An Ant & A Grasshoper

I thought the parables of yore were meant to convey some permanent (moral) lessons. But not any more; if one were to read the twist in the Ta(i)l(e) of the older versions (obviously from the net), dished out by these young ones from my Ivy league. Looks like I am an outdated fossil almost like Rip Van Winkle, (a character in the story by Washington Irving falling asleep for 20 years in the Catskill Mountains and waking up to discover the world around him has changed. He finds that the American Revolutionary war has taken place and instead of being a subject of His Majesty George the Third, he is now a free citizen of the United States.
“You have company, uncle”, say these young ones to me. “His 20 years are nothing compared with Sleeping Beauty who dozed off for 100 years. The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus fell asleep in a cave for some 250 years, and Endymion in Greek mythology received the gift of eternal youth by sleeping forever. Our own kumbakarnan?..uum well”
Read this!

The Ant & the grasshopper......A parable for our times.....
OLD VERSION.....
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

MODERN VERSION
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.
NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food. The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?
Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house.
Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other grasshoppers demanding that grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter.
Amnesty International and Ban Ki-Moon the new secretary general U N criticize the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper.
The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance).
Opposition MP's stage a walkout.
Left parties call for "Bharat Bandh" in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry.
CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among ants and grasshoppers.
Lalu Prasad allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian Railway Trains, aptly named as the 'Grasshopper Rath'.
Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act [POTAGA]", with effect from the beginning of the winter.
The ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV.
Arundhati Roy calls it "a triumph of justice". Lalu calls it 'Socialistic Justice'. CPM calls it the 'revolutionary resurgence of the downtrodden'
Ban Ki-Moon invites the grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.

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MANY YEARS LATER

The ant has since migrated to the US and set up a multi billion dollar company in Silicon Valley
100s of grasshoppers die of starvation somewhere in India...

The End? Or A New Beginning?

I need to go to school again.

But then on a serious note that reminded me of a nice poem titled "Children Learn What They Live" by Dorothy Law Nolte, Ph.D. which I ferreted out from my archive for your reading pleasure.(Open attachment-virus scanned) An unassuming poem that is at once simple and profound. Some call it as today's something of a child-rearing anthem. She wrote the poem in her kitchen, sent it off, and thought no more about it. Its simple message went on to be passed around, eventually translated into more than 35 languages and even becoming a best-seller in Japan, where the Crown Prince revealed that he hoped to raise his daughter by it.

As for me, it is one of the best reminders one could have while serving the cause of children well.

Warm rgds
V V R
17th Jan 007