Jin Yutong

Chapter 89 Huakang Ghost City

The flower and bird market that Guo Hai mentioned is actually Huakang Market in Tianzhong City. Huakang Market is on Jiankang Road, which is near Jingyu Square. The farmer's market is divided into several areas, including a vegetable area, a fruit area, and a pet area. The largest area is the flower and tree sales area.

Now it is the holiday time, although it is only after [-] o'clock in the morning, the market is already full of people, and trucks carrying vegetables or flowers and trees are constantly entering the market, which makes the street crowded, Chen Ran and Guo Hai could only squeeze past from one side.

In the sales area of ​​flowers and trees, there are indeed two or three antique shops, one selling calligraphy and paintings, one selling weapons, and one selling stone carvings, root carvings, or wood carvings.

In the calligraphy and painting shop, Chen Ran also went in to have a look. There were quite a lot of paintings in the shop, but most of them were modern paintings, and there were very few ancient paintings. In the collection, calligraphy and paintings are undoubtedly the most difficult to preserve. Naturally, it is impossible for the owner to hang precious ancient paintings in the store.

After walking around Huakang Market twice, Chen Ran found the antique area. At first glance, there was an antique street, and then there was a small courtyard. The courtyard seemed to be full of antique shops. Compared with the vegetable selling area outside Or the flowers and trees area, the antique area has much more pedestrians, even overcrowded, this is because people who come to Huakang Market to buy vegetables, or to buy flowers and trees, it is impossible to come here so early in the morning, but the antique area is different For those who play antiques, it is normal to get up early and stay late, especially in many places, there is a saying of morning market.

The morning market is a written term. It was also called a ghost market in the past. The ghost market was formed before liberation. It is a collective name for the illegal antique trading market. The ghost market sounds scary, but it is actually very simple. It is to escape the city management Cracked down by the cultural inspection team of the Bureau of Industry, Commerce and Cultural Relics, this kind of illegal antique trading market only appears in the morning and evening.As soon as the agreed trading time comes—mostly at dusk or evening, after the law enforcement agencies get off work, some unknown street vendors come out from all over the place. They occupy the open space on both sides of the street, put down the sacks or snakeskin bags, and take out the goods from inside. Put out some second-hand goods and set up a stall on the spot.

This is a traditional ghost market. The current ghost market is no longer like this, but many rules are still preserved. The start time of the ghost market is also not fixed. In some places, it starts after three in the morning. It ends at seven or eight o'clock, but in some places, it is normal to go until **.

Seeing so many people in the antique city, Chen Ran guessed that the Huakang antique market had also formed a ghost market, which immediately made him interested. He had never visited a ghost market before.

As soon as I entered the antique area, it became lively all of a sudden, but the bustle was only the street stalls in the small courtyard of the antique area, and the formal storefronts like the antique street passing by the small courtyard were empty and there were not many tourists.

In fact, the reason is very simple. Nowadays, there are roughly three kinds of people who go to the antique market to visit the ghost market in the early morning. One is antique dealers, the other is antique collectors. , They don't buy antiques, they don't chat, they just regard visiting antique ghost markets as a kind of fun and a hobby in life.

As for tourists, they are less common.

There are quite a few stall-style shops on the ground in the small courtyard of the antique area. Some nearby people brought tables and the like, some just put a layer of cloth towels, and some even put things directly. On the ground, whether it is finished jadeite or other things, there is a dazzling array of everything.

Chen Ran didn't have any goals, so he just followed the flow of people. Guo Hai followed Chen Ran and looked left and right. Whenever he came across a lively place, he would go to join in the fun. After seeing that he must not make a move, he no longer cares about him.

In front of each stall, Chen Ran would stop and observe. The most sold stalls were still jade pendants or bracelets. These jade wares looked like deceitful things, not to mention how good the carvers were, they were basically carved out of fake jade. Yes, of course, this kind of thing is naturally very cheap, and you can get it for ten yuan if you go for a price, and only tourists will buy it.

In addition to jade, ceramics are the most common, and there are rows of stalls everywhere.

Chen Ran just wandered around, and only when he saw something interesting would he squat in front of the booth, ask questions, 'touch', 'touch', ordinary objects, crude objects that can be seen as imitations at a glance, these things he even He didn't even bother to touch it, he only looked at the fine-looking ones, and if he couldn't tell the truth from the fake with his eyesight, he would use the energy aperture to detect it again, but there were not many such opportunities. Although this ghost market was lively, but There are not many real things.

