for Detlef Seidel
Copyright © 2020 by Werner Kristkeitz Verlag, Heidelberg, Germany. Title of the German original: “Drache und Tiger. Kampfkunstgeschichten für Kinder”, © 2014 by Werner Kristkeitz Verlag, Heidelberg, Germany. All rights reserved.
ISBN 978-3-948378-12-7 (this eBook)
ISBN 978-3-948378-11-0 (English hardcover edition)
ISBN 978-3-932337-61-1 (original German hardcover edition)
www.kristkeitz.de
Companion website to this book:
www.dragonandtiger.info
Social media:
“dragonandtiger.book” @ Facebook
Forewords
Foreword by Yuriko McCarthy
Foreword by Iain Abernethy
Foreword by Natalia Grybos & Martin Minarik
To Our Young Readers …
To the Teachers, Instructors, and Coaches
The Art of Walking a Line | Peter Kuhn
Winning by Giving in | Peter Kuhn
The Story of the Crane and the Snake | Peter Kuhn
The Master of the Way | Eric Mbarga
The Story of Winning without Fighting | Peter Kuhn
Lilly and the Praying Mantis | Florian Hartnack
Why the Empty Hand Points the Way to Peace | Peter Kuhn
“Caramujo” | Carolin Kraft
The Dog Whisperer | Peter Kuhn
The Winner | Peter Jentzen
Ninja Cat and Buddha Rat | Peter Kuhn
How Shōtōkan Came to the Tiger | Martin Joh. Meyer
Dragon Children | Peter Kuhn
Master Cho’s Tiger Academy | Eric Mbarga
Another Story about Winning without Fighting | Peter Kuhn
The Swordmaker’s Sons | Peter Kuhn
The Secret of the Tengu | Peter Kuhn
Like a Stone that Falls into Water | Peter Kuhn
The Secret of the Mountains | Dominique Brizin
The Story of the Thick Hide | Peter Kuhn
Danny | Thomas Leffler
The Story of the Hen that Suddenly Became Brave | Petra Schmidt
Hidden Beauty | Peter Kuhn
The Eye of the Young Tiger | Peter Kuhn
The Story of the Detour | Peter Kuhn
Dog and Cat | Sebastian Liebl
Ben Has the Courage to Be Afraid | Florian Hartnack
The Luck of the Dragon | Peter Kuhn
Sonya’s Doing Karate Now | Peter Kuhn
What the Words Mean
The Contributors
Image Credits
Dragon and Tiger is a book full of fascinating stories about martial arts and life itself. Each story encourages the reader to dive into another person’s life. There is the young Judoka, Tucker, who wins by giving in; Lilly who learns fighting tactics from her Praying Mantis, Trevor who wants to fight for his sister but luckily is saved by an old man … and many more.
The characters in these stories all learn something about life through embracing the martial arts. At the same time, their stories of empowerment help readers learn to resolve problems themselves. How to overcome anxiety, be more sensitive to others and develop a thick “hide” are but a few of the subjects both Noah and Akio help us to better understand.
In today’s era of digitalization, with such a flood of information available, it is a pleasure to sit down with a good book, read stories about human behavior and think about what they mean to us and others. The work before you, “Dragon and Tiger”, is one such book, and it challenges readers to consider what is truly important.
I would like to congratulate and thank the authors and the illustrator of “Dragon and Tiger” for producing such a wonderful book. I am confident that readers will enjoy it and be encouraged by its timeless messages while bringing deeper meaning to both their martial art study and life’s journey itself.
Yuriko McCarthy
Los Angeles, CA, USA
As the coordinator for the International Ryūkyū Karate Research Society, Yuriko McCarthy has, together with her husband Patrick McCarthy, co-authored several best-selling books, including “The Bubishi,” “Ancient Martial Arts of Okinawa” and “Legend of the Fist”. Attaining her degree in English Literature at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tōkyō, she is an interpreter by profession and continues a lifelong passion for Chen Taiji and Yoga.
