[nine_k]

Indeed: even if you get a ship for free, the crew is not free. Unless you're a certified captain already, you probably can't just operate the ship yourself. Also, now you have to pay for maintenance, fuel, mooring, loading and unloading cargo, etc. I suspect that $3k is not sufficient to start and sustain such an operation, so some steps are clearly missing.

(Can't help but remember Grim Fandango, where a similar transition between a small-time sales agent and a ship owner is made by writing "one year later" across the screen.)

[angry_octet]

My favourite example is Roman Abramovich, who somehow made the transition from reselling rubber ducks from his apartment in 1991 to having $100M to buy an oil company worth $3B, to obscene oligarch wealth a decade later.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Abramovich

[bitcoinmoney]

He is friends with Russian president.

[keiferski]

90s Russia was indeed a bizarre place.