The Lure of Online Gambling to China’s Indebted Young

*Another piece from Chinese blogger ‘Hardcore Reporter’. This time they look at the attractions, and dangers of earning high salaries in the shady world of the illegal online gambling industry.

The cost of living is too high, the income barely maintains life, and the Alipay continues to change from time to time.

Saving money for only a few years is enough for the down payment of a car. A house is unaffordable without parent support.

After marrying and having children, the pressure mountain is as thin as ice, and I feel that I can’t get rich anymore in this life.

This is a true portrayal of many young Chinese with poor family conditions. Just when you dream of breaking free from the bottom, suddenly, a chance comes. The chance of a high salary calls , if you to go to Southeast Asia to work on gambling sites (commonly known as spinach farms), will you not be able to resist temptation?

Some time ago, one of my readers encountered such a “good thing”. He asked me on WeChat: “Super brother, a friend said that Cambodia has an opportunity to develop a gambling game. The annual salary gives me 1 million ($149,000). I have a little bit of movement.”

I almost didn’t give my tongue a flash after I saw it. The annual salary is one million. Do you really believe it? I advised him not to have illusions, and the huge temptation might be a scam. Moreover, online gambling is not a glorious activity, pulling domestic compatriots into gambling and losing their homes, which hurts the world.

But the reader was bent on going because he had nothing at all and his wife was sick, so he couldn’t care about his conscience. In my opinion, this reader’s experience is not just an individual’s fate choice. In fact, hundreds of thousands of Chinese are currently engaged in online gambling abroad. Going to Southeast Asia to engage in online gambling seems to be a shortcut to getting rid of poverty, but is this really the case?

In the last hard-core report, I wrote about the status quo and shady of China’s gaming industry in Southeast Asia. Today I want to talk about the true experiences and stories of hundreds of thousands of Chinese “vegetable farmers” (gaming practitioners) who go overseas to earn black money for higher incomes.

▶ Million annual salary, temptation or deception?

“If I work in a small home town in Hubei making 3 thousand a month (about $450), life can not afford housing. “ When I first arrived in Sihanoukville and did a little work with gambling websites, a brother smoking and chatting on the balcony looked satisfied and a little proud to say to me, “I am only 22 years old , came here two years ago, how much money I am not going to say, but definitely more than our domestic peers. I can’t even afford to eat back home (in China)”

Although he looks like a 48-year-old when he is 22 years old, I know what he is saying. The domestic wages are too low, the cost of living is too high and the high salary temptation of the gaming industry is the reason why most Chinese who run to Southeast Asia get involved with gambling.

Online gambling is called “spinach” (the homonym of gambling) in the slang of practitioners, while practitioners call themselves “vegetable farmers”. Cambodia’s Poipet, Sihanoukville, the Philippines’ capital Manila, Burma’s Little Jura, Laos Golden Triangle Special Zone… Hundreds of thousands of Chinese vegetable farmers such as locusts ” invade ” Southeast Asia . They are promoting gambling websites, tricking domestic compatriots into betting, and gaining huge profits.

There are dozens of “vegetable farmers” among my readers. I have been interviewing them in Sihanoukville and the Golden Triangle to learn about their experiences and stories. Money is a topic that cannot be avoided.

The largest number of gambling practitioners are promoters, who are affectionately referred to as “dog pushers” by industry insiders and are responsible for guiding gamblers to bet on WeChat. The gaming company’s requirements for dog pushing during recruitment are very low, as low as “WeChat typing chat”. And the salary treatment is generally in the 6000-10000 yuan starting salary $900-1500) + commission, and expenses packages such as air tickets and visa fees.

In the big platforms such as Post Bar, Douban, and Zhilian, you can often see advertisements for recruiting dog pushes. For many domestic youths who do not have a college degree and a skill, this is no small temptation.Especially those who have gone bankrupt, they are even more eager.

 ▲ Job advertisement of a gaming company, BC=gaming

However, the high salary in the foreign area looks very attractive, but the actual situation is far less beautiful than imagined. The reader’s recent dog-pushing job was in Sihanoukville, when the advertisement was written with a base salary of 7,000 ($1050), and a Spring Festival subsidy of 8,000 yuan. This made the already sturdy and debt-ridden man ecstatic and he did not hesitate to move.

