Empire of the Ring

Shamakhi the grain importer owned several skyscrapers and hotels in Baku’s downtown.

His family’s wealth was not built over one night. From the time of Soviet Union, his father had been buying little bits of land in Baku’s downtown.

In the 1990s, as Azerbaijan declared independence, many people became rich from oil money. Because they built modernized buildings in downtown as the symbol of richness, the downtown’s land price skyrocketed and made Shamakhi’s family one of the riches in the city. Shamakhi used his wealth to establish his grain importing business and was able to expand the business to Iran’s Northern region.

Although It would be difficult to have a grand-scale grain import with Youngho’s funds, he only suggested this to Shamakhi since he was confident that he could get grains at a cheaper price than Shamakhi did since he already discussed it with Sergey in advance.

However, Youngho was not going to be satisfied with being only a broker. He approached Shamakhi because he found out that the grain importer was quietly collecting gold bars.

Youngho now had gold bars that weighed more than 1,300 kilograms; including 1,170 kilograms of gold bars collected from dealing with Chechen rebels and 140 kilograms that were produced from the dead gold mines. Altogether they were worth 78 billion won.

For gold collectors, the worth of gold did not matter.

Investing in gold always had been beneficial in difficult times and recently the gold value had been doubled that it had taken the center stage of people’s attention. When the value of cash decreased, the value of gold always rose. That was why wealthy people like Shamakhi trusted gold as their only refuge although he owned many estates already.

Youngho met Shamakhi with a reason to discuss grain importing business, but his real reason was to sell off his gold bars. Every year, he would have two to three tons of gold piling up and he would get the best out of them if he could exchange the gold with something else of a bigger value at the right time.

That day, Youngho slipped to Shamakhi that he was a broker selling mafias’ gold. Since he suggested that if Shamakhi had something that could be exchanged with gold, he could introduce him to mafias who had gold. Now that Youngho cast bait, all there was left to do was to wait.

***

Buildings over twenty to thirty stories could be found everywhere in the commercial area of Buku’s downtown.

Shamakhi owned five buildings downtown, and even a four-star hotel near a coastal line, Park Bulvar.

The mid-sized hotel had a hundred years of history and had two-hundred-and-fifty guest rooms. Because of its elegant decorations, Europeans liked to stay in this hotel. This hotel could easily be promoted to a five-star hotel if they switched the appliances to new ones. With the intention to buy the hotel one day, Youngho mentioned about gold bars from the mafia.

Soon, Shamakhi made a phone call to discuss importing grains, but he could not hide his excitement for the gold bars.

As soon as Youngho arrived at Shamakhi’s office, Shamakhi started to talking in excitement.

“Mr. Lee, I made a phone call to you because I wanted to find out how much gold bars you could deliver for me. I was also wondering what he would like to get in return.”

It looked like Shamakhi would do anything to get those gold bars.

“At this moment, he would sell 1,300 kilograms. Your hotel might make the deal happen. I remember that Mr. Yaniv continuously complained about places he’s been staying in Baku.”

Shamakhi showed every single sign of being surprised because the amount of gold Youngho mentioned was way over his imagination. Yet, Shamakhi seemed to be very eager to make this deal.

“It’s an old hotel. Don’t you think it would make him upset?”

“I am completely sure he won’t. But I guess it all depends on the value of the hotel.”

“A French businessman offered ninety million dollars last year. But I declined his offer since I did not need cash. What do you think? Would a ninety-million-dollar hotel do it?”

Youngho was satisfied with his answer, that he almost ran to Shamakhi to give him a hug. If this deal was made, Youngho would make a huge profit out of it.

The process of taking over the hotel did not take long. Even though Youngho was there to do the paperwork, Shamakhi did not care to check and signed the paper right away. He probably thought his hotel would not be a big deal compared to Zeynep Oilfield Service of the Caspian Sea.

When everything was signed and the hotel became his property, Youngho changed the name of the hotel to Ariang Hotel and began to operate.

Youngho did not change much about the hotel because it was remodeled only ten years ago. He planned to remodel everything once the time was right, and the world was less chaotic from now.

Youngho had made over twenty million dollars of profit from this deal.

He also subtly mentioned to Shamakhi that he could probably deliver a similar amount of gold every year. If he could buy a few extra buildings in Baku, he would be able to buy a few hotels in European countries in the future.

Youngho planned to make a deal only with Shamakhi since he made a huge profit and it would be hard to find people to make such a deal of this much amount.

