The story teller

It was around 6 pm and I was returning from a photography expedition. The season being mansoon, its very pleasant and green where. I thought of relaxing after an arduous day of trekking, photography and driving. i reached this village called ಕೊಟಯ್ಯನ ಪಾಳ್ಯ. It was village fair that day the village was buzzing with activity. vegetables, fruits, grams, cattle, poutry etc. makeshift hotels sold dosas, idlis, bhajji etc. draw carts carried boiled groundnuts, shaollow fried groundnuts, corn etc.

The sun had just sunk and left some yellow streaks in the sky. A groundnut vendor finished his sale for the day. He threw the left out groundnuts on the slush formed bullock carts' wheel treading over loose soil. As i watched, an old man with a flowing grey beard, aged around 60, dressed in soiled clothes and wearing a woolen blanket sat down near the slush and selected the best of the left out groundnuts, washed it in the nearby water pool formed by the recent rains, went to the big banyan tree which i later came to know as his abode.

The banyan tree being at the heart of the village, the only street lamp in the village was present right opposite to the banyan tree. The street lamp was turned on. The vendor right below the street lamp would toss up the groundnut seeds from the fan shaped wooden apparatus. The flakes would slowly settle down on the apparatus in its next trip upwards. Glittering in the yellow light, wobbling, rotating as they settle. Children would watch it amused.

The old man turned out to be a good story teller and was popular among children. children flocked him for stories. They would sit on his lap, he would tell them stories, some of them from panchatantra and some of which i hadn't heard of. He would hold the blanket as if it were his wings and close it by capturing the children inside, children would scream and be scared away, yet the same children would come back after a few minutes. I looked on curiously. he narrated this small story which held my attention for a short while.

"Six blind men were asked to determine what an elephant looked like by feeling different parts of the elephant's body.The blind man who feels a leg says the elephant is like a pillar; the one who feels the tail says the elephant is like a rope; the one who feels the trunk says the elephant is like a tree branch; the one who feels the ear says the elephant is like a hand fan; the one who feels the belly says the elephant is like a wall; and the one who feels the tusk says the elephant is like a solid pipe. All of them are right. The reason every one of them is telling it differently is because each one of them touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all the features you mentioned."

I thought all of us are blind in one way or other and have touched only one part of elephant and believe thats what is true. That we believe the perceptions generated by our sense organs in coordination with our bloated egos is the truth. As i mulled our the limitations of our reasoning and sensory perceptions, the old man turned to me and said to me an English accent familiar in government circles "You are absolutely right!!"