I love this book! The combination of the vivid storytelling and beautiful illustrations make it enchanting. While the book is aimed at children, I think it will appeal to all who want to take a break from the mundane and wander around the vivid otherworld it presents. Not simply for distraction, but for the experience and education of having explored that world. The martial arts have an abundance of myths and it is important that we understand they are not true in a literal or historical sense. However, they often point the way to deeper truths and ideas that are best communicated as stories in which we can immerse ourselves. This book presents many such stories. The “Ideas for Discussion” section at the end of each tale is also brilliantly done. It asks those who have travelled into a story to reflect on what they have learned from their journey, and it does so in a way that does not prescribe or deny individual experience. It provokes thought and conversation, not prescribed conclusions. All the contributors have done an amazing job! It’s truly a magical book.
Iain Abernethy
Cockermouth, Cumbria, UK
Iain Abernethy has been involved in the martial arts since childhood. He holds the rank of 7th Dan with the British Combat Association, the British Combat Karate Association and the English Karate Federation. Iain regularly writes for the UK’s leading martial arts magazines and he is a member of the “Combat Hall of Fame”. Being one of the leading exponents of applied Karate, Iain has written a number of critically acclaimed books on the practical application of traditional martial arts and is well known for his work on the pragmatic use of the techniques and concepts recorded in the traditional kata.
Dragon and Tiger is a book for martial arts enthusiasts of all ages. Although the stories are primarily written for children, adults will also find them inspiring and thought provoking. The book contains stories of empowerment and spiritual growth that address inner and outer conflicts most everyone will face at some point in their lives. Particularly in times of social transformation, the book invites readers to look beyond their own backyards and find alternative solutions for situations of conflict.
Dragon and Tiger is ideal bedtime reading for children and adults alike, but the value of this book goes far beyond pure entertainment. In many ways it may serve as a starting point for philosophical discussion – inside and outside the Dōjō or Dojang.
It is perfect for martial arts instructors, but also for teachers in general who will find this book especially helpful when teaching children values of mutual respect, inner calmness and peacefulness. Confronting children and young people with these topics is a wonderful addition to traditional martial arts training itself. The questions at the end of each story allow children to gain a deeper understanding and help them creatively find ideas beyond the stories. This is tremendously beneficial for teachers whose primary goal is to build character and teach values through martial arts. Experts of cultural aspects regarding martial arts will also enjoy the extensive and accurate references to traditional philosophical concepts of East Asia, among others, and their terminology.
Natalia Grybos & Martin Minarik
Natalia Grybos, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, is a passionate martial arts practitioner, instructor and social scientist of sports specializing in sports and peace education. She holds the rank of 2nd Dan in Shōtōkan Karate (JKA) and is internationally experienced in martial arts.
Martin Minarik, Paderborn, Germany, is a martial arts practitioner, instructor and scholar. His research focuses on Korean martial arts, cultural theory, theater & performance studies and praxeology. He currently holds a 4th Dan issued by the Kukkiwon / World Taekwondo Headquarters.
Both are co-founders of the international NGO Martial Arts for Peace, which fosters international relations between martial artists and communities and promotes martial arts as a vehicle for social change. With their background in martial arts, both are also part of the “Sport for Development” expert pool of the German Olympic Sport Confederation (DOSB), where they employ martial arts for the enhancement of social cohesion.
We wrote this book especially for you. We are martial arts instructors who enjoy incorporating stories into our training sessions. We got together — and with the help of an illustrator — made this book out of our stories. You can read about who we are at the end of this book under “The Contributors”.
This book is intended for reading aloud and reading by yourself. You will find stories that are exciting and thought-provoking, and sometimes both. They tell tales of girls and boys, young and old, craftsmen and princes, monks and masters, animals and mythical creatures. Dragons and tigers play a special role here. Sometimes it’s about fighting, sometimes it’s about not fighting.
We hope you enjoy our stories. If you see a word you don’t understand, you can look it up under “What the Words Mean” at the back of the book. This section also explains how to pronounce the words. And if you feel like talking to someone about the stories, you will find suggestions at the end of each story.