Shamakhi seemed to show his obsession for gold as much as Youngho did.

Although it was delayed because of the hotel take over, another huge profit would be made from grain importing soon because Youngho had invested around three million dollars for the business as well as receiving his agency commission.

***

As Arirang Hotel in Baku became Youngho’s property, Cha Insoo was one of the busiest people since the hotel had become the asset with the most priority of the security company. Soon, the word spread out that Arirang Hotel’s security was as tight as Baku airport’s.

There was another person who leaped in joy when Youngho bought the hotel. It was Zeynep. She was always fond of fancy things that she fell in love with the hotel’s decorations, statues, and pillars at the entrance. Zeynep made a fuss about how she was liking the hotel.

“Oppa. When I go to college, I’ll major in hotel management. Then I can probably manage Arirang Hotel, right?”

“If my Zeynep wants to do that, I’ll support it 100% but you don’t think managing hotel is easy, do you?”

When she made a fuss about being a musician, Youngho had bought her a piano and gave her a tutor but soon she lost her interest in music. He thought that this would be the case again.

“Wahaha. This is the perfect work for me. I can make this as a super five-star hotel.”

“You are such a spoiled little girl. What do you know about managing a hotel? It’s even difficult for experts with long experience.”

Knowing Zeynep’s fuss was only spontaneous and temporary, Fatima scolded her.

“Unni. I got a feeling as soon as I saw the hotel. This is my destined job.”

Starting Baku’s hotel business gave another hope to Serbian villagers. They considered the business as a stepping stone of the old kingdom’s rebuilding work to regain its power and wealth. When they visited downtown, they always stopped by the hotel to help out with any work.

Despite the cold weather, they cleaned the stonewall and statues outside of the hotel building with bare hands and washing clothes. Youngho did not refuse them anymore. They believed that their Archduchess should be successful in order for the whole kingdom to thrive. Since they insisted to work for Fatima, he could not stop them.

Because of their help to clean up the hotel’s exterior and do all sorts of chores, the hotel was now looking great. They even picked up all the trash in near streets.

There is something called ‘Broken window theory’.

In the mid-1980s, the New York City had quickly turned into a ghetto area but the city government and the police department neglected the situation.

Dirty, old buildings turned even dirtier. Once a broken window was neglected, a weird phenomenon happened that people started breaking intact windows.

When the surrounding is filthy, people tend to throw away trash more easily. However, if the surrounding is clean, people cannot do that.

Once the hotel’s surrounding was cleaned, more foreign travelers visited the hotel. Even though Serbian villagers did not intend this to happen but their actions improved the hotel’s image to guests.

***

Twenty days had already passed since the New Year’s Day.

Shamakhi’s storages, as well as Youngho’s storage units in his farm and ranch, were being filled with Russian grains.

Cheese production was catching its momentum, and Youngho began to distribute some of the cheese products at grocery markets in Baku.

It was not an official sales because Youngho planned to make high-value cheese by processing them for at least six to twelve months.

The pilot sales would be a great advertisement for Serbian Village’s cheese. Although it was only a pilot, the amount of cheese was quite a lot since the ranch had numerous sheep.

Most of the households distant from Baku raised their own sheep and made their own cheese. However, the residents who lived around Baku’s downtown had no other choice but to purchase cheese from grocery stores.

Over two millions of Baku’s residents could not live without cheese just like Europeans and Central Asians. Soon, the amount of Serbian Village cheese would stabilize the cheese price in Baku. Youngho did not foresee how the sheep cover his mining business would help out the village.

As soon as the exterior of houses was completed for Serbian Village, people started to move in. Since they thought all they needed to survive winter was a fireplace, they did not care about interiors.

The solar panels were not installed yet, but they still had small power plant units to make electricity. People worshiped Fatima more and more for what they were given in the village although it was Youngho’s idea and money that provided them with supplies.

It was reported to Youngho that they found gold veins in another dead mine.

This time, the gold vein was thick and long instead of small chunk within sandstones. They could turn these gold veins into gold bars easily because the gold veins had high purity of gold.

Youngho now felt relieved since he found extra veins to make more gold bars. He was feeling somewhat empty ever since he exchanged his gold bars to buy Arirang Hotel.

If a gold mine found on one side of the mountain gave out this much gold, the other side would also include enough amount of gold as well. The other side was not even a cliff. Though the slope was a bit steep, it would be a good area to utilize it as a ranch since it was covered with soil. It seemed like Youngho needed to submit another agricultural business proposal to the Azerbaijani government.