Once upon a time, there was an old Chinese man who lived in an even older shop
in a back alley of San Francisco’s Chinatown. Mr. Chan (for that was the name
by which he was known to his neighbors) ran an Oriental novelty store. He
stocked all of the standard Far Eastern trinkets, such as paper kites shaped
like fish, cheap imitation silk kimonos, Japanese lanterns, chopsticks, and
so on, but both his heart and his profit were in his collection of wooden
figurines. Fortunate contacts, mostly relatives in Taiwan, had given him
access to the finest woods of the Orient, and the most skilled carvers. His
greatest treasures were tiny statuettes, no bigger than your thumb, carved
from teak wood. These were totally unique to his establishment, for he had
a cousin who owned the finest stand of teak trees in Burma, and, his greatest
secret, a distant relative by marriage was a blind sculpter who specialized
in carving these miniatures. Mr. Chan’s statues had made him rather well
known among connoisseurs of Oriental curiosities, and provided him with a
comfortable living.
Mr. Chan’s life had continued undisturbed for years, and all seemed most
serene. Every day he would come down from his bedroom above the shop,
unlock the door, and wait for business. He would sell a few cheap knicknacks
to tourists, and, perhaps once a month, a buyer would arrive to look over
his collection of statuettes. Such a special customer would receive Mr.
Chan’s full attention, and they would talk for hours about the finer points
of Oriental carving. Usually the visit would end with a sale, and Mr. Chan
would retire happily to his bed.
One day, though, disaster struck. Mr. Chan came downstairs, and discovered
that his store had been vandalized! The door was ripped right off of its
hinges and lay 20 feet down the street. Paper lanterns were ripped apart,
coolie hats smashed to straw, and some fine, delicate Japanese screens were
riddled with holes. But worst of all, the glass display case in which Mr.
Chan kept his figurines had been shattered, and all of the figurines were
stolen!
Mr. Chan, though momentarily shocked, was made of stern stuff. He called the
police at once, and consoled himself that, wise businessman that he was, he
was fully insured. While this was meager compensation for the loss of his
beloved statues, he hoped that the police would be able to recover them. The
police, however, despite a painstaking search, could discover but one clue:
tiny, muddy, childlike footprints leading from the door to the display case.
The police suspected a youth gang, but could find no further evidence.
Mr. Chan was forced to disappoint several of his regular customers while
waiting for the next shipment of statues from Taiwan, but they finally
arrived, and Mr. Chan was very excited, for these were even finer than any
he had previously received. He carefully arranged them in his display case
(he had, of course, replaced the broken one), looked over them with pride,
and retired for the night, secure in the knowledge that his new burglar
alarm system would protect them.
In the middle of the night, Mr. Chan was jolted to consciousness by the
sudden blare of the alarm. He wrapped a robe around himself and rushed
downstairs, but too late! The display case was again smashed, the statues
gone, and a set of wet. muddy, miniscule footprints lead out of the
shattered door. Mr. Chan attempted to give chase, but failed to catch the
culprits. The police were again unable to turn up any clues but the childlike
footprints, which seemed particularly incongruous in the face of the fact that
Mr. Chan’s brand new steel reinforced door had been burst open seemingly
without effort.
Mr. Chan had lost confidence in San Francisco’s finest. He replaced the
security precautions, making them even stronger, but determined to take
direct action. Thus, when the next shipment of statuettes arrived some
months later, delayed by a blight on the Burmese teak groves and a typhoon in
the China Sea, Mr. Chan had a plan of action. He placed the figurines in the
new display case and concealed himself behind a curtain made of plastic beads,
and waited, ancient Chinese arquebus loaded and at the ready. Any thief who
dared to venture into his store tonight would be in for a nasty surprise!
The hours passed. Mr. Chan, despite good intentions, dropped off to sleep
and the arquebus slipped off of his lap and slid behind a large pile of
Javanese sandals. Then, all of a sudden there was a tremendous ripping
noise, followed closely by the high pitched scream of the burglar alarm!