Dragon and Tiger wish you a lot of fun reading or listening to the stories!e wrote this book especially for you. We are martial arts instructors who enjoy incorporating stories into our training sessions. We got together — and with the help of an illustrator — made this book out of our stories. You can read about who we are at the end of this book under “The Contributors”.
This book is intended for reading aloud and reading by yourself. You will find stories that are exciting and thought-provoking, and sometimes both. They tell tales of girls and boys, young and old, craftsmen and princes, monks and masters, animals and mythical creatures. Dragons and tigers play a special role here. Sometimes it’s about fighting, sometimes it’s about not fighting.
We hope you enjoy our stories. If you see a word you don’t understand, you can look it up under “What the Words Mean” at the back of the book. This section also explains how to pronounce the words. And if you feel like talking to someone about the stories, you will find suggestions at the end of each story.
Dragon and Tiger wish you a lot of fun reading or listening to the stories!
Many teachers like to tell stories during practice — simple, sometimes funny, exciting or philosophical tales that are interesting and thought-provoking for children, teenagers and adults alike. When we tell a story, we create a meditative mood — a kind of mokusō, which is a silent meditation filled and effortlessly carried by the story. Listening to others telling stories is an exercise in silence, and it creates an atmosphere in the dōjō that we cannot reach in any other way.
By writing these stories down, the authors have not only documented what they have told so far. Their reflections associated with writing have also led to a deepening and differentiation of the thoughts processed in the stories. The result is a mixture of traditional and modern stories that will enrich training in many dōjō. But the stories are not only suitable for reading aloud. They are written so that children of primary school age and above can easily read them themselves. Many stories contain wisdom that has been recounted over centuries and has been lost and rediscovered. And there are books in which this wisdom has been captured in stories for adults. Annotations have been given in places where the authors were aware of this and where they were inspired by such works.
We call the book “Dragon and Tiger” because these two figures occur frequently in martial arts — as role models for moves, as eponyms for styles, as symbols on coats of arms and as figures in stories.
A book like this cannot be created single-handedly. That is why I would like to thank all those who have contributed to it. First of all, I would like to thank the authors for their stories and for their openness regarding editorial and content-related feedback. Next, I thank Mrs. Masako Mitsch, Grand Master Cho Bok-Nam, Mrs. Yuán Xīnchí, Mr. Lǐ Wéntāo, Mr. Chéng Wēi and Mr. Líu Tiānbiāo for their advice on Japanese, Korean and Chinese terms. [→ 1] I also want to thank Heero Miketta for his thematic suggestions, as well as Paul Bowman, Dinah Kretschmer and Michael Wutz for their advice on content and language. Special thanks go out to Lisa Henke for her wonderful illustrations. They make this book not only worth reading, but also a feast for the eyes. I thank the calligraphy artist Zhāng Jìdōng from Shěnyáng — he drew the big Chinese characters. My thanks go to Gerhard Illig for the layout of the cover, for his suggestions regarding the interior layout and for his professional support throughout the entire project — and not least for introducing me to Hermien Stellmacher. I thank her for her dedicated advice and for recommending Lisa Henke to me. My thanks go to Yuriko McCarthy and Iain Abernethy as well as to Natalia Grybos and Martin Minarik for their appreciative forewords. My special thanks go to my sensei and friend Detlef Seidel, who, through the way he embodied and conveyed budō, ultimately gave me the idea for this book.
Last but not least I thank the translator of the stories, David Brueske, who deeply dedicated himself to developing a homogeneous text corpus, while keeping the authors’ different writing styles vivid. I would also like to thank Amy Hotchkiss, who translated the prefaces and the word explanations at the end of the book, and Julie Cornillie, who smoothed everything over and put the final touches on the English version.
