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Like A Shepherd
Nasruddin strikes again!
Every first of the month Mullah Nasruddin used to cross the border with thirty donkeys, with two bales of straw on each. Each time the custom person stopped him to ask about his profession and Nasruddin would reply, “I am an honest smuggler.” So each time, Nasruddin, his donkeys and the bales of straw were searched from top to toe. Each time the custom folk could not find anything. Next week, Nasruddin would return without his donkeys or bales of straw. Years went by and Nasruddin prospered in his smuggling profession to the extent that he retired. Many years later, the custom person too had retired. As it happened one day, the two former adversaries met in a country far from home. The two hugged each other like old buddies and started talking. After a while, the custom person asked the question which had been bugging him over the years, “Mullah, please let me know what were you smuggling all those years ago?” Nasruddin thought for a few seconds and finally revealed his open secret, “Donkeys.”
— From Tarana Wesley
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At times I feel as if I am spread out over the landscape and inside things, and am myself living in every tree, in the splashing of the waves, in the clouds and the animals that come and go, in the procession of the seasons…
