The Fisherman and the Big Fish

Jan. - Mar. 1996

Fairy Tales

He was very poor, he was living alone, no wife, no sons, no parents and no friends.  He was the poor fisherman who lived in a small hut near the beach.  He was dreaming of being wealthy; one day while he hunted for fish, he caught a very large fish.  He was very happy.  "That's the first time in my life I caught a strange fish like this, but nobody will be able to believe me later."  "Please let me go, don't kill me!"  That is what the fisherman heard when he was carrying the big fish with him, and suddenly he stopped, he was asking:  Who is talking?  He thought that someone was talking to him, or maybe he imagined that he heard somebody talk, but no, the sound repeated many times; it was the fish, the fish was the one that was talking to him.  He didn't believe that, and he started asking the fish, "Who are you?  And what do you want?"  She said: "Please, don't kill me, please leave me to go, and I will do whatever you want, whatever you wish, I can give it to you, but please, leave me to go."  The fisherman was thinking about that; he told the fish, "OK, I will leave you to go, but I want to be wealthy, very wealthy."  The big fish said to him, "OK, you go now, and you will find much money, gold and jewelry in your hut, and if you need anything, just yell on the beach and you will find me under your service.  The fisherman left the fish to go; he ran to his hunt, he found much money, gold and the jewelry, he yelled, "I'm wealthy, I'm wealthy, I'm not poor anymore, but I'm still living in this small hut; I want to live in a big palace."  He went to the beach and yelled at the fish.  The big fish came very quickly.  "Yes, what more do you wish?"  "I want to live in a big palace."  "OK, you go now and you will find a big palace instead of your small hut."  He went there and he found a very big palace.  Nobody had a palace like this in his town.

   After many years, this man became a tempter, he thought that he could do whatever he wanted, and one day while he was walking with some of his friends in the backyard of his palace, the rain came to descend very hard from the sky, and he said: "Oh, dammit, I want this rain to stop, I want to enjoy this day with my friends."  He went to the beach and yelled at the big fish.  He asked her to stop the rain.  She told him, "That's what I can't do for you, because it's between the hands of God."  Then, after that, the man lost everything; he lost the money, the gold, the jewelry, and the palace, and he returned back to his job as a fisherman.

   -Haitham