GUANGZHOU, China – For businessmen traveling from the Kurdistan Region to China, the difficult language is not an insurmountable hurdle. That is because merchants on both sides speak the common language of numbers.
Arif Jewhar, a Kurd who has been traveling to China on business for years, has managed to learn a few Chinese words, but not enough to bargain in the language. When words fail, his way is pull out a calculator.
“When I bargain, I use a calculator. For instance, they punch in the price on a calculator, and I punch in a lower one, until we reach agreement,” said Jewhar, explaining how he gets by without much problem.
According to a Rudaw correspondent in China, around 100 Kurds from the Kurdistan Region live in that country, where they moved in 2004 for business. Most are young, some are still single and all are keen to better master the challenging language.
Along with the Kurds, Kurdish cuisine has also invaded China. Three Kurdish restaurants serve mostly visiting Kurds, many having heard scary stories of what one might find on the menu at restaurants in China.
At the Shakhawan Kurdish restaurant in the commercial city of Eiu, a Chinese waiter asked in Kurdish, “What can I serve you?”
The restaurant owner and manager, a Kurd from Halabja, explained: “I have written the menu in Kurdish and Chinese. Most of my customers are Kurds. Therefore, my Chinese waiters have learnt some Kurdish words.”
Outside the restaurant, which the owner named after himself, Kurdish words and phrases are heard here and there, throughout the time that the market is open from 5 pm to 4 am.
Because they have dealt with Kurds for so long, some Chinese businessmen in the market also have learnt a few words in Kurdish. The best Kurdish speaker in the market is a tough merchant known as the “fat lady.” She bargains in Kurdish, and sometimes mutters, “I am not selling. There is no profit.”
Thirty Kurds live in Guangzhou, a commercial and industrial city which hosts some of the world’s largest exhibitions. An exhibition last month attracted nearly 30,000 companies and three million visitors, including Kurdish businessmen.
“I have attended the exhibition for four years to buy electrical stuff,” said Azad Haji Omer, a businessman from Duhok. “You can rarely find a Chinese who can speak another language other than Chinese. Therefore, Kurdish businessmen try to learn some Chinese,” Omer said.
The Kurdish businessmen in China own around 40 shipping companies, four restaurants, a light factory and several airlines and mobile phone companies.
Dashti Anwar visited China with his cousin nine years ago. Now he owns a shipping company in Guangzhou. “The fall of the Baath regime, and the opening of the Kurdistan Region to the international community, offered a golden opportunity for us,” said Anwar. Now so many young Kurdish businessmen like me are working in China, and have good businesses.”