When the New Year was over, the company did not issue the 8,000 yuan subsidy at all. The reason is that the company has changed personnel. The former supervisor was gone, and the salary policy had also changed. The basic salary was also reduced to 6,000 yuan. In the Golden Triangle Special Zone, many gaming companies have written a basic salary of 8,000 yuan, and the actual basic salary is only 4,000 yuan.Some black-hearted companies are even more horrible. When ‘ dogs’ find big customers, the company will often cut out any commission.

▶ Cheap labor for the tiger

What, do you think you have been cheated, want to find a company to discuss, do it, right? People can’t rely on overseas work, and the black-hearted betting company can’t be more difficult. The legendary million-year salary is even more nonsense, wake up, what line of high income is not occupied by the head staff?

Compared with other industries, online gambling is a pyramid-oriented industry, with 1% of people taking more than 90% of profits. The ones who can get millions of annual salary are the shareholders, core executives, top development engineers, and managers in the family business. The ordinary vegetable farmers eat the leftovers and the second-hand spare tires.

Of course, there are some vegetable farmers who are fascinated by high-paying operations, like the pyramid schemes, they are trapped in the quagmire. When in Sihanoukville making a report, I just got into contact with the gaming industry, and I met a small person in charge at a gaming base.

“I’m mixed here, it’s a general salary, it’s about 2 million a year. I bought a house and a car with my girlfriend. You said that I can’t go abroad to grow vegetables. Can you have this achievement? Here we can be earning millions in annual salary. Do we have the opportunity to line a great deal? If a big customer loses tens of millions, it will go straight to our good life. “

Chatting and chatting, I found that he actually tried to pull me into the gang. Later, another personnel reader in Westport told me that the supervisor was actually pulling me into the gang, because the successful recruitment of a person can be rewarded with thousands of dollars. The reader also spent two years in personnel and was paid more than a thousand dollars. Sihanoukville’s consumption level is higher than that of Shanghai (in US dollars as the main currency of circulation), and it’s only enough to get a $70 for a daily income.

Most vegetable farmers come to Southeast Asia for the purpose of obtaining higher incomes, and they are often already heavily in debt. They work 12 hours a day, usually only one day off a month, working like a machine on the assembly line. Living in a 6-8 dormitory, except for work, it is sleeping, full of bets, recharges, plans.

The gaming industry does not raise idlers, and the work pressure of dog pushers is very high. In the Golden Triangle, when the vegetable farmer gets off work in the early hours of the morning, the supervisor will lead the staff to speak. Everyone uses slogans such as “Unity and forge ahead, hard work and hard work”, and dozens of employees can be seen everywhere in the square to listen to the supervisor:”You have come across the ocean to come here, can’t you be able to make a performance, can you afford yourself? Can you afford your parents?”

In addition, the gaming industry has an extremely strict management system, and the consequences of violations of taboos are very serious. In some companies, using a personal mobile phone, throwing cigarette butts, and not paying attention to table manners during work will see the employee being fined more than 3,000 yuan. Serious offences, such as photographing, or leaking company office space details, work materials, etc., can see violaters imprisoned in ‘ black house’ dungeons by bosses.

▲ Employees will be locked into a small black house or a dungeon if they violate the company’s interests.

To put it bluntly, the vegetable farmers have gone abroad to grow spinach for the tiger, but they can only become cheap labor. Compared with the huge profits of the heads of the gaming industry, ordinary practitioners gasp like dogs and are raped by managers. Poor and hateful are even more tragic.

▶ Want to return to China? You have been eyeing the Chinese Ministry of Public Security

When your face is not eager to make money in Southeast Asia, you are likely to have been targeted by the relevant domestic departments. Ah Xing is a reader of the Golden Triangle Special Zone. He joked that he is a“chopper .” (Cooking chopper is another slang word, referring to gambling websites, game development, and technical personnel in the gaming industry).

He is a native of Longyan, Fujian. He has been in the Golden Triangle for three months. He used to be a veterinarian at a certain farm in China. Fujian Longyan is not famous, but anyone who knows the insider knows that it is China’s gaming market. Most of the gaming companies in the Golden Triangle are opened in Fujian, and most of the practitioners are also from Fujian.

▲ Gambling company office building in the Golden Triangle Special Zone

After facing unemployment, he could not find a good way out. During the reunion of the Chinese New Year, he found that 8 of the 10 people on the table were engaged in online gambling in Southeast Asia, so he joined decisively.

