Once a man and his son were taking a donkey to the market.
As they were walking, some people saw them and remarked, ‘Look at these fools, why don’t they ride the donkey?’
The man heard this and asked the son to ride the donkey while he walked alongside.
And old woman seeing this remarked, ‘What is the world coming to? Look at that young man riding comfortably while he makes his poor father walk!’
So the young man got down and this time the father rode the donkey.
As they went along, a young woman passing by said, ‘Why don’t both of you get on the animal?’
So they listened to her and both rode on the animal.
Yet another group who saw them said, ‘Oh! What a poor animal. It has to carry those two fat good-for-nothings! How cruel some people can be!’
By this time the father and son were getting quite fed up. They decided to dismount and carry the donkey instead so as to stop everyone from talking.
This led people to laugh and say, ‘look at these human “donkey” carrying a donkey’.
Of course the donkey did not like this peculiar arrangement at all. Whilst approaching a river, it struggled vigorously to set itself free and finally the man, his son and their donkey all landed themselves in the water.
– How to live without fear and worry, K.Sri Dhammananda
