Chapter 785: Chapter 774: Dealing with Scalpers
“With , the sleeper berths are double the price too. Let
tell you, don’t even think it’s expensive, you might not even be able to buy one!” the sleazy scalper whispered, “Right now, I’m the only one with tickets. If you want to buy, you better hurry, or else if soone else buys them, you won’t be able to get back ho!”
“But this is really too expensive, can you make it a bit cheaper? Add one hundred yuan, sell it to !” the man pleaded.
“How could that be possible? I’m not afraid to tell you, for each ticket I get from the inside, I have to pay a one hundred yuan kickback to soone. You know, now it’s the Spring Festival travel season, and the Spring Festival ans price hikes. These are the unified prices nationwide, if you want to buy, do it quickly! If not, don’t delay my business!”
“This…” the man was conflicted for a while, then sighed and asked, “I want two tickets, do you have them?”
“Of course, I have as many as you want!” said the scalper, “Money in one hand, tickets in the other, eh!”
“Deal!”
“Hold on.” Just as the two were about to make the trade, Song Yun suddenly spoke up and stopped them.
“What is it, young man, you want tickets?” the scalper asked.
“I’d like so, how many do you have?” Song Yun asked, with an interested look.
“However many you want, I can provide!” the scalper said proudly, “And no matter which seats you want, I can get them for you.”
“Oh? That confident? I’ll take fifty sleeper tickets to XX, do you have them?” Song Yun asked.
“As long as you can pay, I can get them for you!” the scalper asserted.
“These tickets, are they all acquired from the inside?” Song Yun curiously asked.
“Of course, do you think we produce them ourselves?” the scalper looked at Song Yun with a ‘you’re such an idiot’ expression and said, “I’m not afraid for you to know, the tickets in my hands are all from internal connections. You see all these people in line? Probably only one third of them will be able to get a ticket. For every carriage, roughly half the tickets are sold outside, the other half are in our hands! Let
tell you, even if you want an entire carriage’s tickets, I can still get them for you!”
“Really? Then what about the people who can’t buy tickets?” Song Yun asked.
“If everyone could buy them, how would we make a living?” the scalper said, sowhat speechless.
“Well, what if you don’t sell all the tickets, but the train is about to leave, isn’t that a waste?”
“That won’t happen. We only take as many tickets from the inside as there is demand. Simply put, we get tickets earlier and more easily than you. Enough talk, are you buying or not? If you want them, give
the money and I’ll go inside and get the tickets for you.”
“Yes, yes, yes, I have a whole bunch of coworkers who can’t get back, fifty sleeper tickets, can you really make it happen?” Song Yun still seed doubtful.
“Of course, I can definitely make it happen, no question about it.” the scalper boasted, “If you don’t trust , you can co with
to pick up the tickets.”
“Let … I’ll co with you to have a look, my coworkers are counting on , after all!” Song Yun said, turning his gaze to his parents not far away, and Song Ergou followed after him.
“This is my dad, we’re together,” Song Yun pulled Song Ergou’s hand and introduced him.
“You guys do look alike, both workers from here?” the scalper asked.
“Yes, yes, we all work over here!” Song Yun quickly nodded.
“But… where’s my ticket?” The man Song Yun bumped into earlier followed beside the scalper and asked.
“Wait a mont, I’ll take you guys to get the tickets. Like I said, my reputation is the best here. However, you’ll only be able to wait outside, you can’t go in. This involves confidential matters, got it? Confidential!” the scalper said earnestly.
“Aren’t you afraid we’re the cops?” Song Yun asked.
“Pfft, we have connections in the police departnt too. Plus, unless it’s sothing serious, they generally won’t bother us,” the scalper explained, “They have too many other things to deal with, and us scalpers, you can never catch them all. As long as there are railways, we’ll exist.”
“That is indeed the case!” Song Yun nodded as if enlightened.
Soon after, the group wandered around the station, and they surprisingly ended up in the inner part of the station, in a large courtyard. “Wait here, I’ll go in and get the tickets.” The scalper said, “Hey you, I’ll show you ten tickets later, if you think they’re okay, you can go get the money. We’ll trade money for tickets, how about that?”
“That works! If there’s no problem with the tickets, we can go get the money right away,” Song Yun said.
When the scalper walked into a room in front of the courtyard, Song Yun said to the man he had bumped into in the morning, “Aren’t these doubled prices way too expensive?”
“Sigh, there’s no helping it, going ho isn’t easy,” the man lanted, “Like us who work out here, we only make so much money each month, and we still have to send so back ho. Usually, there’s not much left over each year. Let
tell you, taking the train ho once, it’s like five days’ worth of my wages. If I took a plane, I’d have to work for half a month for free. Sigh, everything is so expensive, except wages never rise.”
Before the conversation went on for long, the scalper ca out of the room with a few more tickets in his hand.
“See these? All sleeper tickets, all genuine! No fear of being caught!” the scalper flaunted the tickets in hand and said, “If you want to buy, go get the money now. You should know, sleeper tickets are extrely hard to get! Here, this is your hard seat ticket.”
The man handed over the money to the scalper and, with a word of thanks, carefully put the ticket into his pocket.
Song Yun said he needed to go out and get money with Song Er, and they promptly left with the man who had just bought his ticket.
“I’ll be waiting at the sa spot after you get the money. If you wait there, I’ll show up,” the scalper said, then walked off into the crowd.
“Son, what are you up to?” Song Ergou asked curiously.
“Nothing much, I just felt like this whole thing is pretty shady and wanted to do sothing about it,” Song Yun shrugged and said.
“These sorts of things happen all over the country, do you really think taking care of it in just one place will make a difference?” Song Ergou asked.
“Maybe, but I always feel if it’s happening right under my nose, I can’t stand it, I just want to do sothing. Look at these people.” Song Yun gestured toward the line of people stretching at least a hundred ters and said, “All these people lining up all night, just for a ticket to get back ho. And to think that these tickets were controlled by soone with ill-intent, engaging in backdoor deals, ending up in the hands of scalpers, then resold at high prices, it just really annoys , seriously annoys !” Song Yun licked his lips and said.
“Ha-ha, you, you’ve got spirit, just like I did back in the day. But now, I don’t have the sa passion as you. Go on and do it, but we’re about to head to the capital, you better finish quickly, to avoid dragging it out till after the new year. So things, if you don’t do them, you don’t, but if you do, you must do them with the force of a thunderbolt,” Song Er encouraged with a laugh.
“I got it!” Song Yun nodded and picked up his phone to call Wang Dong.
The hard-done-by Wang Dong, every ti there was sothing to handle, he was the one Song Yun utilised, that was the so-called trade. Back when I supported you to rise to power, now that I need you, you have to obediently be of use to .
When Wang Dong heard Song Yun wanted to bust ticket scalpers, he was also overwheld.
“This is an unspoken rule, a widely accepted practice. Behind these scalpers stand the heads of the railway bureaus, and even so people from the provincial transportation departnt. Song Yun, are you really determined to take action?” Wang Dong asked softly.
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