The gambling practitioners are very regional, especially in core positions such as website development and financial management, and only the trusted counterparts are used. Therefore, his income was higher, stable monthly salary has 20K plus bonus. However, his birthplace of Fujian on his passport also made him the target of the frontier defense customs officers at home.

Fujian Public Security conducts investigations at various ports of entry and exit. If illegal gambling staff are found, the police will tear up his passport directly. At present, the source has found it very difficult to return to China, and being caught is too great. He said in his WeChat: “If you come out, you can’t go back.”

▲ Reader Ah Xing has been stared, it is difficult to return to China

“I just went abroad, the police went to my house, let me go back to China, or I will not go back after a long time.” Ah Xing said, “We have too many dragons to do this, and the reputation is stinking. What do you do? At the end of the family, the police are clear.”

Ax Hing’s girlfriend is a civil servant. She can’t go abroad to see him. She didn’t meet for three months because of his career, which made this relationship enter a delicate period. When chatting with him, he regretted that the final result is likely to be a breakup.

▲ no airtight wall

“Who wants to go abroad to do these things? The domestic wages are too low, there is no money to buy a house, no money to get married. The class has solidified, the people at the bottom have never seen hope, they will be numb, and when they are numb, they see hope and will become greedy, stupid, maybe I am the one who sees hope at the bottom.”

The online gambling industry is the hope of Ah Xing. He knows that because of this notorious industry, he can’t return to the country, may lose love, and let domestic gamblers go bankrupt, but he will not leave. ( Note: I have no intention to defend Ah Xing, but objectively present the true mentality of the gambling practitioners.)

▶ There is no shortcut to success, wake up

It is not the most serious that the country cannot be returned. The Chinese Ministry of Public Security does regularly arrest overseas gambling practitioners. The police in the country will also arrest them from time to time. The higher your position and income, the more important they are for the police to focus on.

▲ Cambodian police arrested Chinese gambling practitioners · Picture @ Today Angkor

Gaming seems to be a shortcut, but it is more like poison. Many domestic young people are reluctant to learn professional skills, just want to come to the money quickly, and see the basic salary of 8,000 on the recruitment can not help but fly overseas. Doing things that hurt the world, I look down on getting three or five thousand peers in China.

However, the dog didn’t have the last thing, and the dog pushed to the end with nothing. Long-term engagement in the gaming industry can not accumulate formal professional skills. One day you have to return to the country, and once you return home you will find that you will not do anything. Five years later, the same age people who have taken three or five thousand have been skilled, and most of them can get into the 10,000 yuan. They have a career and a family, maybe not so rich, but at least safe and stable.

The rising channel of the gaming industry is very limited. After five years, the dog push still works for 12 hours. Every day, it is disguised as a cute girl and a gambler chatting. What is even more frightening is that practitioners are prone to gambling habits in the process of growing spinach, turning from gambling to gamblers. Over time, the conscience is numb, the gambler’s mentality has the upper hand, and everything is more willing to speculate, not willing to work hard.

“I will be addicted to this trip, because I will not do anything else.” Jingxiong is one of my Henan readers. He once vowed to stay away from the gaming industry, but after resigning, he repeated the same mistakes, and finally could not stand the New Year. Tempted to go to the casino to lose to pay the money to redeem. (The casino story will be written later)

▼

Here, I also advise all those who try to grow spinach in Southeast Asia. The wind and the long-term should be eye-catching. The life is very long and the eyes may be long-term. Thickness can be thin, and skill is an eternal treasure.In the early twenties, please forget about your temporary poverty and ignore the temptations. Choose a industry to immerse yourself for three or five years, you will see hope, you will also buy a house to buy a car.

As for domestic wages are too low, the class can not cure the future? You can work 12 hours a day in Southeast Asia, and you can only take a day off in a month. In the country, you can take out this hard work and do something serious. Don’t say anything big money, it is not a problem to mix a well-off life.

Finally, I am gratified that the reader at the beginning of the article who wants to earn millions of annual salary did not go to Cambodia to grow vegetables. Whether it is a conscience owing or a risk of concern, it is a good thing that the gambling industry is drowning.

Once in the Houmen, it is like the sea. From then on, Xiaolang is a stranger. I hope all Chinese youth will share the problem and save the province.