# The Hibernation of Jia the Abacus

Back in the late Qing Dynasty, there was a small tea peddler surnamed Jia in Huizhou. He was a whiz with an abacus and had a silver tongue to boot. Not long after he got into the trade, he stumbled into a windfall of several dozen taels of silver by pure luck, and promptly decided he was a business genius. He walked with a swagger and greeted everyone with a grin, as if he could buy up the entire city of Huizhou by tomorrow. When the older folks in the neighborhood advised him to play it safe, he would curl his lip and scoff: "What do you old fogeys know? This is what they call *a pig caught in a gust of wind*—even a pig can fly if the wind is strong enough!"

That year, when spring tea hit the market, he poured every last coin of his profits into the trade, and even took out a usurious loan from a money shop at three percent monthly interest. He stockpiled a whole roomful of tea, just waiting for the price to double so he could buy a grand mansion in the city. He’d even spent two taels of silver to have the blueprints for the house drawn up.

But as luck would have it, the heavens refused to smile on him. Days of relentless rain triggered landslides on the mountain roads, and tea prices plummeted. The money lender showed up at his door with thugs to collect the debt, kicking open the wooden gate with a snarl: "No silver today, and we’ll smash this place to smithereens!" Jia fell to his knees with a thud and begged for mercy. The creditor sneered: "Settle the debt with your lousy tea then! It’s already damp and moldy as it is!" He was so frantic that blisters broke out all over his mouth; staring at the room full of tea leaves, he was sick with regret.

The old owner of the local teahouse took pity on him and handed him a bowl of hot tea. "Lad, in shallow waters, even a dragon has to coil itself up. You had barely a few coins in your pocket, and you thought you could swallow an entire tea mountain? Plunging all your money in before you even know the ropes? That’s just asking for trouble. First pay off your debts, start small with a modest business. When the market truly turns in your favor, there’ll be plenty of time to soar to great heights."

Jia gritted his teeth, sold off his tea at rock-bottom prices to pay his debts, and never again gambled on big deals. He worked from dawn to dusk every day, buying only a few dozen jin of loose tea at a time, roasting it himself over a stove. He stirred the leaves in the iron wok with his bare hands, never stopping even when blisters covered his scalded palms. Three years later, a severe drought hit, and fine tea crops failed entirely. Thanks to his skilled craftsmanship and well-timed stockpiling, he was hired by a major tea merchant at a handsome salary to be their head manager, turning his fortunes around completely. The storyteller rapped his wooden block with a sharp *crack*: It’s the same with making money—don’t reach for what isn’t ripe yet. Wealth never rushes through an impatient door. Only with a steady mind can good fortune flow in abundance.