R.D. Bhardwaj “Noorpuri”
Once, a great scholar said, “Don’t stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing.”
Once, an Indian tourist walked into a curio / antique shop in San Francisco with an intention of buying something which is really rare or is hardly heard of.
He saw many articles and antiques etc. in that shop, but did not feel like buying anything, as they did not impress him and make him spend money on it. He was just about to leave that shop, that suddenly, his noticed something which caught his fancy. Curiously looking around at the exotica, he noticed a very life-like, Life-sized bronze statue of a rat. The piece did not have any price tag, but it was so striking that he decided to buy it. He grabs it, and walks upto the owner of the shop and asks : “How much for this bronze rat ?”
“Twenty five dollars for the rat, one hundred dollars for the story about it,” says the owner.
The tourist gives the shop-keeper twenty five dollars and says, “I will just take the rat and you can keep the story.”
After putting the antique in his bag and he started walking down the street carrying his bronze rat. Suddenly, after walking for some time, he noticed that a few real rats have started crawling out of the alleys and sewerage and begin to follow him down the street.
This is really disconcerting; he began walking faster and faster. But within a couple blocks, the herd of rats behind him grows into hundreds, and they began squealing and making weird noices. He began to trot towards the bay, looking around to see that the rats now numbered in the thousands, and are still squealing and coming toward him faster and faster, as if trying to chase him to get hold of something from him.
He became somewhat scared and concerned as well, and he started running towards the edge of the bay. On reaching there, he throws the bronze rat as far out into the bay as he could. Amazingly, the thousands of rats who were following and chasing him very weirdly, also jumped into the bay. He was really flabbergasted to see and judge the whole scenario, as to what was really happening to him and to the suddenly appeared rats ………. And within a few minutes, to his astonishment, he saw that all the rats who have been chasing him just a little while ago, have all drowned in the bay.
He was not really able to judge as to what and how did the whole incidence happen ………. Then he walked back to the shop owner with his curious mind and all full of questions and a lot of amazement. But on seeing him back in his shop, the Shopowen started laughing loudly and weirdly.
“Ah ha….. ah haa…… ” says the owner, “You have come back for the story, I knew that you will certainly return to me ……… ?”
“No,” said the tourist, with a lot of conviction writ large on his face, “I have come back to see if you have any other statue of an Indian politician in bronze !!
