An Old Japanese Tale: Omusubi Kororin

     Once upon a time an old man went gathering firewood on a mountain.
When he began to eat lunch, he dropped his rice ball. It rolled over and over
and fell into a hole. He looked into the hole, and a sweet song came out from
the bottom of the hole.

�ô Omusubi kororin sukkororin (A rice ball is rolling into the hole.)

�gOh, it�fs strange! I will drop another rice ball,�h said the ojiisan (the old man).

�ô Mohitotsu kororin sukkororin (Another rice ball is rolling into the hole.)

He said, �eHow interesting it is!�h

While the old man was peeping into the hole, he fell into the hole like the rice
balls. He rapidly fell to the bottom of the hole. The place where he reached was
�ea land of rats.�f �gWelcome to our land, Ojiisan. Thank you very much for the
nice rice balls,�h said one of the rats.

�ô Sutton, sutton (A kind of onomatopoeia, which expresses the movement of
pounding steamed rice into cakes.)

We like rice cakes very much.

�ô Sutton, Sutton

We don�ft like cats very much.

The rats in the hole pounded the rice into cakes and served them to the ojiisan.
Then he was given a big wicker basket as a souvenir. When he opened it after
going home, he found the wicker belt filled with �ga lot of gold coins (koban).�h

     Another greedy man, jiisan (This Japanese word suggests some contempt for
an old man), who is living in the house next door, imitated Ojiisan at once. The
greedy jiisan said to himself, �gThis is the hole which bore a lot of money.�h Soon
he dropped a rice ball into the hole and jumped into it. The place where he
reached was �ea land of rats.�f �gWelcome to our land, Ojjisan. Thank you very much
for a rice ball. We will serve rice cakes to you in reward for it.�h However, this
greedy jiisan has been anxious about gold coins (koban) all the time. �gWell, I will
turn the rats out of the hole by pretending to be a cat. Mew! Mew, mew, meow!
Suddenly, all the rats disappeared from the hole. The inside of the hole became
completely dark. The greedy jiisan managed to crawl out of the hole stained
black as coal.

You know, greediness does not produce any good results.