Joyo and
his Abacus
Once there was a boy called Joyo. On his fifth birthday, his paternal
grandfather gave him an abacus. He told
Joyo to take good care of it as it was an extraordinary abacus.
Joyo liked the present very much. He always brought it along wherever he
went. He even put it beside him when he
was sleeping. He really believed that
his abacus had magic power capable of giving him protection.
The abacus was an antique. It was considered a family treasure. It was made about two hundred years ago. It was passed down from one generation to
another generation. For many
generations, Joyo’s forefather used it for counting in business. Joyo called it an ancient calculator.
Joyo liked to shake his abacus to make
the beads cluck to create some noise whenever he was scared. At one time,
he shook it so vigorously that he even scared the burglars away.
It was said that 200 years ago, his
forefather called Chulee was fascinated by an abacus a businessman was using in
counting. Since then he started to save
money to buy the required materials for the making of the abacus. It took him two years to complete the work.
The abacus proved to be very useful to
him. He used it to do counting in
business. He could do it fast and
accurately. As time passed, he found
that it seemed to have vested with some kind of power. As far as honesty was concerned, it had the power
to express.
At one time, Chulee was dealing business
with an old man. A dishonest thought
occurred to him. He wanted to cheat the
old man. When he was moving the beads
in counting, his index finger got wedged in the rows of the beads. He tried to dislodge but failed. In his panic, he nearly screamed out for
help. But he kept cool and started
praying for forgiveness in silence.
He looked at the old man and he saw the
brightness in his eyes. The old man
seemed to know the happening. The old
man touched his shoulder. To his
astonishment , he could detach his index finger from the bite of the
beads. Chulee flushed all over and
bowed in shame. The old man took the
good and walked away slowly and disappeared suddenly.
Without a second thought, Chulee quickly knelt down and thanked the god
for teaching a lesson. Since then,
Chulee upheld the principle of honest and tried to be as honest as
possible. He chose to believe “Honesty
is the best policy.” He might not be
100% honest but he could be as honest as possible.
As years passing by, Joyo found out more
and more stories associated with the abacus.
(I composed
this story years ago.)
