Fifteen Years in America Chapter Two – The Professor of Duke’s Lane (Part 2)

This is a continuation of my family’s immigration story as told by my dad. If you have missed the previous posts they are here:
Fifteen Years in America — An Introduction
Fifteen Years in America – Chapter 1: The Struggle Before the Reunion by Jian (Part 1)
Fifteen Years in America – Chapter 1: The Struggle Before the Reunion by Jian (Part 2)
Fifteen Years in America – Chapter 1: The Struggle Before the Reunion by Jian (Part 3)
Fifteen Years in America – Chapter 1: The Struggle Before the Reunion by Jian (End)
Fifteen Years in America – Chapter 2: The Professor of Duke’s Lane (Part 1)
Enjoy!

When I saw that most of the salespeople nearby were young females I became a little disheartened.  I was afraid that I went there for nothing and wasted a whole $0.75 for the bus.  After I walked past eight or nine stores I saw a middle aged man standing in front of a shop.  I figured out that he is Korean from his face shape.  So I went up to him and muttered in broken English, “Do you need a salesman?”

He looked at me as if he were startled, and then shook his head and said, “No, I don’t need a salesman.  I need a salesgirl.”

I didn’t give up, and continued to walk forward.  I asked a few more Korean managers if they wanted help, and all the responses were “NO”.  Finally I was at the middle of the lane, and I saw a 30 something storekeeper who looked Chinese.  I looked at his products, and they were mostly crystal baubles like pineapples, dolphins, volcanoes, and coconut trees.  Besides crystal products, he sells  some perfume and Hawaiian print bags.  Additionally he had some Chinese imports such as exercise balls and other random knick knacks.

When I was in front of his shop, I heard the storekeep speaking to a teenage looking salegirl in the Chinese I am familiar with, “Ah-Mei, today the business is very light!”

The girl named Ah-Mei replied, “It sure is, until now I still haven’t sold anything.  Peter, how about you?”

Peter said, “I only sold a bottle of perfume. The business is so light that I don’t want to continue working.  However Meilan just had a child and only works four and a half shifts a week now.  My wife also returned to Taiwan so I have no choice but to work here.”

When I heard their dialog, I felt that it was my chance.  Because they spoke Chinese I didn’t feel shy.

I walked up to Peter and said, “Sir, do you need help?”

Peter said to me, “Oh, do you have experience in selling things?”  This was my third day in America, and of course I didn’t have any sales experience.

I had a sudden flash of inspiration and pulled out a business card from my university.  I told Peter that in China  I was the assistant department head of the Economics department, and I was also a professor.  I told him that of course I had sales experience, because that is a skill I teach my students.  Actually, this is a half truth because even though I have students that became businessmen, I really haven’t had actual experience outside of the school.  In school everything is theory in books, and I have never actually sold a single thing before.

Peter picked up my business card and read the titles I had printed in both Chinese and English.  Then he looked at me from head to toe and saw that I was clean cut and quite energetic.  He didn’t reject me right away like all the Koreans, and seemed a little bit interested.  At this moment a Caucasian couple walked to the store and started to peruse the goods.  Peter started to talk to the customers right away.  The woman seemed interested in the perfumes, and Peter immediately brought two bottles from his shelf for the customer.  The man didn’t seem to have any interest in buying things, and looked at the various products in the store.

When Peter was working on selling to the woman, I targeted the man.  When I saw that he seemed to be curious about a pair of exercise balls with a dragon design, I walked up and picked up the balls and started to roll them in my hand.  The exercise balls had tiny bells in their centers and when you played with them they would make ringing sounds.  My performance piqued the interest of this man.

“What is this?” He asked.

“These two balls are good for your health.” I told him.

“Really?”  He seemed a bit surprised.

It seems that the man was really interested, but I didn’t know much English.  However, I have been a professor for many years and I was used to giving a performance.  So I rolled the balls in my hands more quickly and more loudly.  When I saw this man was quite mesmerized by my performance I stopped playing with them and asked him, “could you turn around?”

He turned around and I started to roll the balls on his back, and as I rolled them I asked, “very comfortable?”

He nodded his head and said, “Oh, it’s massage, good, fast, faster!”

Finally he was conquered by my performance, and asked, “How much?”

Peter was negotiating with the woman, but he was also paying attention to what I was doing.  When he saw that the man was asking for a price, he said to me in Chinese, “just give it to him for ten dollars, if he haggles, you can give him a little discount.”

Now I remembered the rule about setting prices that I learned at school.  The idea is that you should “wear a three feet tall hat and let them take a cut.”  So I said to that man, “fifteen dollars a pair, and you also get a very nice box.”

That man must have known that in a street market haggling is normal.  So he said to me, “how about eight dollars?”

I replied, “eight dollars is a little bit too low, how about ten dollars?”

That man replied, “Ok, ten dollars.”

At the same time, Peter reached an agreement with the woman, and sold a bottle of perfume for 50 dollars.  That woman told her man to pay, and the man pulled out an one hundred dollar bill and said to Peter, “the total is sixty dollars, just give me back forty.”

Peter was quite happy, and as he got change he said to them, “you guys got a very good deal.  Thanks and come back again!”

When this couple left, Peter said to me, “come back here for a moment, I have something to say to you.”  Peter didn’t want Ah-Mei from the other shop to hear what we were discussing.  At that moment I knew there was hope that I found a job.  He said to me, “how about this, you come to work at 4pm, and I will have Meilan call you.  To begin I will give you the minimum wage, and after a month I will give you an additional 3% sales commission.  The more you sell the more you will get.”

When I heard this I was truly excited.  I told peter, “many thanks for giving this opportunity.  I know a little bit of Japanese also and I can sell thing to Japanese people.  I won’t let you down!”

Thus I started my first job in America.  I was a salesman!

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