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Intermediate

Fable: The Turkey and the Bull

If you’re in need of a fable that demonstrates the dangers of kissing ass, you’re in luck.

The Turkey and the Bull makes it pretty clear that (and here I quote) “butt licking” is not the path to success. I started off thinking this was entirely unsuitable for the children’s reading site I found it on, but then again, some of our most beloved fables are all about evil women baking little children in ovens, so… yeah.

Read the original story

火鸡与公牛

一只火鸡对公牛说: “我真想飞到对面那棵大树的顶端可惜现在一点力气也没有。”公牛出主意道: “你为何不吃一点我的粪便呢,里面可是富含营养哟,呵呵。”火鸡觉得有道理,啄食了一点,立即感觉有了力气,便尽力飞到一根树枝上。第二天,火鸡又吃了几口粪便,有了力气,便飞到更高的树枝上。两周后,当火鸡吃下足够多的公牛粪便,终于飞上大树的顶部。火鸡极目远眺,正在洋洋得意,被一名农夫发现了,迅速开枪将它射落在地。

这则寓言的寓意: 别人的屁股是一条捷径,能使你迅速获取较高的位置,但却不能保持长久。

Show English translation »
A turkey said to a bull: “I really want to fly to the top of that tree, it’s a pity I don’t have any strength.” The bull proposed an idea: “Why don’t you eat a little of my feces, it’s rich in nutrients, hehe.” The turkey thought that this made sense, so he ate [lit: pecked at] a little, and immediately felt strong, and trying as hard as he could, he flew onto a tree branch. The second day, the turkey ate several mouthfuls of feces, got strength, and flew to an even higher tree branch. After two weeks, when the turkey had eaten enough bull feces, he finally flew to the top of the tree. He gazed into the distance, and just when he was feeling very pleased with himself, a farmer saw him, and quickly opened fire and shot him down.

The moral of this fable is: licking other people’s butts is a shortcut, and it can get you to a pretty high position very quickly, however [success gained this way] doesn’t last long.

4 replies on “Fable: The Turkey and the Bull”

Interesting story, thanks for posting. Seems like the turkey would’ve gotten shot even if it had reached the top of the tree by other means, so the moral of the story perhaps should be “licking other people’s butt can get you to a high position, but do you really want to eat someone else’s shit?”

I believe what you peotsd made a great deal of sense. However, what about this? what if you were to write a killer title? I mean, I don’t want to tell you how to run your website, but suppose you added something that makes people want more? I mean %BLOG_TITLE% is kinda vanilla. You might look at Yahoo’s front page and see how they write news titles to grab viewers to click. You might add a video or a pic or two to grab readers excited about everything’ve got to say. Just my opinion, it could bring your posts a little livelier.

It is such a nice collection of short stories that not only kids but I am also pleased to read it. I really appreciate the great work.

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