The martial arts around the world are entwined by many myths and legends. In many cases, this involves attempts to explain what has come into being and to justify what exists — often to reassure doubters and refute critics. The editors and authors of “Dragon and Tiger” are aware of this and don’t want to encourage debatable developments in this book, even if the stories deal with “classical” topics of martial arts: Peace, Threats, Overcoming, Submission, Spirit, Weakness, Fear, Recognition, Trust, Respect, New Beginnings, and so on …
The last three aspects especially portray the central themes of the book. We encounter trust as an expression of the relationship between student and teacher as well as a call to confidence in those who have not (yet) recognized their potential. Respect becomes apparent in the attitude of the young towards the old, the students towards their teachers — but even more as respect “from top to bottom”. This book is also a bow to the “master in the disciple”, who may become even greater than his or her teacher. Young people learn respect when they themselves are respected. Respecting children and young people first — before they show adults their respect — seems to be a rewarding task. The underlying attitude here relates to the beginner’s mind. This not only enables us to put ourselves in the position of beginners, to understand their biases and fears, it also allows and encourages us to keep trying from the beginning, to understand the potential of our own renewed insecurities, to experience the “magic of the beginning”.
In this respect, this book does not seek to remove the “magic” from martial arts and therefore dedicates itself to its secrets. To not fight is one of the secrets of martial arts. And the best fight is the one that doesn’t take place. We encounter this paradoxical truth repeatedly in literature. The character 武 (Chin. wǔ; Jap. bu) connects the character 止 (Chin. zhǐ; Jap. shi), which can be translated as ‘hinder’, ‘interrupt’ and ‘stop’, and the character for an ancient weapon ⼽ — the helbard (Chin. gē; Jap. ka). To stop the weapon and to stop the fight — that is the message of the character 武. Stopping the weapon applies to both — that of the attacker and one’s own — and even to a third person.
What does this mean in concrete terms? I have weapons at my command — my ability to fight — but I don’t start a fight with them. If someone intends to fight, I will try using words and demeanor to prevent a fight from starting. Only when a fight is inevitable do I use all my abilities — not to fight, but to end the fight. In doing so, I don’t give up and at the same time take care to avoid causing harm. For both situations I need “art” — 術 (Chin. shù ; Jap. jutsu ), something I can do, because I have learned it and have practiced it for a long time — possibly a martial art. The better I can fight, the better I can “not fight” — and the more peaceful my charisma is with which I can prevent a fight. To convey martial arts as a rejection of violence, as an art to preserve peace, is important to us, and this is expressed in this book. [→ 2]
Peter Kuhn, summer 2020
Once there was a boy named Haruto. Haruto had made up his mind that he wanted to learn karate. So he went to the clearing in the forest where Master Yamakawa always trained with his students on Fridays and asked to be taught karate. Master Yamakawa agreed and gave Haruto the task of walking the line around the practice area.
This line was marked with thin bamboo sticks that had been pressed into the soft forest soil. Haruto was proud to have immediately been given a special task, said “Hai ” — that means “Yes” —, bowed and walked along the bamboo line around Master Yamakawa and the other students as they trained.
When the training session was finally over, Master Yamakawa gathered his students into a circle — and Haruto was now one of them, too! They knelt down, remained silent for a while with their eyes half closed, then they bowed, stood up and everyone went home.
The following Friday, Haruto could hardly wait for practice. He was certain today would be the day he learned karate.
He went to the clearing in the early twilight to be a part of everything from the very beginning. Some of the other students were already there and were doing strange and interesting moves. “To warm up,” said an older student in reply to Haruto’s question. The atmosphere was cheerful and relaxed.
Then Master Yamakawa arrived. The students became respectfully silent and formed a circle with their Master. They knelt down, closed their eyes halfway, remained silent, opened their eyes, bowed, stood up, and bowed again. Then the lessons started all over again. Master Yamakawa assigned each student a task and when it was Haruto’s turn, the Master told him to walk along the bamboo line around the dōjō again.
Haruto wasn’t expecting this, but he respected the task, said “Hai ”, bowed and did his exercise. The lesson ended without Haruto being given another task. After the closing ritual he went home, a little disappointed.
But next Friday he was excited again about going to practice — after all, he was one of Master Yamakawa’s karate students now, and that was something very special.
