I was watching a debate on television which was a special program telecast for Diwali*. The judge of the debate session was telling a story in context with the topic.  I was intrigued by the story he told.  Here it is.

A saint was giving a talk on a great Indian epic in a village.  An illiterate farmer passing by was carried away by the talk of the saint and started listening to him.  After the talk was over the farmer went home and his wife asked him where he was. He told that he was listening to a talk by a saint. His wife asked him what he understood.  He told his wife that he didn’t understand what the saint told but somehow he liked the way the saint explained the epic story.  This went on every day as the saint was explaining the story in parts for ten days.  On the tenth day the farmer’s wife asked him the same question and he told the same answer that he didn’t understand but was interested listening to the saint.

The farmer’s wife asked him to pick up a bamboo basket which is used by the farmers in the Indian villages to collect cow dung (dried cow dung is used as fuel for making food in villages).  The basket is woven with bamboo shoots which has small holes in the intersection of the shoots.  She asked the farmer to collect a basket full of water from the well.  As the farmer tried to collect water in the basket, it seeped away through the holes of the basket.  After seeing the futile attempt of the farmer, his wife told him “The epic story sessions by the saint you attended is like collecting water in this basket. Your brain could not hold what the saint told”.  The farmer replied back, “…but look at the basket, it is clean now.”

Though the story seemed to project the farmer as a stupid person who cannot understand whatever the saint taught but the ending is a twister that really makes us think. The farmer may not have understood the epic but his regular visits to the session has really cleaned his mind in understanding that there is something beyond what he does regularly in his day to day life. There is something to learn in everything.

Wish you a happy and prosperous Diwali to everyone. Happy Weekend

*Diwali - Diwali is a major festival to Hindus as to how Christmas is to Christians or Ramadan is to Muslims.