Hukumusume fairy tale collection > Foreign language (English) > Short stories of Edo

Gleaner

(Short stories of Edo)

Translation　ちいさな翻訳屋さん

Make Origami ( ORIGAMI CLUB) Purse

Japanese　←→　Japanese ＆ English　←→　English

　There was a shabby row house in some place.

　A guy named Mosaku moved into the row house.

　Nobody knew what he did for a living since he left early in the morning and came home at sunset without any business tools with him.

　One day, a guy who was the landlord of the house wondered and asked him about his job.

“My job? I’m a gleaner.”

“A gleaner? What exactly do you do?”

“If you wander around the town every day, you should be able to find something good. That’s how I make a living.”

“…..?”

　The landlord had completely no idea what Mosaku said.

“Ok, I have an idea,”

the landlord thought and he secretly followed Mosaku the next morning.

　Not knowing it, Mosaku was walking straight on the street.

　He past the middle of the town but still just kept going.

　Then he passed the temple grounds and got to the neighboring town, but it didn’t seem like he was going to pick up anything.

　As he kept walking from town to town, the sun started to set.

　Mosaku seemed to have given up and head home.

　When the landlord also returned home feeling exhausted, he noticed that he dropped his money in his pocket.

“That guy brings bad luck,”

as he was talking to himself, Mosaku came home.

　He thought, “I’m so mad at him but maybe I shouldn’t yell at him,”

　but he pretended nothing happened and said

“I guess there were more people in town today and you found better items than usual.”

“Oh, dude. Business was the slowest today. But luckily, I found some money on the street nearby on the way back home. I could say it was worth walking.”

The end

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