Harmony of home and nature

Harmony of home and nature

家住夕陽江上邨，一彎流水遶柴门。
種来松樹高於屋，借与春禽養子孫。

Home at evening sun river up village,
one curvy flowing water coils wooden door.
Plant comes pine trees taller than house,
lend with spring animals raise children grandchildren.

jia zhu xi yang jiang shang cun,
yi wan liu shui rao chai men.
zhong lai song shu gao yu wu,
jie yu chun qin yang zi sun.

* * * * *

My dream home is the one located at the upper part of river in the village. Preferably with beautiful sunset view too.


The river flows just nearby and it's convenient to get the fresh river water through the wooden door of the house.

Next, there are a few pine trees taller than the house; providing good foods for animals in the spring to raise and nourish their next generations. What a dream home this is!

(Click on the picture for detail viewing)

* * * * *

PS:

+) Comic: Comic drawn and poem written by the late Mr. 丰子恺 / 豐子愷 (FENG Zi Kai / FENG Zikai).
+) Mr. Feng's comics are simple and neat, not so much color tones yet the concepts are well represented. I hope those who like his comics will also read more of his writings; quite many are sympathetic and caring about the world and beings. People like him, who settles for nothingness and simple life, are scarse these days.
+) Translation: John Lew.

Ants move house

Ants move house

This is children's naughty act? Small stools lined up as road barriers blocking pedestrians? Or some sorts of children games? The boy and the girl use stools acting like daytime soap series? For behaviours of children, many adults who are busy making a living usually don't care, don't notice, don't understand about what children do.

Oh you, busy walking by, please bend down your body and take a good look. Underneath the row of stools is a team of living life force full of discipline and marching spirits. Ants are moving family/house! Up front are leaders with sharp destination in mind; no distractions get in the way. And follow by soldier ants of strong forces, many of whom carry heavy loads of grains.

These two children are setting up corridors from stools in order to protect the ants crossing the middle of the street safely. In the world of tens of thousands of climatic scenarios, there are many 'normal scenes' which get ignored by human beings. And thus many small and minute lives get jeopardized. In the journey of life, the weak life forms need to be protected. And that the sacred hearts of children, and children's behaviours that are full of love and care, need more nurture and encouragement!

Please praise and encourage children games such as this one that helps ants move house!

NOTE:
+) Comic: Comic drawn by the late Mr. 丰子恺 / 豐子愷 (FENG Zi Kai) in his book 《护生画集》; hu sheng hua ji; Protecting-lives-drawing-collections. Original writing in the comic: 蚂蚁搬家, Ma-Yi Ban Jia, "Ants Move Family/House".
+) Writing: Original writing in Chinese edited by 宋慧燕 (SONG Hui Yan), Sin Chew Plus， July 20th, 2011, of Sin Chew Daily, a Malaysian daily newspaper in Chinese language.
+) Translation: By John Lew, trying to keep the original tones and grammar patterns intact.

The eel that arched her abdomen

In ancient China (Song dynasty? (960–1279)), there lived an educated man named 周豫(Zhou Yu). One day, his friend brought him some fresh eels, a delicacy that Zhou Yu liked very much. Having little to do that day, Zhou Yu wanted to try his culinary skills, which he had long left unused, and prepared to make a batch of unseasoned eel stew.


He placed the eels in a pot, and when the stew began to boil, Zhou Yu lifted the lid and saw an extraordinary phenomenon: One of the eels had pushed its abdomen upward in an arch, leaving its head and tail in the soup. With great curiosity, Zhou Yu immediately spooned the eel out of the soup and cut open its abdomen. To his amazement, he saw countless eggs inside. In order to protect its spawn, the mother eel had struggled to prevent hot water from hurting its abdomen by pushing its body into an arch.

The sight left Zhou Yu dumbfounded, and he could not contain his tears. Even an eel knew how to protect its eggs, he thought, yet he, a human being, the highest of all creatures, had not been filial to his mother. Deeply moved, Zhou Yu vowed never to eat eel again. And he loved and respected his mother evermore.

Original writing

“学士周豫，尝烹鳝。见有鞠身向上，以首尾就烹者，讶而剖之，腹中累累有子，鞠躬避汤耳… 物类之甘心忍痛，而护惜鞭子如此。恻然感叹，永断不食。” --《护生录; hu sheng lu; Protecting-lives-records》

"xue shi zhou yu, chang peng shan. jian you ju shen xiang shang, yi shou wei jiu peng zhe, ya er pou zhi, fu zhong lei lei you zi, ju gong bi tang er... wu lei zhi gan xin ren tong, er hu xi bian zi ru ci. ce ran gan tan, yong duan bu shi." --《护生录; hu sheng lu; Protecting-lives-records》

“Scholar Zhou Yu, tried to cook eels. [He] saw an eel bowed up, with head and tail fully cooked in soup. Puzzled, [he] cut open the eel, abdomen strains of eggs, bowing to avoid soup… living kinds willing to suffer, to protect babies at such. Deeply touched and sighed: Never to eat eels. ” --《护生录; hu sheng lu; Protecting-lives-records》

The story tells us:

“Animals do not live without feelings, emotions.
Neither do they live without love.”

Like you and I,
animals have mothers who care about them,
even when they die, babies come first.

Happy Mother's day
to all animals!
All living beings!

Shall we celebrate this Mother's day without taking lives? with vegetarian food?

Note:
1) I was preparing to translate this article from ancient Chinese expressions to English when I stumbled upon this writing. Apparently Sonoflight, a blogger from China, had already done the translation a while ago. Her narration of the story is of my taste and I can’t resist but to ‘borrow’ her work over here. Thank you, Sonoflight. A good job, indeed. The original article is at: http://sl.iciba.com/viewthread-85-347008-1.shtml#2625029

2) Original writing, quote from 《护生录; hu sheng lu; Protecting-lives-records》, was written probably during the time of Song dynasty (960–1279). A slightly more illustrated version (by John Lew, for the sake of more complete sense. Pin Yin pronunciation and English translation by John Lew) is shown above in Chinese language. Anyway, there is more than one version with slight difference in wordings.

3) The first illustration (首尾就烹; shou wei jiu peng; Head-Tail-In-Cooking) is by the late Mr. 丰子恺 (Feng Zi-Kai) in his book 《护生画集》第二集39; hu sheng hua ji; Protecting-lives-drawing-collections, 2nd episode, page 39. Origin of the second illustration (烹鳝; peng shan; Cooking-Eels) is unknown, though the style looks similar to that of the first one.