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Once upon a time, in a small
village, there lived a chef. This chef
was known all throughout the village for making excellent soups, specifically
his beef soup. One day the chef decided that he was going to make the perfect
beef soup.
He realized
that in order to make the perfect beef soup, everything had to be perfect. So first he thought, “Of course I must start
with the meat.” So he went to the neighboring
village known for the perfect beef and bought enough to feed the whole
village. But when he made his soup it
was not perfect.
So he
thought, “Surely it must be the pot. I
must find the finest pot in all the land to make my soup.” So he inquired of all the towns and all the
metal workers and finally found the perfect pot. But even with the perfect beef and the
perfect pot, when he made the soup, it still was not perfect.
And one by
one, he went through all the ingredients and searched everywhere to find the
perfect ingredients, but every time, it still was not perfect.
Then he
realized that there was one ingredient on the list that he forgot: the water. All this time, he had been drawing water from
the well outside. The chef ran out to
the well, drew a bucket, and tasted the water.
It was not perfect.
So he began
to search. But of course, no one had
ever thought to taste all the water in the world. He went out and searched high and low,
tasting all the waters on the earth.
Finally he found it: a small lake in the middle of a high mountain
valley. When he drank the water there,
he knew – it was perfect.
The chef
took all the water he could, filling up barrel after barrel, and brought it
back to his village. That night he
cooked beef soup non-stop until the morning for the whole village. And throughout the day he gave it free to
everyone who wanted it. All the
villagers agreed – it was perfect.
They praised every ingredient,
especially the water. “Where on earth
did you get this amazing water?” they asked.
“This water is the best water I have ever tasted!” they would
exclaim. All day, the chef served the
villagers, explaining to them the perfection of the water, until at last
everyone had their full and the soup was gone.
And so
contented, the chef went back home, tired but happy. He was about to fall asleep when he looked
over and saw that he had one barrel of water left over. So he opened the barrel and used some of the
water in it to wash the pot. Then he
used the rest of it to take a bath. When
he was done, he dumped out the water into his garden.
Then the
chef went to sleep.
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