The Ugly Boatman

The story of the ugly boatman begins with a lonely fisherman most of his days. Troung Chi was the name of the fisherman and every evening he would sit in the back of his boat and row his boat on the river. He played his bamboo flute, and the music he produced was heavenly, attested by anyone who listened.

 

The Ugly Boatman

 

With this beautiful music, one might think that the fisherman would have it easy in life. However, this wasn’t the case. Girls in the village found it challenging to marry the fisherman due to his ugly face, and he lived alone as a result. He longed for marriage but was consistently rejected.

In the same village, there was a young lady who was very pretty and wealthy, however, she too was very lonely.  The father of the young lady was very rich and he would give the whole world to his daughter. But he wouldn’t want to lose her so he banished her from leaving her room. So, the young lady passed the time by sitting in her room all alone.

However, the young lady wasn’t spending her days without doing anything. In the evening, she would sit by the window which was looking over the river and she would wait for the fisherman to pass. The beautiful notes of the fisherman‘s flute made her heart flutter and let her imagination run wild.

The young lady would dream of laying her back in the boat and looking into the eyes of her good-looking and strong fisherman as he played his flute. The young lady feels connected to the fisherman just by listening to his music. Then she swore that she would marry him one day.

Time flew by and everything was the same as usual. Her father still insisted on not letting her go from her prison. She then begged him to call the fisherman to the house so that she would be able to look into his eyes.

However, her father only replied that the fisherman was way beneath their level. He sent his daughter to the other side of their house, having his servant keep her from seeing the fisherman and avoiding distraction.

The young lady cried and cried in her room until she became so ill that her father grew concerned. He had no choice but to give in to her. So he sent for the fisherman and requested for him to sit next to his daughter and serenade her with his music.

If the fisherman’s music healed her, he would be given a bag of gold. Troung Chi lay next to the young lady’s bed and he played his flute. While playing his music he felt a deep connection with the young lady who was in a deep state of sleep.

The sweet notes of his flute reached the soul of the young lady who was asleep and the warmth of the music revived her. This made the young lady open her eyes and she saw the fisherman. The man of her dreams.

However, the fisherman was ugly and not what she had imagined at all. She yelled for her assistants to take him away and she didn’t want to see his face. The fisherman was escorted out of the lady’s room. On his way out of the young lady’s mansion, the man met with the young lady’s father. A bag of gold was given to the fisherman, but he refused it. The fisherman returned to his boat and set off, heartbroken. He lost sight of the river as he threw the flute in.

The fisherman’s prolonged absence had been causing concern for the old lady neighbor. The woman went into his hut and all she could find was a cup. The young lady’s behavior made the old woman sense that she would surely regret it.

The old lady met the Mandarin’s daughter in her mansion and gave her the cup. She gave that cup so that the young lady would remember Troung Chi. The fisherman whose music saved her from her deep sleep.

The young lady clearly remembered the man and she missed him and his music. She held his cup in her hands and she drank out of it. Then she had a dream and the fisherman’s music filled her and she heard his music as if the fisherman was in the same atmosphere as her.

Then the lady knew from that moment that she loved the fisherman. After the dream the music stopped and she looked up and saw a bird that flew out of her window and flew high in the sky. This made the fisherman soul free and he was happy because he had gained the love of the young lady. The young woman recalled only the boatman’s music and his delicate affection, staying unmarried.


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