They Accomplish Their Mission Only If They Are Eaten

They gave me all that they had without asking for any return

Animals are such agreeable friends — they ask no questions; they pass no criticisms.

George Eliot

During the Chinese cultural revolution, my parents had to leave their working places in the city for the countryside. In the 1970s, we landed in a small village and have lived there for two years.

The best part of this experience was that we could hold poultry in the yard. My parents raised some chickens at first. Among them, there was a Chinese Luhua hen who laid the most eggs and got our most attention.

Later on, two geese babies joined in. They were sent to us just a few days after they were born. They were such adorable creatures. Every day I fed them. They grew fast. After a couple of weeks, they were almost as tall as me. Their soft and bright yellow feathers turned into white.

These two geese were very attached to me. Every morning, they accompanied me walking to school in the sunshine. They watched me entering the classroom. When I got off the classes and walked on the way home, they quacked with excitement and rushed towards me by spreading their wings.

Compared with other animals, such as dogs, they were not strong, but they knew how to guard our home. Whenever strangers knocked on the door, they became wary. Once someone broke in, they rushed immediately to them and bit them with their hard flat beaks.

They were my good friends, my childhood partner.

However, like poultry, the Chinese Luhua hen and the two geese ultimately failed to escape their fate.

The hen died of chicken disease. The two geese were given to the friends of my parents when we were allowed to go back to the city two years later. Very soon they became the main dish on the table.

It was a time of a food shortage. People were struggling with filling their stomachs. The two fat geese were seen as a luxurious gift. Adults celebrated happily together. They mocked that I refused to eat any poultry and claimed that poultry could accomplish their mission only if they were eaten up.

The adults were right, but they couldn’t relive my sorrow or convince me to eat any poultry. Many years have passed, I still feel sad and shed tears for the two geese, whenever I remember them. They had a such short life, but they did their best to make me happy. I just fed them with little food and water, and they rewarded me with their entire lives.

We often complain that we receive too little from other people, but we rarely ask ourselves how much we have given to others.

There is a Chinese phrase: “舍得(pronunciation: SheDe)“. The first part “舍” means “giving”, and the second part “得”means “receiving”. This phrase tells us if you want to receive/have something, you should be willing to give first. It is called “receiving by giving”.

I believe that there are unforgettable people or things in everyone’s memory. Maybe we belong to the part of others that cannot be forgotten. If everyone is willing to give something good to others, we will all benefit from each other’s contributions.

Thank you for stopping by.

In case you are interested in animal stories.