Actually the first destination of Kaka Chen in Africa was Ghana, where his family clothing business started more than 10 years ago.
Yiwu’s businessmen always choose the clothing business as their starting point when they go to overseas countries to explore new profits, especially in African countries. ”
That was really a wise choice made by my parents 10 years ago. But nowadays clothing business environment is becoming tougher and tougher,” said Kaka.
So it was not strange that Kaka proposed to his parents that they should explore new business after he stayed in Accra, the capital of Ghana for two years. “What’s your plan?” asked his parents.
“Ketchup packages.”
The ketchup should be a prosperous business. Kaka stated that Africans always add some ketchup into their staple food, to satisfy their unique taste. “They like the sour taste, they feel delighted when their fry rice with ketchup.”
So that’s how Kaka fought for his own business, by leaving Ghana and opening a ketchup factory in Douala, the largest commercial city in Cameroon.
“Life in Douala is boring, I have to say.” Kaka confessed that life in Africa is kind of simple, like the life of monks in the temple.
There are no malls for shopping, no entertainments for killing time; what Kaka usually do at nights is watching the CCTV-4 programs and occasionally pressing the F5 button to
refresh the net page. “CCTV-4 is the only Chinese channel we can watch in Douala. The network speed there is slow to a crawl, it always takes minutes to access the website, and
that really cultivates my patience.”
But what at t r a c t s Kaka in Douala is still the simple life. Africans generally get married when they are 15 or 16 years old. Yaona, a 20-year-old young man Kaka hired as his employee, is already playing the role of a father – “I have 2 kids to feed.” Yaona’s opening remarks somehow astonished Kaka. “They work for 8 hours a day and get 600 yuan a
month, and they feel satisfied and cherish their work opportunities.
They sing when they are working, they look very happy and optimistic, and I like the way they work.”
One more thing which impresses Kaka in Douala is the frequent usage of the typical made-in-China mobiles. “You must know this kind of mobiles, with long time stand-by and amazingly high decibel ringing. It costs about 200 to 300 yuan in Douala.”
Kaka said Africans always show their kindness to Chinese, just like what Yaona said one day when Kaka had chats with his employees:”Chinese people are so smart, their mobiles are of good quality but low prices, and the TV show made in China is wonderful.” Kaka briefed that his African friends like the ”
Journey to the West” the most. “It is translated into English, of course.
Africans are big fans of the ‘DaShiXiong’ Sun WoKong.” Yaona and his fellows nicknamed one of Kaka’s Chinese employees (who is fat) as “Er ShiXiong”(Pigsty), and this nickname could get all the people in Kaka’s factory into a big laugh.
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