Little Blog Inspiring Gratitude One Person At A Time. Watch Incredible Things Happen To Change People One Experience At A Time.
Doris Lim Writes Gratitude
The Story of Pig: Hero, Trickster, Legend
When I started blogging, I wanted to blog about PIG.
The entire PIG if I could.
I started with PIG ears, worked the stories to PIG leg but somehow stopped at PIG fat – that was a home run.
Eight years later (was a dark and stormy night of 2012 – nothing happened, don’t worry)
1 Pig ears have it…
A quick tug of my earlobe is sufficient to tell the young woman at the Lor Bak pushcart that I wanted braised pig ears.
I know that this sounds disgusting and repulsive to most people who were never poor nor exposed to this type of food from a young.
Pig’s ears are floppy, fleshy nasty bits in one versatile package of meat, skin, and cartilage.
The cartilage’s texture is like a sheet of al dente lasagna encased between meat and rubbery skin.
For the romantic at heart, sorry, it is not an aphrodisiac food said to affect the libido.
The slow stewing and braising make it extremely palatable when eaten with spicy, sharp, garlicky chili dip.
Who would eat this, you ask?
Well, older folks who have acquired a taste for bland, chewy food for one.
Or if you’re out to thaw the advances of an enamored girl (whatever her age!) – this is definitely on the top list of things to chew on (pun intended)
2 The Story of Pig with a Wooden Leg
Farmer Jones got out of his car and noticed a PIG with a wooden leg while heading for his friend’s door.
His curiosity aroused, he asked, “Fred, how’d that PIG get him a wooden leg?”
“Well, Michael, that’s a mighty special PIG!
A while back, a wild bear attacked me while I was walking in the woods.
That PIG there came a running’, went after that bear, and chased him away. It saved my life!”
“And the bear tore up his leg?”
“No, he was fine after that.
But a bit later, we had that fire.
It started in the shed up against the barn.
Well, that ole PIG started squealing’ like he was stuck, woke us up, and ‘fore we got out here, the darn thing had herded the other animals out of the barn and saved ’em all!”
“So that’s when he hurt his leg, huh, Fred?”
“No, Michael.
He was a might winded, though.
When my tractor hit a rock and rolled down the hill into the pond, I was knocked cleanout.
When I came to, PIG had dove into the pond and dragged me out ‘fore I drowned.
Sure did save my life.”
“And that was when he hurt his leg?”
“Oh no, he was fine.
Cleaned him up, too.”
“OK, Fred. So tell me. How did he get the wooden leg?”
“Well,” the farmer tells him, “A PIG like that, you don’t want to eat all at once!”
3 The Story of Pig – Source Unknown
A very long time ago, when the earth was still new, and the Father walked among the animals, teaching them the wisdom they would later explain to humans.
He gave each animal a gift.
He called them all together in the Garden, and to some, he gave the gift of beauty, the gift of swiftness, to some the gift of strength, and so on.
Each animal had received a gift from the Father.
But the PIG was not there.
PIG was out looking for tasty roots and did not come to the Garden until the Father was giving the last animal its gift.
Pig cried
The PIG cried because the Father had already given out His gifts.
The Father saw PIG crying and asked what was wrong.
PIG said, “I was late, and now you have given away all your gifts.
I will have nothing to teach the humans.”
The Father gently took the PIG into His lap, rubbed his ample belly, kissed his wet snout, and told him not to cry.
He said, “I have saved the best gift for you, PIG.”
PIG said, “But I am not beautiful, or strong, or swift, I will be despised by humans.”
The Father thought for a moment on how to explain to PIG how great his gift was.
Finally, after a while.
He said, “PIG, you have all of those gifts and something more within you, but because they are within you, it will take an extraordinary person who is seeking greater wisdom to find them.”
PIG did not understand, but PIG trusted the Father and went back to digging for roots.
Humans met pig
Humans came to the Garden and found all the beautiful animals with their gifts.
But humans didn’t care for the PIG.
He was not fair or fleet or strong, and the humans shunned PIG.
