The New Words -自欺欺人

Once upon a time, there was a poor man who was lonely and lived inside a small hut on a big mountain. Once a month, he came to a nearby village to get all his supplies.  The store manager usually laughed at him and that made him feel embarrassed and ashamed.  One day, the store manager was not there, there was a new clerk that was nicer to him.

The new clerk asked him, “How are you, sir?” He felt so good when others addressed him as “sir”, so when the clerk asked him, “where do you live?” he replied, “a castle”. Then the new clerk looked at him with eyes open wide, which amazed him even more.

When he returned to his little hut, he decided that he was going to call this a “Castle” instead of hut. Then he looked around and saw the dirty dish which had a crack in it. He thought for a moment, and smiled a little and said, “Ah, this little broken plate has a small yellow flower next to it; I will call it a golden flower.” That thought delighted him. He looked again and stared at his shaking bed which only had 3 legs. He said, “This is my hammock”.  Then slowly, he made a list of words he wanted to use for his normal ordinary stuff as below:

Normal Words	New Words
Hut	Castle
Plate	Golden flower
Bed	Hammock

Next month when he visited the village to buy lumber he told store clerk, “I need lumber to fix my hammock”. The confusion on the store clerk’s face made him happy. Then he chatted with the clerk and told him that he lived in a castle all by himself and needed glue to fix his golden flower.  The clerk gave him free lumber and glue because he was afraid that he might be a rich and powerful man disguised in rags. The free lumber and glue encouraged him to make more new words.  

Normal Words	New Words
Hut	Castle
plate	Golden flower
bed	hammock
rice	Dragon meat
Water	Wine
Wild flower tea	Coffee
Rag cloth	Golden robe
Leaking Roof	Diamond stars
bird	Servant
walking	Riding in a carriage
hand	Spork
Bamboo cup	Silver goblet
well	Cellar
stone floor	Ruby floor

He felt awesome now because he considered himself as the happiest man on earth. He said to himself, “I wear a golden robe and sleep in a castle with diamond stars on the roof. I wake up every morning in my hammock while listening to the servants sing different songs. I eat dragon meat with my Spork on a golden flower and drink wine in my silver goblet; I do all that on a ruby floor. When I’m done eating, I ride in a carriage around the castle to get wine from the cellar; I gather wildflowers to make coffee. Once a month, I go to the village to buy enough dragon meat. I also buy anything else that I might need. Can you have a better life than that? I am the king of the world!”

A month passed and he went to the village to shop.  He used to walk slowly with his head down, now he walked straight with his chest up, proud and happy. The people saw him in the village and they asked him what had happened. He told them his stories in his new words.  No one believed him. He went to the grocery market to buy two bags of dragon meat. Then he got kicked out of the store. As the door shut behind him, he realized that he wasn’t the king of the world. He returned with an empty bag, sad and lonely.