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Tales

Good luck, Bad luck

Posted on 1 min read

A man’s horse ran away. His neighbor came to him and said, “Bad luck that your horse has run away.”

The man said, “Good luck, bad luck, what do I know?”

But a week later, the horse came back, with 20 wild horses in his wake.

The neighbor said, “Good luck – you now have many more horses.”

The man said, “Good luck, bad luck, what do I know?”

Trying to tame one of the new horses, the man’s son was kicked, and his leg was broken.

The neighbor said, “Bad luck, your son’s leg being broken.”

The man said, “What do I know about good luck and bad luck?”

A few days later a bunch of thugs came by in search of able-bodied young men for their gang. They were about to kidnap the man’s son. But when they found out that his leg was broken, they left him behind and moved on to the next house.

The neighbor said, “What good luck that your son’s leg is broken!”

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The story of two fish

Posted on 2 min read

Two fish were swimming when they saw a piece of meat dangling before them.

The younger fish darted toward it with an open mouth. The older fish cried out,

 

“Stop!”

“You can’t see it, but there is a hook inside that meat. It is connected by an invisible line to a pole outside the water. There is a man holding the pole.

THE TRUTH is, if you eat the meat, the hook will catch in your jaw and the man will pull you out of the water. He will cut you open with a knife, roast you on a fire and eat you. Then he will throw your remains to his cat.”


The young fish stopped. The two swam away. But when the young fish was alone, he thought to himself, 

“Let me investigate the truth myself how accurate these lousy claims are.”


He went back to the meat, swam around it, above and below it. He swam as far as he could in widening circles around the meat.

After a long search, he said to himself, 

“I’ve looked far and wide, and I haven’t found any sign of a man, a pole, a knife, a fire or a cat. In fact, I’ve found nothing outside this water we live in” I have come to realise my truth.

“These must just be stories made up to limit our freedoms.”


He went back to the meat and ate it.

The hook caught in his jaw, he felt himself being yanked out of the water.
For sure He saw a pole, a man and a knife, and a little further, he saw the man’s cat sleeping in a shade, but at that point his knowledge of the TRUTH was useless.



~Anonymous
 

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The Dog who Ate a Leopard

Posted on 1 min read

A young girl takes her pet chihuahua with her on a safari holiday. Wandering too far one day the chihuahua gets lost in the bush, and soon encounters a very hungry looking leopard. The chihuahua realises he’s in trouble, but, noticing some fresh bones on the ground, he settles down to chew on them, with his back to the big cat. As the leopard is about to leap, the chihuahua smacks his lips and exclaims loudly, “Boy, that was one delicious leopard. I wonder if there are any more around here.”

The leopard stops mid-stride, and slinks away into the trees.

“Phew,” says the leopard, “that was close – that evil little dog nearly had me.”

A monkey nearby sees everything and thinks he’ll win a favour by putting the stupid leopard straight. The chihuahua sees the monkey go after the leopard, and guesses he might be up to no good.

When the leopard hears the monkey’s story he feels angry at being made a fool, and offers the monkey a ride back to see him exact his revenge.

The little dog sees them approaching and fears the worse.

Thinking quickly, the little dog turns his back, pretends not to notice them, and when the pair are within earshot says aloud, “Now where’s that monkey got to? I sent him ages ago to bring me another leopard…”

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The Most Foolish Bird

Posted on 2 min read

There is a very foolish bird called Ngune. That’s the name in my native Embu language, I don’t know its English name.

The bird only feeds on frogs, and the highlight of its foolishness is that it spends the whole day catching frogs from the river and placing them on a rock on the riverbed (perhaps to dry them) so that it can eat them later.

The stupid thing about it is that whenever it places a frog on the river bed and gets back to the river to get another one, the frog immediately jumps back to the river, and chances are that it will pick the same frog in the next catch. This goes on for the better part of the day. At the end of the day, the foolish bird carries home just one frog, after laboring for a whole day.

To help this bird, we’ve come up with a very bizarre but workable plan. We are going to send someone into species travel, be laid as a Ngune egg and hatched into a Ngune chick, and grow to eat frogs. By speaking fluent Ngune-ese, he will teach other Ngunes that they need to eat the first frog they catch, before attempting to catch another one.

We don’t promise any security, or that Ngunes will believe him. We just hope that he will not be eaten by crocodiles and foxes, poisoned in a polluted river, or even die of hunger in case rivers run out of frogs or climate change gets rid of frogs. Besides, the Ngunes might not believe them.

Can we get a volunteer, please?

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Parable of the Life-saving Station

Posted on 2 min read

On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur, there was once a crude little life-saving station.

The building was just a hut, and there was only one boat, but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought for themselves went out day and night tirelessly searching for those who were lost. Some of those who were saved and various others in the surrounding area wanted to become associated with the station and gave of their time, money, and effort to support its work. New boats were bought and new crews trained. The little lifesaving station grew.

Some of the members of the lifesaving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea. They replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the enlarged building.

Now the lifesaving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it beautifully because they used it as a sort of club. Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on life-saving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do this work. The lifesaving motif still prevailed in the club’s decorations, and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where the club’s initiations were held.

About this time a large ship wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boatloads of cold, wet, and half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick. The beautiful new club was in chaos. So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where victims of shipwrecks could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting, there was a split among the club membership.

Most of the members wanted to stop the club’s lifesaving activities as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal social life of the club. Some members insisted upon life¬saving as their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a life-saving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save the lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own lifesaving station.

So they did.

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. It evolved into a club, and yet another lifesaving station was founded. History continued to repeat itself, and if you visit that seacoast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along that shore.

Shipwrecks are frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown.

by Dr. Theodore O. Wedel

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Is there life after birth?

Posted on 2 min read

Two twins were talking in the womb:
Tell me, do you believe in life after birth?
Of course. After birth comes life. Perhaps we are here to prepare for what comes after birth.
Forget it! After birth there is nothing! From there, no one has returned! And besides, what would it look like?
I do not know exactly, but I feel that there are lights everywhere … Perhaps we walk on our own feet, and eat with our mouth.
This is utterly stupid! Walking isn’t possible! And how can we eat with that ridiculous mouth? Can’t you see the umbilical cord? And for that matter, think about it for a second: postnatal life isn’t possible because the cord is too short.
Yes, but I think there is definitely something, just in a different way than what we call life.
You’re stupid. Birth is the end of life and that’s it.
Look, I do not know exactly what will happen, but Mother will help us…
The Mother? Do you believe in the Mother? !
Yes.
Do not be ridiculous! Have you seen the Mother anywhere? Has anyone seen her at all?
No, but she is all around us. We live within her. And certainly, it is thanks to her that we exist.
Well, now leave me alone with this stupidity, right? I’ll believe in Mother when I see her.
You can not see her, but if you’re quiet, you can hear her song, you can feel her love. If you’re quiet, you can feel her caress and you will feel her protective hands.

Written in Hungarian by Útmutató a Léleknek, translated by Miranda Linda Weisz.

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