No one wanted to be around him.
The humans preferred the other animals who preened and showed off their gifts.
Then after a while, one woman came to PIG and sat down where the PIG was eating.
What can this be? Why a PIG, of course!
It was the first time that a human had come to be with PIG.
So he stopped eating and looked at her curiously.
She looked deep into his eyes and saw the gift that the Father had hidden so well.
And she loved PIG for who he was and respected PIG for the beautiful gift the Father had given him to share with humans.
Pig’s Gift
I can’t put into words what the gift was that the Father gave to PIG.
You have to look into the eyes of PIG and find it for yourself.
For each human, it will be different. It will be the gift they need to see to help in their search for wisdom.
Not many humans will discover the gift PIG has to offer.
They will be too dazzled by the gifts the Father gave to the other animals.
But for those that do, they are forever changed and never see the world in quite the same way.
They are the ones that root like PIG through what is on top to find treasures and gifts hidden below the surface.
4 Rhapsody on a Pig
“To begin with, PIGS are very beautiful animals.
Those who think otherwise are those who do not look at anything with their own eyes, but only through other people’s eyeglasses.
The actual lines of a PIG (I mean of an obese PIG) are among the loveliest and most luxuriant; the PIG has the same great curves, swift and yet heavy, which we see in the rushing water or the rolling cloud.”
GK Chesterton liked PIGS. This is from “Rhapsody on a PIG,” published in The Illustrated London News, 8 May 1909.
Source:
A Certain Sleepy Perfection of Contour
The Story of Salt & Other Gratitude Stories
I have been thinking about the story of salt and other stories I have encountered.
There are hundreds of varieties of salt worldwide to satisfy those curious about this vital ingredient.
Salt and gratitude are essential for human life; we can taste the saltiness. Gratitude is heartfelt and changes lives.
Salt is essential, although harmful when consumed in large quantities. It is the only mineral that humans consume as nourishment.
Salt is an ingredient that enhances the flavor of food and even desserts.
If you love salt like me, you will know that salt is used extensively in areas other than food.
From legends and religions to migrations and wars has been used for centuries – Salt is a precious and rare ingredient.
Even more so, is Gratitude.
A grain of salt can change the flavor, so does heartfelt gratitude.
The cure for anything is saltwater – sweat, tears, or the sea. ~ Isak Dinesen
Other Gratitude Stories
When I started writing, I recall that the stories of salt are actually stories of gratitude, and this has become my Gratitude Journal.
The Story of Salt – Carrot Cake with Salt Cream Cheese Frosting
The first time Ben bought something from his home to the office – we were surprised.
IMPRESSED.
Pat nudged me and whispered loudly, “He bakes!!!”
“Of course. Baking is just science,” I said.
UNIMPRESSED.
“But it’s carrot cake.”
“Which tasted like wilted strands of coconut.”
“But you like coconut.”
“I like coconut water.”
“But there’s Cream Cheese Frosting.”
“I prefer shaved Parmesan cheese onto pasta and risotto, meatballs, and Caesar salad.”
“Why don’t you like him?”
“Why do you like him.”
Pat shrugged and went to chat Ben up.
She couldn’t understand why I was so unimpressed.
I didn’t tell her that I also baked.
Baking is just science.
Measure the dry ingredients accurately.
Follow the instructions to the tee.
What could go wrong?
Ben forgot that grain of salt in the cream cheese frosting.
He said he created the recipe himself.
There was no gratitude in any way, shape, or form shown.
But that is just Ben.
The Story of Salt – What could go wrong?
Using salt instead of sugar is one.
One day I helped Geri baked. Of course, it had to be coincidentally a Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting.
It was for her 21st birthday.
I have two BIG weaknesses when it comes to baking.
Hard to count this as TWO – it feels like a few hundred.
- She can’t measure accurately.
- She has a nasty habit of opening the oven to peek at the cake.
So, I was tasked with whipping the cream cheese for the frosting.
I put in salt instead of sugar.
Geri never spoke to me again.
