Pet King
Chapter 1464: Chinatown

After having breakfast, Zhang Zian took the elves with him and drove off.

They went out later than yesterday, and since he already got dressed in the evening to prevent getting caught in traffic jams in the morning, today’s schedule was very relaxed. He was only planning to go to one area in Chinatown. If there was more than enough time, he would slowly explore Fusong City and Little Italy City nearby … not to watch a strip show, of course.

Richard crouched on Zhang Zian’s shoulder in resentment with his mouth tied closed using a string. Sadly, that meant he couldn’t sing.

The other elves weren’t as interested, but since they wouldn’t be doing much, they followed anyway. Since they just came from China, how interesting would it be to go back to Chinatown? Isn’t the bustling area full of Chinese people? Nevertheless, it was at least better than staying in Binhai.

The terrain of San Francisco was undulating and required the car to move slowly. Zhang Zian drove while listening to the navigator’s directions.

As he passed by a local pet store in the United States, he stopped to visit it and found the Leshi dog food on the shelf. Since he had plenty of time, he pretended to be an ordinary customer wanting to buy things and stayed in the store for a while to observe. He roughly estimated that the sales of this dog food were relatively average, probably because this was made in the United States and they couldn’t rely on the blind trust of Chinese customers to sell foreign brands as a key promotion tactic.

He stood in the store for half an hour and would sometimes see someone come over, pick up Leshi dog food and compared it with the dog food next to him, then either take it to checkout or put it back in place.

He didn’t know what they were thinking, but It seemed that the Americans who choose Leshi dog food generally wore ragged clothing and had contemptible personalities; this dog food was considered a bargain. However, it was placed with other smaller brands of dog food on both the higher and lower shelves. Popular expensive dog foods were placed on the middle shelf, slightly lower than the customer’s line of sight; it was the easiest place for customers to find it. It seemed that wealthy customers entered the store and often bought popular dog food brands without thinking about the other ones, and the customers who would squat down or tiptoe are the ones that would pick up cheaper dog foods from smaller brands and contrast them carefully.

“Hello. I’m struggling between these two dog foods, would you mind if I ask you which one you would choose?”

Zhang Zian called out to a young man who was holding two packs of dog foods for comparison, with one of them being the Leshi dog food.

The young man glanced at him and weighed Leshi dog food in his hand before he said, “I choose this.”

“Why?” Zhang Zian asked.

The man shrugged and said, “Because it’s cheap enough, and it says the source of raw materials and processing place are in the United States. I think it’s better than the other one.”

The raw materials of high-grade dog food were traceable. However, raw materials for lower-grade dog food couldn’t be traced but generally indicated where they came from. Americans often thought that the raw materials that came from foreign countries, especially China, were unreliable.

Zhang Zian didn’t ask anything else left the pet shop after the bill was settled.

He believed that Leshi dog food’s packaging didn’t lie. The source of the raw material and the processing place were indeed located in the United States, but this didn’t necessarily mean that it was reliable.

The elves waited impatiently as he continued driving around Chinatown, deliberately changing where he would enter so he wouldn’t pass that green-roofed door.

Many people were attracted to gold. God knew why the arches of Chinatown were green; this made Zhang Zian extraordinarily superstitious.

The car window was rolled down. As soon as someone drove into ​​Chinatown, familiar Chinese languages would be swept into the car by wind. Mandarin and Cantonese were used equally, while English and other languages were used less frequently.

67% of the shop signs on both sides of the road were written in pure Chinese using traditional characters, while the rest were a mixture of Chinese and English.

Overall, it was similar to the old style of Hong Kong and Taiwan, but very different from Binhai.

Tangren Street was too narrow to drive through, so Zhang Zian parked his car on the side of the road, used the parking meters to start the charge time, and took the elves out of the car and walk around.

Most Chinatowns consisted of only a few restaurants. Chinese pharmacies were more abundant; you could encounter a pharmacy with pungent Chinese medicine just a few steps away.

Additionally, many shops selling snacks put their goods out by the shop window, attracting the smell of pedestrians passing by.

“How fragrant!” Snowy Lionet licked its mouth as it stopped following Fina and staring intently at the neighboring shop, drooling.

It was a prosperous butcher’s shop with bright lights. Customers come and go from time to time. The store sold both raw and cooked meat products. Roasted turkeys and roast ducks were hung from iron hooks on the other side of the window, illuminated by the sun and glowing with a dreamy luster. It was almost within reach.

There was also a lot of fresh meat, sorted in transparent refrigerators.

Outside the shop window, there were advertisements with slogans written in pure Chinese slogans on red and white backgrounds that read “Our New Variety: Wild Boar Meat” and “Our New Variety: Wild Venison”.

“Wild board meat, venison … I don’t think I’ve eaten these yet,” Snowy Lionet suggested, hooking to the corner of Zhang Zian trousers with her claws. If he forced his leg forward, his trousers would tear.

“Don’t you eat all the time? Besides, you eat a lot!” Zhang Zian whispered whilst looking around to see that no one nearby noticed him. “The pork and venison sold in this shop are raw, and I can’t just hold one bag of raw meat as I go shopping, can I? ”

“Meow meow! I just want to eat raw meat! The cooked meat is not delicious, all covered in MSG! And it’s not pork, it is wild boar meat!” Snowy Lionet was enticed by the smell of raw meat and couldn’t move forward.

“What’s the difference?”

Zhang Zian didn’t believe that the pork was real wild boar meat. It was likely pretending to be real meat but was actually some domestic pork with high muscle content. The same applied to the venison. How expensive would it be if they were all really wild meat?

“I don’t care! I’m going to eat it!” Snowy Lionet said sternly, “Otherwise, I’ll rip your pants in front of everyone!”

“Zhang Zian, since she wants to eat, let her eat. It may be better to buy less and let her taste fresh meat,” Old Time Tea advised him, now tired of Snowy Lionet’s whining.

“All right…” Zhang Zian reluctantly agreed.

Even so, Snowy Lionet couldn’t eat much after having breakfast that morning. Now she could eat at most 2 or 3 slices of raw meat. Zhang Zian also didn’t want to walk around carrying a bag of raw meat. If he bumped into a pretty girl, she might think he was a family cook.

The flesh was too fragrant and tempted the other elves, especially Fina. However, Snowy Lionet was too embarrassed to speak up and ask for it. When Zhang Zian said he wanted to enter the store, she ran in first.