warlord
Posted: January 8, 2013 Filed under: figures of speech, history, pearls of wisdom | Tags: a true story of china, folly, gambling, justice, karma, preserving capital, risk 24 Comments »When I was young I knew a young martial artist from Hong Kong. Just a small fellow, his skill was such that I knew I would never match him. We worked in IT together and became friends.
His grandfather had lived in mainland China near a river before the revolution. He had a small army, including his own tank. All goods that passed up and down the river paid tribute to the Warlord. When the communist revolution began, the Warlord sent one of his sons out to Hong Kong to secure a place in case the war was lost. The son purchased an entire city block of land in Hong Kong. Imagine the value of an entire city block there today.
The war against the communists went poorly and the Warlord and his family fled before Mao and his army. When they arrived in Hong Kong there was nothing. The son had gambled the entire fortune away.
Perhaps it was justice, or karma or the son was just a fool. It is not uncommon for a man to lose a fortune to folly, but still…
The moral: Only a fool doesn’t manage risk and preserve his capital
it kind of reminded me of the game Monopoly
yeah — it did, I was always for developing baltic avenue, that real cheap one right by GO
i believe that…lol
Me too. I call it my “mansion in the ghetto” strategy.
You have met some very interesting people!
Isn’t the world full of interesting people?
sure is!
actually the next post is about what his wife gave up to wed him.
The one good thing about blogging is I always thought how boring my life was, and I actually did a few interesting things.
You’re anything but boring!
Today a co-worker invited me to go on a walk. I was wearing a dress and panty hose, but put on my coat and went. It didn’t take me long to realize I would not last. The cold wind was freezing my legs so we cut the walk short.
Later in the lunch room I guess she was sharing this story but said we had to cut the walk short because Diana’s not wearing pants today! Some news just travels faster than other news…Nothing to do with your post haha! but I thought you would enjoy the story.
want to go for a walk ( laughing )
laughing too!
at a loss here… true words
What an interesting story! My thought? That I need to buy a tank, move near a river, and demand tribute from large boats passing by.
good work if you can find it!
Maybe that’s what Arnold is doing with his tank, although demanding tribute in California is probably an exercise in futility!
Logistics. I’ll think of how awesome it would be in my mind.
Having your own tank would be cool!
having a tank means always going first at the 4-way stop!
Nice lesson and story about the old days of Hong Kong. There are many fools today, lol!
few get the opportunity to lose so much.
It sounds as though the warlord was attempting to manage risk and preserve his capital, and made a mistake in judgment regarding the son to which he chose to entrust a large portion of his wealth. Perhaps it speaks volumes as to the intgrity of the warlord that he had no one–not even his own son–who he could entrust with his wealth. Intelligent and honest people tend to surround themselves with other intelligent and honest people.
Russ
I think you are spot on. Aside from the cultural 1st son/second son dichotomy — people like that are rarely surrounded by integrity.