“And every offering of your grain offering you shall season with salt; you shall not allow the salt of your God’s covenant to be lacking from your grain offering. With all your offerings, you shall offer salt.” Leviticus 2:13
The Story of Salt – Curry Noodles with Sugar Broth.
I used to eat at the same noodle shop every day for almost a year.
I love the convenience, and I’m boring when it comes to food.
There’s no hard and fast rule about eating.
At the Noodle Shop, the rules are simple.
Mr. Goh makes the Curry Noodles.
Mrs. Goh makes the Poached Chicken.
The rest of us (read customers) eat, pay, and come back every day.
It was a sure-fire way for a successful Chinese business.
The Chinese are simple, straightforward people.
My biggest Chinese trait?
I like to do business, and I’m not too fond of gossip and small talk.
Neysa told me that the owner of the shop she goes to for meals makes too many comments.
The woman owner commented on her dress.
She commented on her friends.
The owner woman commented when Neysa’s friends paid for her food.
The solution: Just eat at a Chinese-operated eating shop.
You come in.
They nod.
You nod.
They bring the food out.
Hot, consistently good.
You eat.
You pay.
You come back tomorrow.
Repeat.
No other suggestion is needed.
No warmth.
No apathy.
The Story of Salt – Chinese Businesses
I told Neysa that I ate at Mr. and Mrs. Goh’s restaurant/café/Kopitiam/canteen every day for two meals for the year I worked next door.
You got to eat at a Chinese operated business.
No one makes any suggestions or comments.
It’s just like that.
That’s the way it goes.
Until one morning at breakfast.
I looked at Mr. Goh, yawning like a Hippopotamus in his corner.
“Why did you make a syrup soup for the Curry Noodles? What’s wrong with you?”
“No, what’s wrong with YOU, Aunty?”
I pursed my lips.
I collected all the half and empty soya sauce containers from all the tables in his restaurant/café/Kopitiam/canteen.
I plopped that on the counter where Mr. Goh serves his Curry Noodles.
“Twenty bowls and my regulars didn’t say a WORD.”
“Well, Mr. Goh, you run a Chinese-operated restaurant/café/Kopitiam/canteen.
The customers eat quietly, pay, and leave clues for you.”
“I overslept. I must have put sugar instead of Salt in the Curry Broth.”
No suspicious explanations either.
Needless to say no sense of gratitude from Mr. Goh.
Perhaps his customers deliberated not to tell anything rather than face a resolution of conflicting emotions.
The Story of Salt – I didn’t marry for the disparity.
Budi, my friend’s Indonesian maid, is 4′ -10″.
Her lack of height has always impacted her outlook toward gratitude.
One day, she said, “I show a family photo. Sisters”
There was a photo with that unmistakable grin.
She was standing next to two younger women.
Both women reached her shoulder.
Budi looked like a giant.
“You are Giant (Raksasa).”
“Me, no big. They are very small.”
Budi found work in Medan, at the bustling wet market.
She met her husband Mas, a lorry driver there.
They dated and decided to marry.
Both have a balanced outlook when it comes to marriage.
Budi said simply, “he is a man, hard-working, have a job.”
The Story of Salt and Black Tea
Budi journeyed to her husband’s home in West Java’s hills – home of the tea plantations.
The actual reality of the much-loved brew, the Tea that is produced comes at a high cost to the tea farmers – unfair wages, malnutrition, and high maternal mortality.
At home, plantation workers often drink salted black tea, like we would a cup of coffee.
In the 19th century, colonizers would give laborers salted black tea to help replace the essential salts lost through dehydration.
A cup of salted black tea is what many tea plantation families drink for energy.
Something they have been doing for generations to counter symptoms of low
- blood sodium
- weakness
- fatigue or low-energy
- headache
- nausea
- vomiting
- muscle cramps or spasms
- confusion
- irritability
Each generation born on the plantations produces the next batch of laborers; drinking salted tea has become a daily habit.
Family members who don’t work in the fields also drink copious hot cups of salted tea.