Mr. Chan leaped to his feet, clutching for his weapon, but he could not
find it! The lights, activated by the alarm system, flashed on, revealing
to Mr. Chan a sight which made his blood freeze. Running quickly towards
the display case, in a crouch to get through the low door, was a tremendous
grizzly bear. Saliva dripped from its yellowed fangs and Mr. Chan was almost
overcome by the greasy stench of its fur. Despite its huge size, the bear
moved swiftly, almost delicately…on little tiny feet no bigger than those
of a ten year old child. The bear reached the display case and, with a
single swipe of its fearsome paw, smashed the security glass. It reached
inside and rather clumsily gathered up all of the figurines. Then, with an
almost balletic move, it spun round on its tiny feet and prepared to leave
the store, no more than ten seconds after it had entered.
Mr. Chan was momentarily unnerved by the sudden appearence of the bear, but
the courage of generations of Chinese warriors flowed in his veins, brought
to the fore by the desecration and theft of his most prized possesions. Taking
no head for his personal safety, caring not at all that he was frail and
unarmed, he leaped out from behind the bed curtain and, in a voice so filled
with outrage that it even overcame the screaming sirens of the burglar alarm
system, shouted:
“Stop right where you are, boyfoot bear with teak of Chan!”
[Father Goose #35]
Once upon a time, in the Kingdom of the Pearls, there lived an extremely
cultured pearl named Michael. Michael was a pearl of high ideals and
great aspirations, and, in the hopes of better serving his fellow pearls,
he went to law school, graduated, and opened a legal clinic. He became
well known for his charitable services to less fortunate pearls. But alas,
after a few years, he began to burn out. He paid less and less attention
to his cases. Eventually, he dropped out completely and became a beachcomber,
spending his days lying on the strand with grains of sand sticking to his
filthy, unwashed body. And his relatives, filled with sorrow at this sight,
all chanted,
A gritty pearl is Michael, LLD.
[Father Goose #36]
Once upon a time there was this bum named Benny. Benny didn’t have a dime,
except when he could beg one off of somebody, and he lived by sifting through
garbage heaps looking for discarded items which could still be sold to a
pawnbroker for a few cents. On day, as he was looking through the city
dump, he came upon an old-fashioned Arabian Nights style lamp. It was
pretty beat up, and Benny didn’t think he could get much for it, so he
was about to discard it. Then he thought, “Well, if I knocked out some of
the dents and polished it up a bit, maybe Sam the Pawnbroker would give me
a quarter for it.” So Benny rubbed it against his sleeve to see if it would
polish up without too much work.
Lo and behold, a huge cloud of tastefully colored smoke billowed forth from
the lamp and formed itself into a gigantic genie. Benny cowered in awe, until
the genie bellowed: “Oh, Master, I am the genie of the lamp, and I am yours to
command. I will grant you any wish, any desire you may have. Nothing is
beyond my power. I can make you rich. I can make you famous. I can make
beautiful women fall in love with you. I can make the networks put “Star
Trek” back on the air. But I am an eccentric genie, and, if all of this is
to be yours, you must do one thing!”
Benny, knowing a good deal when he hears one, says, “What must I do, oh
genie?”
And the genie replied, “It is a simple thing, a trifle really, but I must
insist upon it. You must never again, under any circumstances and for any
reason, shave your beard. If you let your whiskers grow, I will serve you
faithfully and grant your every desire. But should you ever shave again,
I will strike you with a lightning bolt, reducing your body to ashes, which
I will then store in a gawdy funeral urn alongside the remains of all
of my former faithless masters in a cave in the vicinity of Damascus.”
Benny, being a bum, didn’t shave very often anyway, so this sounded like
a pretty good deal, and he agreed. He wished for wealth, and, lo and behold,
he was wealthy. He wished to become powerful, and he was immediately elected
to the board of directors of seven companies and named Time’s Man of the Year.
Then he met Sally. Sally was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen, and the
moment he saw her, he knew that she was the only woman for him. As the
genie had promised, Sally fell in love with him. However, despite her love,
…End of the part6. To be continued..