поучительная история

[erasmus-mundus]

Once there was a young woman named Helen who was sad.

In an effort to cheer herself up, she went to visit

her friends who were infatuated with the art of Feng

Shui. Her friends noticed the mournful expression on

Helen's face and asked, "Why are you so sad?"



Helen slowly explained the reasons for her despair.

Although she was already 30 years old, she did not

have a husband or a boyfriend, and she couldn't

understand why. Helen said that she had many good

qualities, among them being that she was pretty,

intelligent, open-minded, and humorous.



Her friends said: "Let Feng Shui help you. If you

don't mind following some rituals, soon you will have

a husband! It's Christmas now, which is magic time,

and all the Feng Shui rituals will be much more

effective!"



Helen did not believe in Feng Shui, but she decided

that there was nothing to lose by trying, so she

agreed. "But what should I do?" she asked.



Her friends advised her to buy men's socks, and to

walk around her apartment house three times--jiggling

the socks in her hand and saying aloud a special

prayer to God, which they taught her, in which Helen

was to ask for a good husband. If Helen followed these

instructions, her friends assured her that Feng Shui

would help her find a suitable man within a few days.



When Helen heard this advice, she laughed out loud.

After all, how could buying socks, walking around her

apartment house, and praying to God give her a

husband? But, when she went home that evening, she

stopped laughing and started thinking. The ritual did

not seem hard, so what had she to lose by trying?



The next day, Helen went to a discount store and

bought a pair of men's socks that were on sale for

approximately $0.30. She waited until night, so no one

could see what she was going to do and think her

crazy, and then walked outside the building with the

socks in her hand. Following the instructions, Helen

walked around her building three times, whispering the

prayer to God about a husband, and waving the socks in

the air as a symbol of future marriage.



The following day Helen went to work and forgot all

about the ritual. In the light of day, it did seem

rather silly after all. When she returned home that

evening, she saw a man coming downstairs who looked at

her and became instantly smitten--so much so that he

asked her out for a date, right then and there. Helen

was shocked; after all, the man was a plumber and a

fitter--a job in Russia viewed as so degrading that

only drunkards or drug addicts without an education

apply for such work. The man was rude and smelled

badly, so Helen refused.



The man, however, would not take no for an answer. He

followed Helen upstairs to her apartment, knocked at

her door, and begged for her to marry him--he told her

that he had seen a woman like her in his dreams, he

thought that she was a princess, and he promised to

love her and be faithful all his life if she would

only consent to marry him. Helen eventually called the

police, and the man went away.



Helen saw her friends the following day and told them

all about this strange incident. "How could you give

me such a stupid ritual to follow?" she cried. "Now

you see the result, and I will be haunted by this

crude fitter all my life."



Her friends thought a minute and then asked what sort

of socks she had bought.



Helen answered, "The cheapest socks that were on sale,

of course."



Her friends said, "You see? You bought the cheapest

quality socks, so you got the worst pretender to

become your husband! What did you expect?"



Helen thought about this a bit and decided to try the

Feng Shui ritual again. The next morning, she went to

an expensive men's fashion boutique and bought a pair

of exclusive silk socks for $30.00. When she got home,

she repeated the ritual by walking around her

apartment house and saying her prayer to God out loud

this time, and not in a whisper as before. To improve

her chances (and to be sure that God did not make any

mistakes this time), she placed a golden ring in the

socks while she waved them around.



A few days later, Helen was walking the downtown

streets of St. Petersburg, where she saw a mobile

phone lying on the pavement. She wondered who could

have lost such an expensive phone, and then saw a

well-dressed man obviously in distress, who was

searching the sidewalks on the opposite side of the

street. Without hesitation, Helen saw her chance,

picked up the phone, and carried it across the street

to the well-dressed gentleman.



By the greatest luck, the gentleman Helen had spotted

had, indeed, lost his phone. He was so overjoyed that

he asked her out to dinner, so that they could become

better acquainted. The man was very rich and so

invited Helen to one of the most expensive and

exclusive dining facilities in St. Petersburg; no

expense at all was spared on the meal. After dinner,

the man seemed to be possessed by Helen--so much so

that he admitted that he was already falling in love

with her. Helen, however, was not satisfied; although

the man was rich, he had no intelligence, no wit, no

tenderness about him; in fact, he reminded her of

someone who worked in the Italian mafia, who would

kill someone without a second thought because that is

what they are told to do. Helen made some excuse and

left the man's company, where she made sure never to

see him again.



A few days later, Helen decided to make the third

"husband attempt." She went to a reputable sports

store and bought JUST GOOD white socks of acceptable

quality and reliability--nothing flashy, but socks

that were designed to last for a long time. Within a

day or two of trying the ritual for the third time,

she ran into a very nice sportsman whose white socks

looked "the twins" of the socks she had bought

earlier. The man was not wealthy, but he had a good

heart as well as all those intangible qualities women

look for in a mate. The two of them got engaged and

were married a few months later.