He went to the opening in the forest again and did exercises with the other students to warm up before the Master arrived. Then the Master came. “Kan !”, that means circle. “Musubidachi !”, that means stand with heels together. “Seiza !”, that means sit down. “Mokusō !”, that means silence the thoughts. “Mokusō yame !”, that means stop the silence of the thoughts. “Zarei !”, that means bow while sitting. “Kiritsu !”, that means stand up. “Ritsurei !”, that means bow while standing. “Yōi !”, that means beware.
Haruto listened carefully, did everything that the students did and memorized the words. Then Master Yamakawa assigned the tasks again until he finally came to Haruto.
Haruto looked at the Master, full of anticipation and very excited. Without any emotion, the Master told Haruto to walk along the bamboo line around the dōjō. Haruto bowed, bit his tongue so as not to express any objection and hurried along — showing his obedience, but fuming inside.
This continued for weeks and months. When a year had passed, Haruto couldn’t take it any longer.
One Friday evening Master Yamakawa assigned him the same task again. This time Haruto bowed, without saying “Hai ”, and said: “Master, for one year now I’ve been walking along the bamboo line around the dōjō without complaining and I think that I’ve gotten quite good at it. Won’t you let me learn karate now together with the other students?”
Master Yamakawa looked at his young student with compassion and said: “Come, I want to show you something.”
They walked deeper into the forest together where it was already quite dark in the twilight. After a while the path came to a small gorge — maybe ten feet wide and fifteen feet deep. The trunk of a fallen tree connected both sides at the place where the path met the gorge.
Master Yamakawa said: “Now we want to see whether you are truly good at walking a line already.”
Haruto was terrified. The Master continued kindly and with encouragement. “Show me what you can do! Walk to the other side, turn around and come back.”
Haruto’s heart dropped to his feet. The tree trunk didn’t really look that safe. What if it’s slippery or if it starts to roll? And you could hardly see where you were walking, it was that dark — at least that’s how it seemed to Haruto.
While he was still hesitating, an elderly man came along the path. He was already a bit frail, so he had to use a walking stick. When he came to the gorge, he bowed to Master Yamakawa, greeted him politely, put his stick under his arm and walked across the tree trunk, carefree and without wavering. Once he reached the other side, he took his walking stick in his hand again for support and continued hobbling along.
Haruto watched this, his eyes growing wider and wider. All at once, he was humilated and deeply ashamed by the effortlessness with which the old man walked across the tree trunk.
From this day on, Haruto would no longer question any task that Master Yamakawa gave to him. He willingly walked along the bamboo line around the dōjō for several more weeks, eager to get better and better at it. Then one day, in the middle of training, Master Yamakawa called him over to give him a new task. Which task this was, however, has not been passed down …
Ideas for discussion
Tucker stood with his friends in the schoolyard. All the ping-pong tables were taken, and they weren’t allowed to kick the ball around today either. “Because it’s too icy,” Mrs. Meyer had said. The ground was in fact frozen and the janitor had worked hard to clear snow and spread salt this morning.
It was good to drink hot chocolate in weather like this. There was a vending machine in the school where you could get one. Tucker loved hot chocolate. “And it makes you strong!” his dad would always say. He was probably right.
But Tucker was also strong because of jūdō. He had been going to jūdō for the past six years and had just recently taken the test to get his orange-green belt. It made him feel good. And a good feeling like this was exactly what he needed right now because he had changed schools this year.
Nevertheless, it wasn’t that easy for Tucker to make friends with the other fifth-graders. Luckily, he knew a few boys from elementary school. And now he was standing around with some of them in the schoolyard, talking about football and other stuff.
Tucker was explaining what happened during the last game played by his favorite team, waving his arms around for emphasis, when suddenly a kid from the sixth grade ran right into him. Of course, the sixth-graders just had to play tag today, even though they weren’t supposed to — because it was too icy …
“Crap!” shouted Calvin — that was the sixth-grader’s name. Tucker didn’t know him. Then Calvin really got going: “Are you nuts?!” he yelled at Tucker. “My new jacket! It’s totally ruined, man!”
It was true, Tucker spilled his entire cup of cocoa on Calvin. But it wasn’t Tucker’s fault because he couldn’t see Calvin coming — and besides, Calvin had run into Tucker.