At this moment, Chen Ran was attracted by a booth. In fact, this booth not only attracted him, but besides him, there were many people who would stop and take a look when passing by, but most of them They all just asked, then shook their heads and left. Many people were interested, but very few actually bought it.

This stall sells a very rare item. Although the item is rare, everyone has heard of it, and that is the longevity lock.

The longevity lock is a unique ornament of the Chinese people, even overseas, as long as it is in an area where the Chinese gather, you can see this kind of ornament.This may be the meaning of the collection of longevity locks.

Longevity lock is also called "send name lock".It is a decoration hung on children's necks during the Ming and Qing Dynasties. According to superstition, as long as this kind of decoration is worn, it is not only for decoration, but also for the purpose of warding off evil spirits and blessings. From the very beginning, they hung this kind of ornament until they reached adulthood.

In China, the custom of wearing longevity locks is very widespread.In ancient times, from the sons of the princes and nobles to the sons of the common people, they would wear longevity locks after birth.This can be evidenced by its materials. Changshou Lock can be made from a wide range of materials. Precious materials include gold, silver, ivory, jade, coral, tortoiseshell, ordinary copper and iron, and even wood and stone.

At this stall, it is roughly estimated that there are at least two or three hundred longevity locks, including gold, silver, copper, jade, ivory, wood carvings, stone carvings, and coconuts. The leather carvings, etc., look extremely spectacular.

But obviously, if this thing is placed in a busy city, it will definitely attract the attention of many children and women, but in this antique market, it is still a ghost market time, although it can attract people, but the people who really buy it Not many.

After all, at this time, most of the people who go around in the ghost market are Taobao people, and the longevity lock in front of me, the stall owner has collected so many, must have studied it very much, no matter what kind of material it is carved, it will not If it is sold at a low price, there will be no leaks to pick up. Another point is that there are not many people who know about longevity locks.

Chen Ran wasn't interested in longevity locks either, he was interested in jade and ivory longevity locks, and while he was observing with an ivory longevity lock, Guo Hai also ran away When he came over, he saw that Chen Ran was looking at the longevity lock, so he couldn't help but joked: "Aran, you didn't think about buying a longevity lock for your son so early, did you?"

Chen Ran ignored him, put down the ivory carving longevity lock in his hand, and picked up a jade carving longevity lock.Longevity locks have been gradually accepted by collectors in recent years. As the collection of longevity locks has become more and more popular, many imitations have appeared on the market.

Chen Ran remembered that in an antique essay diary written by a master collector he read, there was such a sentence, at present, there is only one way to distinguish the longevity lock, that is, if you see two identical ones The cleats must be fake, because the previous longevity locks were all handmade, and even the same craftsman could not make two identical cleats.

"Aran, if you buy one, pick one for me too, and I'll take it back to Aunt Yun, she will be very happy." Guo Hai knelt down and put his arms around Chen Ran's neck, and locked his eyes on the longevity lock in front of him. Interest also came.

Chen Ran turned back to stare at him, and said angrily, "Aunt Yun is so happy, it's time to urge you to find a wife!"

As soon as Guo Hai heard this, he immediately became silent. Isn't this just making himself guilty.

Putting the longevity lock in his hand on the booth, Chen Ran stood up and was about to leave, but just as he was about to leave, the stall owner suddenly stopped him: "Wait... little brother, what is your name?" Sure?"

Chen Ran was startled, and then nodded. It's not surprising that the stall owner knew that Guo Hai called his name just now.

"Yeah, what's the matter?" Guo Hai also looked at the stall owner strangely.

The stall owner is a middle-aged man about 40 years old, with a thin body and a pair of small eyes. He looked at Chen Ran and said with a cheerful smile: "Little brother, wait a moment, I have an ivory Carved longevity lock, can you see if you are interested?"

Chen Ran was noncommittal, but looked at the stall owner, feeling a little strange in his heart. What does this ivory longevity lock have to do with his name? The stall owner seemed to know that he would be interested... The stall owner smiled and stood up. He got up and opened the box he was sitting on. There were quite a lot of things in the box. There was a steel water bottle and a porcelain teacup. Quaint old stuff.

The stall owner was rummaging through this pile of miscellaneous things, and from time to time he found a long-lived lock, looked at it, and put it back into the box, and then found another long-lived lock, which he took out Longevity locks are all carved from ivory.

Chen Ran saw that besides the longevity lock, there were many small things in the stall owner's box. These small things must have been collected by the stall owner himself when the ghost market first started.

Thinking of this, Chen Ran took a step forward, flew out an energy aperture to detect the past, to see if the stall owner had received any good things... Who knew that when he probed, what happened immediately made him stunned!