The entire family were farmers and eked out a living planting tea leaves.
The smallholders in West Java and West Sumatra have small plots of land—infertile ground located in remote locations.
- Faced with so many limitations, the generation of farmers continues to live in harsh conditions.
- The farmers find it hard to improve their livelihoods, productivity, and limited access to international markets.
- Limited technical knowledge
- Poor farming practices
- No logistics of getting leaf to factories in good time and condition
- Lack of working capital (e.g., fertilizers, new tea bushes)
The Story of Salt and Gratitude – Budi
Budi recounted her wedding.
She was shocked that they had so little.
They had a gruel made from corn with bitter tea berries and fried shaved coconut with salt for the wedding feast.
The star dish was RICE!
The farmers were so poor that they could not afford to buy rice and salt.
They could grow some corn for their daily sustenance.
When they have enough money, they will travel to town to buy rice and salt.
Budi continued planning for her trip home as she cooked lunch.
“I buy rice, many packets. Pay motor (motorcycle rider) driver to send to family.”
“Buy salt, salted fish, oil.”
“I give something good for food.”
She grinned at the happy memory in the midst of challenging times.
I shared in Budi’s enthusiastic holiday feelings.
I reached for the salt container.
She held it up and stared at the white grains of salt.
I put it back and handed Budi the Soya Sauce.
“Use this.”
Black Dog Story – Lessons For My Faint Heart
I’ve had many encounters with Black Dog.
Sometimes I think it’s the same Black Dog, which appears at different times in my life – there are various lessons to learn here.
Black Dog: Being A Teacher
It’s a bit like Go Ha-neul, who faces many struggles as she becomes a temporary teacher for the first time.
I became a teacher to many inspiring stories of hope.
Like Go Ha-neul, after a teacher saved me and schooled me, I decided to become a teacher.
It is years later.
Many, many years later, after I met Him.
Through my struggles, I grew as a teacher and as a person.
Black Dog: Can Dogs See Ghosts?
As children, we were all spooked with tales of ghosts and the supernatural.
While there are people who believe in the paranormal – most people believe in God.
When your dog sometimes seems to be barking into the night and retreating, there could be something he sees – and you don’t.
Do certain times of the year seem to make them nervous?
The truth is dogs can see or sense something people can’t.
My mom used to tell us children about some connection between dogs and ghosts — and dogs’ mystifying behavior.
If a dog dabbed on your eyelids (not eyes), the tear stains would allow you to see into the spirit world during the Chinese 7th month.
It used to freak the children out, and we would all scream when she told us our favorite ghost story.
The ghost story happened in her hometown in Taiping, Perak.
A man did that and stood at a crossroads in the middle of the night.
He stood with his legs apart to form a V.
He dabbed dogs’ tears on his eyelids and bent over to look backward between his legs.
And The children gasped!
He saw ghosts.
Millions of ghosts.
When I think back, it was quite funny to believe that the man could carry Black Dog tears in a container in his pocket!
Black Dog: Barking!
I remember Ah Hin, a construction supervisor.
When I was in my 20s, I was in charge of a project in an affluent area.
It was quiet and near a park.
There was a handsome stray Black Dog without a collar who lived in the area.
He would bark at me as all dogs do.
He didn’t chase or growl.
He just stood his ground and barked very loudly.
I wasn’t frightened but rather amused.
I was silly because I told Ah Hin about it.
It was one of the meaningless one-liner openings that I sometimes say.
“The Black Dog likes to bark at me.”
I smiled and shrugged.
Ah Hin: He chases you?
Me: No.
Ah Hin: He growled?
Me: No.
Ah, Hin: What he do?
Me: Bark loudly. Some people talk loudly too. It doesn’t matter.
Ah Hin: I will take care of him, Miss Doris.
My mistake.
I didn’t know what to take care of him meant.
In subsequent weeks, the neighborhood was quiet.
I would park my car in the same spot.
Territorial Bad Boy – Black Dog was nowhere to be seen.
