insomnia.
This kind of pain has accompanied me for half a year.
During this period, my memory dropped significantly, and I found it difficult to concentrate on my work, and I often made mistakes. I often buy the wrong goods and even send the wrong address. All of this made me upset and began to become irritable.
Actually, I know that if this continues, I will collapse. So, in order to relieve my stress and emotions, I chose to go back to China to visit relatives and friends. Finally, after two months of long adjustments, I finally got out of the predicament, my mentality returned to the past, and returned to Japan with high spirits to continue my business!
Facts have proved that I am right, I actively respond to market demand and follow the trend. In the first year alone, the result I got was 15 million yen (the exchange rate at that time was about 1 million RMB).
This can definitely be regarded as my first pot of gold in my life.
(Return to China to visit relatives and friends)
It is precisely because of this money that I set up my first company. In the past, I fought alone, although I had good returns. However, if you want to become bigger and stronger, you must expand your team and standardize your operations.
So, I started recruiting troops, looking for locations, and preparing for the establishment of the company. is on other people's territory after all, and when doing things, you will inevitably be reluctant to do things. Especially in the early stages of entrepreneurship, I did encounter many difficulties.
At the beginning, as a Chinese company, how to win the same treatment and trust as a Japanese company was the biggest difficulty. In a foreign country, if you want to overcome the different treatments of others to treat us, you can only make more efforts and there is no other way.
Under normal circumstances, the Japanese can pass the exam by 6 points, and we have to get 8 or even 9 points. Because when we have the same 6 points, many opportunities are not our turn.
No matter what we do, we have to make double efforts to overcome this unequal social condition.
The sword is sharpened by the sharpening, and the fragrance of plum blossoms comes from the bitter cold. All the difficulties and obstacles cannot stop me from moving forward. In 2016, I set up a second company. Two years later, after various preparations, my third company was officially opened.
(participate in the New Year activities in Nagoya)
After 8 years of ups and downs, I have gone from one person to a trading company with 32 people. Now, our company has become a representative Chinese trading company in Nagoya.
's turnover this year has reached more than 600 million yuan.
Although I have been very tired and hard during the past few years of starting a business, I also feel very happy. I want to tell those young people that if your job happens to be something you are interested in, then you are so lucky. This will allow you to work happily every day without feeling tired.
I have many young friends around me, who often ask me: "What is the secret to success?"
I always feel that if you want to accomplish something, the first condition is desire . What I often say to employees is: "There is nothing that cannot be done. It is only if you want to do it or not, and how much do you want to do it."
Desire is the prerequisite for success, and hard work and persistence are just success. Necessary conditions.
In addition to work, I will also integrate into local life. Over time, I found that Japan and China are actually very similar in many aspects. There is almost no big difference in skin color, appearance, or food culture.
(Climb up to see the distance, overlooking Kobe)
However, there is a big difference, that is, the Japanese society is a bit cold and ruthless.
In Japan, parents do not care about their children, and the children do not take care of the elderly, and there is almost no connection between relatives. The Japanese society is more or less extreme. It doesn’t matter if you don’t meet your parents and relatives all your life, let alone friends who don’t treat each other to dinner and don’t give gifts.
Because many people around us are like this, Chinese people like us who are thicker than water have become aliens here by relying on their friends' way of thinking when going out.
This point is unacceptable to me. I always remember that I came from China, a country with a strong sense of humanity, a country with blood thicker than water, and a country with values affection.
When it is late at night, I often ask myself, why am I here alone?
(a football match sponsored by our company)
If it is just for life, then I can let go and return home at the moment. But, that's not what I want either. Now, I have a bunch of brothers who have been following me since the beginning.
No matter how cold winter and hot summer, they will never leave me and always support me behind my back. Without them, there would be no achievements I have today.
is now not only for myself, but also for the entire team, to take them further and to help everyone realize everyone's wishes. This is my greatest motivation.
(Birds who yearn for freedom will fly higher)
The old saying is good, stand at thirty, be forty, not confused. I happened to be stuck in the middle this year, and it was also my 8th year of starting a business. In terms of life experience and network resources, the next 10 years will determine my success or failure.
No matter what, I have set sail. I am not afraid of whether the future is full of thorns or stormy waves, because I have dreams.
I plan to work hard for another 20 years, then retire and return home, accompany my parents, and make some contributions to my hometown. Looking back on this life, I have fought hard, won, and have no regrets!
[Oral: Chen Hongyu]
[Editor: Xiaobo]
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