“Hey!” Calvin continued to shout. “You idiot! Can’t you watch it?” And then he became furious.
The other kids stood there not really knowing what to do. Everyone had seen that it was Calvin’s fault. He was the one who should be apologizing, not Tucker. Tucker’s coat was also full of hot chocolate and, not only that, his cup was as good as empty now, too.
Then Calvin started to push Tucker. ‘Uh oh,’ thought the other kids, ‘there’s gonna be a fight.’
Even though Tucker was younger than Calvin, they were both pretty much the same size. But Calvin didn’t know that Tucker was a jūdōka.
“I’m gonna kick your butt, man!” yelled Calvin, his face already bright red with rage. He shoved Tucker so hard that everyone thought: ‘Now he’s gonna fall down and then …’
But Tucker didn’t fall down. And he didn’t lose his cool either. Even though he was in the right, he didn’t even defend himself.
“Hey, sorry!” he said now very calmly, raising his hands. “I didn’t see you, excuse me, I’m really sorry!”
The other kids couldn’t believe what they heard. Then Tucker apologized again, even though it wasn’t his fault.
“Moron!” yelled Calvin and tried to shove Tucker to the ground again. “You think you can just say ‘sorry’ and that’ll make everything better?” Then he took a swing and …
Tucker ducked the punch. “Sorry man! I’m sorry!”
Tucker’s friends knew that he could easily take down Calvin and they were just waiting for Tucker to show what he could do.
But Tucker didn’t do anything. He just kept dodging and apologizing. Tucker knew that if he used jūdō against Calvin, things could get dangerous on the icy ground. So it was better for him to just take the insults and keep apologizing.
“It was my fault, for real!” said Tucker. “I’m really sorry!”
By now, Calvin was a bit confused. He knew, of course, that he had caused the accident. And it shouldn’t be any trouble to knock over a fifth-grader like Tucker. But for some reason he couldn’t get to him. Tucker kept apologizing. And he wasn’t the least bit afraid!
“WHAT’S GOING ON OVER THERE?” shouted a deep voice from afar. Mr. Miller was in charge of recess today and had seen that kids were gathering around Tucker and Calvin to see what was going to happen next. He had been watching the conflict from a distance for a while. ‘Amazing,’ he thought, ‘how that little Tucker is behaving — so calm and composed.’
By the time Mr. Miller came over, Calvin’s anger had turned almost completely into astonishment.
“That …, that …, that kid!” he shouted to Mr. Miller. “His hot chocolate, he totally … Well I … And then … Man, my new jacket!” — and he was about to break out in tears.
“Yeah,” said Tucker to Mr. Miller, “it was stupid. I’m sorry about that. We were standing here and I was talking about football and then, all of a sudden, he came running this way behind me from the left and directly into my hand and then the hot chocolate spilled all over the place. I didn’t want it to happen, really I didn’t!”
“But if Calvin came running this way, then you can’t really do anything about it, Tucker,” winked Mr. Miller. He knew both of the boys from math because he was teaching fifth and sixth grade this year.
“He shouldn’t’ve been dinking around like that!” shouted Calvin. “Then it wouldn’t’ve happened at all!”
“And you shouldn’t’ve been running around like that!” said Mr. Miller. “Tucker was just standing here!”
“Yeah,” said Tucker. “But Calvin isn’t completely wrong.”
Calvin shrugged. Not only was his new coat ruined, he was also powerless against a fifth-grader.
“Come on,” said Tucker and reached out his hand to Calvin. “I’m sure you can wash the coat, or have it cleaned. I’ll ask my mom if she can do it.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Miller. “Shake hands. That’s right!”
Reluctantly, Calvin took Tucker’s hand. And when he felt Tucker’s firm handshake, things became very clear to him …
A few days later Mr. Miller spoke to Tucker in the schoolyard. “Hey Tucker,” he said, “I’m putting together a group of students to be mediators. And I’d like to have you on board!” he said, winking at Tucker with a smile on his face.
And Tucker smiled back with a wink, too …
Ideas for discussion
Once there was a wise old mountain monk who was a master of all kinds of arts. His name was Shān Sēng — and he was short and scrawny.
