Friday, March 12, 2010

Speak!

Once there lived an intelligent farmer in a remote village. He had some strange ideas. He owned a goat which he trained in all sorts of skills like talking, calculating, computing and so on. It was a secret process of years and years. NOBODY knew about it.

At last when he became satisfied with his goat’s extraordinary skills he decided to show it off to his villagers. He wanted it to be grand event with a sumptuous feast to all the invitees. His wife was an excellent cook which was also a secret to everybody. He decided to make that secret public too.

So he fixed a date for the event and invited all the villagers. His wife was overjoyed at the thought of her culinary skills being made known and appreciated.

On the Big day she set about the preparations and the invitees started arriving. When they had all arrived the farmer went to the backyard to fetch his prize animal. Alas! It was not to be found there.

He hastened to the kitchen from where the delicious aroma of a mouth-watering feast was emanating. He found his wife there giving the final touches. He asked her about the missing goat in desperate panic. She coolly opened one of the containers and showed the delicious mutton briyani and smiled meaningfully!

The farmer’s heart sank and he almost collapsed. The guests somehow guessed that the event was a flop. Some left the place quietly not wanting to embarrass the farmer. Some others stayed on for the dinner not wanting to disappoint the farmer even though his main plan went wrong.

What an unexpected anticlimax to the farmer’s great expectations! What an untoward tragedy of errors! How did it happen?

A clear case of lack of communication. The farmer never spoke about his project to his wife. The goat which could talk did not speak to the farmer’s wife when she came to kill it. The wife never spoke to the farmer about her plan of making a dinner of his goat. So the moral of the story is communication is vital for happy, healthy relationships.

( A story told by the chief guest at our ladies’ club anniversary).

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