In 1984, Zhang, barely in his twenties, heard that his sister-in-law was raising chicken and selling eggs, so Zhang decided to learn and master the trade himself.
Every night, he would spend three hours sorting out the eggs for sale the next day, stacking each one carefully on top of another inside two baskets.
Every morning, he would get on a bus carrying the two baskets, weighing over 90 kilograms, and head to a market street more than 30 kilometers away from home.
The back-and-forth trip was not as easy as Zhang's relaxing and joyful demeanor make it out to be. He told a reporter that he often ran into electric poles and had fallen into sewage systems and even deep wells before becoming familiarized with the new areas.