Donkey Knows Best
Once, an unkind neighbor, Faruk, asked to borrow Nasruddin’s poor old grey donkey.
“I’ll have to ask her what she thinks about it.”
The neighbor agreed to this foolishness, saying, “Alright then, go and ask her.”
Nasruddin returned from the stable with a long face.
“I’m terribly sorry,” he told Faruk, but my donkey is psychic, and she says the future does not bode well for your relationship with her.”
“What exactly does your prescient donkey see in her destiny with me?”
“I asked her that very question. She said, ‘Long journeys and short meals, sore bones and scuffed knees.’ Not only that, she said that you are likely to slander me and my family in my absence.”
Faruk reacted angrily and began reviling Nasruddin and his donkey, when the Mullah held up his hand and halted his tirade. “Clearly now, the donkey was correct in her assessment of you, except that you are apparently willing to slander me to my face.”
Excerpted from The Uncommon Sense of the Immortal Mullah Nasruddin: Stories, Jests, and Donkey Tales of the Beloved Persian Folk Hero
Your Daily Nasruddin
Another example of how Nasruddin craftily squirms his way out of lending his donkey. The Mullah is sometimes portrayed as being affluent and generous, but generally he’s said to be poor and somewhat of a skinflint.
In another story, when asked why he put his gum on his nose when eating, the Mullah replied, “Poor people always have to keep their possessions right in front of them.”