Sometimes Shān Sēng would go into the village for the things he needed to prepare medicine. On his way home, he liked to rest under a tree on a small hill because the view from there was so beautiful. Children from the village would often come to this beautiful place as well to play. And because they knew that the old man was a very good storyteller, they would sit beside him and ask him to tell them a story.
One mild autumn day, Shān Sēng was walking again from the village to the monastery. When he reached his familiar resting place, a thief jumped out from behind the tree brandishing a knife and shouted at the old man to give him his belongings.
Shān Sēng kept his composure and said calmly: “No.”
Then the thief lunged at the old man with the knife — but before he could get to him, the old man cleverly slid to the side and moved behind the attacker. The thief turned around in astonishment and swung the knife at Shān Sēng again. He ducked and the thief lost his balance. Right at this moment, the old man grabbed the thief’s wrist, twisted it and the knife fell to the ground. With an elegant move, the old man picked it up and put it to the fallen man’s throat. The thief pleaded for mercy now, and Shān Sēng granted it to him.
And you can’t even imagine how quickly the thief ran away!
Meanwhile, the old man sat down against the tree to rest.
The children — who had followed Shān Sēng out of the village at a distance to ask him to tell them another story — had been watching the whole thing, breathless and trembling. They would never have thought it possible for the old man to beat the strong, wild thief and scare him off. And now that he was sitting so relaxed against the tree, they ran up to him and asked excitedly how he had done it.
Shān Sēng smiled. “You know what, children,” he said, “many, many years ago, while I was almost still young, I had a dream one night. What do you think, who was in this dream?”
The children gathered closer, eager to hear. “A gōngfu master!” exclaimed one. “A tiger!” cried another.
Shān Sēng smiled again. “Yes, animals were in it, indeed — a crane and a snake.”
The children wrinkled their brows. They were almost disappointed. Well, at least there was a crane. The crane, you should know, has a very special meaning in China. It symbolizes good fortune and stands for wisdom and longevity.
“And,” continued the old man, “the crane was bent on getting the snake. It needed the snake as food for its younglings. The crane had been watching from the air how the snake moved across the field. But as the crane made its dive, the snake felt the flap of the wings in the air and skillfully evaded the attack. The crane lunged at the snake with its beak, but the snake anticipated this again and dodged out of the way. Again and again, the crane thrust its beak for it was very strong, experienced and knew many maneuvers to mislead its prey. At some point, the crane was convinced, it would get the snake; it had already done this so many times before. The crane put the snake under such pressure that it began to hiss and every time the crane pulled back its beak, the snake plunged forward in an attempt to bite one of the crane’s legs. After some time, it became an equal fight. Hmm — what do you think, children: Who won the fight?”
The children pondered. Their hearts were for the crane, because in ancient China the snake symbolized cunningness and deception and was therefore not very popular. On the other hand, the snake in the old man’s dream seemed to be very skillful as well. They couldn’t make up their minds and asked the old man to tell them the rest of the story.
Shān Sēng continued. “After countless lunges, flapping maneuvers and beak thrusts, the crane’s movements became slower. And the snake became more courageous. It lured the crane with a slight forward motion and the crane fell for it. The crane attacked again with all its might, the snake slid out of the way and darted behind the crane — the crane spun around and lost its balance. At that moment the snake bit into the crane’s leg, pulled it and the crane fell to the ground. The snake arched back and …” — Shān Sēng paused to add to the suspense.
The children’s faces were filled with fright. “That evil, evil snake,” said one child.
“Yes, my child,” said the old man kindly, “I also felt like this at first. But no animal is evil. Animals do what their instincts tell them to do. And when they kill, it’s not because they are evil, but because they are hungry or in danger. But listen to how the dream went on. The very moment the snake advanced to give the crane its second bite, the crane put every last bit of its strength into a fierce flap of its wings — and the snake missed. The crane rose, staggering and — then I woke up!”
Some of the children were relieved. Others grumbled because they would have liked to have known how the fight ended.