I remember asking Ah Hin.
Me: Where is my Black Dog? I miss his barking.
Ah Hin: He was gone.
Me: Gone?
Ah Hin: Gone. I gave him a BBQ Pork Bun.
Me: You feed him? Does he like BBQ Pork Buns?
Ah Hin: Yes, I put a box of needles into the buns.
I saw Ah Hin gloating and expecting praise from me.
I remember sitting in the container office.
My eyes welled with tears.
I burst out crying.
Me: Black Dog didn’t do anything. Why did you do that, Ah Hin?
Ah Hin: So he doesn’t bite you, Miss Doris.
Me: Please leave. Please don’t speak to me again. Please leave.
I was filled with anguish and took a long time to forgive myself.
Not everyone who wants to protect me is an angel.
Until today – I can not understand why people would hurt animals this way.
But they still do.
Black Dog: Guard Dog
When I used to visit Dee, I would enter their house from the side gate.
The family opens it in a certain way.
One afternoon, I dropped by. I say Black Dog’s water dish was leaning against the wall.
I thought to myself.
“He’s run away again to the forest where the family found him.”
Black Dog likes to do this.
He disappears once in a while.
Dee: You know, he thinks he is Indiana Jones looking for the Ark of the Covenant.
Me: You just like the actor Harrison Ford.
So I entered the house, a year since I played with Black Dog.
The gate squeaked sharply.
I made my way up the metal ramp.
Overhead I hear the ringing noise of metal windows opening rapidly.
I froze.
I could see Black Dog race with all its limbs in the air towards me.
Not a single bark.
I knew he would attack.
I Dropped my hands.
Black Dog stopped a good six feet away, tail wagging happily.
He remembered my scent.
He kissed my hands and waited to be petted.
In the house, I heard loud running down the stairs.
The door flew open.
Dee and her family gasped.
His brother said, “We thought he would have ripped you like the monitor lizard that crawled in one night.”
I laughed.
I bend down.
Black Dog sneezed.
I patted him more.
I smiled at the family.
Black Dog remembers who loves him when he’s a puppy. That’s all.
Black Dog: Mama Dog and Pups
When it comes to Mama Dog and newborn pups, the best advice is to stay away.
I used to work around Beach Street, George Town.
I would have lunch at Ann’s Economy Rice Stall, which she shared with Ah Seng, who sells drinks.
Every lunchtime, I would run down the back staircase of the Behn Meyer building to lunch, a few steps away.
That day I was in another building.
I decided to take a shortcut through an alley.
On my first and last shortcut.
I can attest that I still walk down allies in different parts of the world.
Dogs display aggression for several reasons, such as
- fear
- overwhelm
- pain
- anticipated pain
- overstimulation
- resource guarding
- territoriality
No matter the reason – bared teeth are a sign of a dog becoming aggressive.
These three adult dogs are past their comfort zone.
Halfway down the alley, I remembered that Black Dog Mama was nowhere to be seen.
She was heavily pregnant a few weeks ago.
Suddenly Papa Dog and two other dogs stood at my sides, growling.
Papa Dog had his face at my abdomen, his two budding growlings loudly at my sides.
There was no way I could leave the dogs alone.
All three stood on their hind legs, and their paws rested heavily on my thighs and abdomen.
My hands at my sides.
My head was reeling.
With a push by all three, I would have fallen backward.
I looked into Papa Dog’s eyes.
I know I’m supposed to avoid eye contact. If possible, carefully step away from the dog.
Papa Dog’s face softened.
His mouth relaxed, and his ears sat flatter against his head. He averted his gaze and stepped away with his companions.
I stood in a daze.
I turned to look at Mama Black Dog and the pups. They curled up suckling, and she was asleep from the exhaustion of birth.
I must have caused them so much stress and anxiety just walking by.
The dogs were possibly grinning because they were stressed. I wasn’t afraid, so they didn’t feel threatened enough to get defensively aggressive.
Inspiration: 5 Heartwarming Stories That Prove Dog Is Man’s Best Friend