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Once upon a time, there was a little, young monk living in a temple on the top of a mountain. Since there was no well in the temple, he had to go down to the foot of the mountain to fetch water for drinking and cooking. Every day he carried the buckets of water from the well without any complaint, though he felt tired. He lived there lonely but happily. |
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One day, another young monk came to the temple. So they lived there together. Every
day both of them went down the mountain and carried a bucket of water from the well with a
carrying pole, one end on the first monk's shoulder and the other end on the second
monk's shoulder. They got on well with each other. |
| After some time, there came the third young monk. He joined them and not the three monks lived in the temple together. Time for carrying water came again, but none of them moved. All of them were waiting for the other two to fetch water, because they thought carrying a bucket of water with a carrying pole just needed two persons. They each thought, "Why should I go? I'd like to stay here and let the other two go." |
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They waited and waited. They began to feel thirsty, but no one moved yet. As time passed, they felt more and more thirsty, almost fainting with thirst. But they each still waited for the others to go.
Added to the WWW on 06/29/99
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