Mr.Yangchin Kaewchaicharoenkij
THAILAND e-mail :
zealose@hotmail.comThe Folklore Of Currency
The tale for adults in a capitalistic world.
(Not to be prohibited for kids)
Tale# 1
A king and Animals
Once upon a time on this immense world, animals earned their living happily. Even small animals must be prey for bigger animals; they do not mind living together.
“Hey girl, do you believe me?” the young male zebra spoke to the young female zebra “If on that day you agreed to be his wife, your child would become an orphan and be weak of course”
Then he laughs loudly and comes closer to the young female zebra and thinking about yesterday’s incident. His young rival became lion’s prey because he was too awkward and he has to thank the lion for killing his rival.
Not too far from the zebra herd, earthworms are burrowing soil to feed themselves and are singing a song.
“We, earthworms, are friends of the farmer, dig soil all day all night, so plants can grow and grow, Ow Hoo-le Hoo-le.
Earthworm life is a pure funky life. They forage and work at the same time in the day and rarely stop singing songs. Whenever the songs stop, they will look up to the sky, trees, grass and say
“See, all these green trees are our accomplishment, aren’t they?
When one of them starts saying, the others will respond “Hey.. Hey”
Another time to stop singing is when other animals tread on the plants and grasses.
“Come in Come in and make yourself comfortable” kind earthworms usually say to their visitors
“Thanks” cow says and starts eating the delicious grass
Those earthworms are looking at the cow’s movement in order to avoid being trodden on and also watching the hayseed fall off its mouth.
“I am full” cow says before leaving “I do not know how to thank you, if you want any help just let me know”
“You’re welcome you’re welcome, come back again if you want to eat” earthworms say looking at the scattered cow dung piles.
When cow left, the earthworms will have to wait for the hayseed from cow’s mouth to decay because it is tasty food.
On immense land, animals live according to their ways, also maintaining each other such as butterfly’s, birds, rats, elephants, horses, cows, buffalos, tigers lions, snakes and others. Even the earthworms still sang happily until one day……
On that day, when there had been no rain for a long time, the grass started to die while big trees were still fresh. The earthworms escaped the drought and lived under the big trees. After a short time they heard the sound of a runaway herd, all the animals running desperately from a hot wind that was blowing as never before.
“Fire..Fire all forest is burning” The running animals loudly cried out .
The earthworms were frightened, some crawled and some ducked into the ground.
Nobody knew how long a time had passed. The herd had run very far until the elephants ordered them to stop
“We have not heard the wildfire noise anymore” the elephant said
“That is a forceful fire, we all may die if we do not continue to run” the cow said
“Stop arguing” said the rabbit who was following and gasping “I followed you in order to tell you that the fire has been extinguished for long time ago”
The animals do not believe the rabbit.
“How is it possible to extinguish that forceful fire so easily” several animals commented
“A man helped to extinguish the fire” the rabbit replies “Let’s see a man”
The animals return to the same place and found that it was true. A man helped to extinguish the fire.
“Thank you very much Thank you very much” the animals bawled “We can survive because of you We can survive because of you”
“Everything is alright, good bye” the man said
“Do not go, please stay with us and becomes our king” All animals yell
“King..King” they loudly yelled “Our king”
Finally the man becomes a king. All the animals love the king very much and want to please him. The tiger normally eats everything for himself but he finds more prey for the king, the birds also give the king some fruit and vegetables. Animals start looking for additional food for the king not only for themselves.
Sometimes the king returned some food or gave it to other animals, if the food was excessive. So the animals loved him more and looked for things for the king.
Changing from self sufficiency to additional food for the king became a new habit and sometimes the king returned food to the animals.. The carnivores started looking for tasty fruits for the king because the fruits were his favorite. Many more changes and confusion arose
Unbalance makes changes in the animal society.
The zebras have more weak individuals in herd because lions did not hunt them. So the strong zebras beg the lions
“Why don’t you hunt zebra?” the strong zebra asks the lions
“I have plenty of food because the king gives it to me” the lion replies
“What can I do” the zebra asks “The weak zebras snatch not only my wife but also my wife’s hay”
“That’s your business, I cannot help you” the lion replies
“Lion” the zebra asks reluctantly “What else do you want, except food”
Lion is still awhile, thinks and replies
“Winter is coming soon, I should have some more hay to prevent me getting cold, can you find some for me ?”
The Zebra feels that it is so easy to get what lion requests, he nods his head
“If I can find hay for you, you have to hunt and kill the weak zebra”
Lion growls for promise
Young zebra thinks that it is easy. It tries to bite the grass but it must chew and swallow whenever grass is in its mouth . It cannot get one even when it’s full.
Zebra thinks of rat. He has to ask rat to bite the grass and carry it to Lion.
It has to give rat something but it has no idea what rat wants.
Young zebra cries and is really depressed
problem of zebra happens to other animals. insufficiency and inappropriateness resulted in those animals’ living.
Zebra’s problems also happened to other animals who suffered from insufficiency and inappropriateness.
Even cow and worm
Cow initially wants himself to have a lot of milk for the king. So it tries to eat a lot of grass. The more was eaten, the more was fallen. When food is excessive, earthworm gets mad.
Sir” earthworm says “You ate too much”
“I want some more milk so I had to eat a plenty of grasses” cow says
“You ate a lot, sunshine was too shine that made me very hot. Dead and fallen grasses were excessive for my needs.
“But I had to eat a lot” cow says “Please let me eat”
Earthworm still showed unpleasant manner.
“If you let me eat, tell me what you want” cow begs
“So” earthworm says “Please find some meat strip for us, we rarely eat meat”
“Ok” cow promises
While cow is eating grass, it’s worried how and where it can find meat because it is an herbivore. From talking with earthworm today, it knows that when it eats grass , the earthworm gets the fallen grass and it craps dung as the earthworm’s food in the past.
“From now on, I should get something back from earthworm for my dung” cow groans while he is thinking about how to get meat strips. He’s really worried.
Problems are increasing, existing peace gradually clears away. Animals want something that they have never wanted or needed before. When they cannot stand it any longer they decide to see the king.
“Alright” the king says “I have heard your stories before”
“Please solve the problems for us” the animals yell
“I have an answer for you, I will present you a thing”
“What is it, sir” they ask noisy
The king picks a square paper that is smaller than man’s hand then says that
“From now on I will grant you this thing which is called Money”
“Money…..” All animals around concurrently respond even elephant, horse, lion, and tiger
“Yes, money, I will let you use money to exchange what you want hereafter. Zebra, you can buy hay from rat or hire rat to gather hay for lion as well. Cow, you can buy meat from tiger or anybody who has your required meat”
Zebra, cow and all animals are excited.
“This money has value instead of all you want. I guarantee that each bill of money can be exchanged for 1 handful of rice or 1 piece of meat or 1 bowl of milk or anything from me”
All the animals cheerfully shout because they found an answer.
“Afterward I will exchange money with anything. I will give wages for anybody who works for me” the king says loudly before go back to his throne.
Society that uses money as a medium has begun. In the beginning, lion wanted to test the system; he used money to exchange meat from the king which he got. . Anybody can use money to exchange anything with the king. Lion told this to all the animals that he met
“I have exchanged the king’s money with meat and I really get it”
The animals continually talk like that.
Money becomes more and more popular. The confusion gradually clears away, no sadness, no worry. They can use money to get anything. Peace comes back again.
This story teaches us that any place involved with people, confusion will happen and people will also invent money.
